US Foreign Aide and Other Bribes

In enacting the recent Covid Relief Stimulus Plan and the discretionary budget for 2021 with a total of more than $2 Trillion, the whole issue of foreign aide has come to light.  The United States gives out more than $100 Billion each year in foreign aide, which can include military assistance, humanitarian assistance, social engineering and other bribes.  Added to that is monies that go to fund the United Nations and other world wide organizations; probably another $50 Billion or more.  These are just the monies we know about.  No doubt, the CIA is involved in clandestine operations involving all sorts of bribes to foreign leaders, general etc. to buy influence.  

Of course, since we have a $4.8 Trillion annual budget with about a trillion dollars of it being borrowed in normal years and much more related to Covid relief in 2020, these amounts going to foreign aide and bribes are chump change in the DC Swamp.  The problem is that some of these monies end up in Swiss Bank Accounts.  To the degree that the US government is providing American made goods; military hardware, food and medicines at least there might be some job creation in the US.  However,  we should never give corrupt foreign leaders cash because those monies often end up in Swiss bank accounts.  We have given the Palestinians billions of dollars in the last 20 or more years in an attempt to buy peace; yet Palestine remains a hell hole.  A lot of those monies went to support Terrorism and or into Swiss Bank accounts.  Yasser Arafat's wife, the long time deceased leader of the Palestinians lives in Paris at last count.  Arafat's fortune is reported to be several hundred million dollars to several billion dollars.  No one really knows for sure since the money was hidden in numerous bank accounts and investments. Until Trump who stopped giving money to the Palestinian Authority, how stupid were American leaders of both parties.  

And, if we are giving away tangible items like food and medicine, those items should all be distributed through trusted religious Non Governmental Organizations (NGO) and not the United Nations,  or the countries in question many of which are corrupt.  We certainly should not give any items other than military hardware to the leaders in foreign countries because very often tangible items end up on the Black Market and are sold to their people in desperate need. 

Since we have to borrow the money we provide foreign assistance and bribes, it might be time to rethink our strategy.  If the money gets us same old same old, then we should stop giving it.  We certainly should not give aide of any kind to countries that hate our nation. If there is a return on investment for the people of the United States, then perhaps foreign aide and bribes make sense.  In the end, we need all of our foreign aide policies based on America First not America Last.