FOREIGN MILITARY SALES
Shape Strategy and Operations
U.S. Airmen assigned to the 60th Aerial Port Squadron load cargo onto a Ukrainian Antonov AN-124 Ruslan heavy transport on the flight line during a Foreign Military Sales (FMS) event at Travis Air Force Base, Calif., Jan. 30, 2026. FMS helps provide U.S. forces with peacetime and contingency access to a host nation and ultimately builds defense relationships that promote specific U.S. security interests. Source: U.S. Air Force photo by Kenneth Abbate This image was cropped to show detail and edited using multiple filters plus dodging and burning techniques.
Foreign military sales (FMS) cases are the most cost-effective way to meet the global challenge of an increasingly unpredictable and shifting political and military environment. Innovative means are needed to maintain and extend effective political and military relations with chosen U.S. in- ternational partners and allies in an increasingly constrained fiscal environment.
The kinetic and operational value of effective political-military relation - ships is that they can enable a more permissive operational environment for commanders responding to in - ternational crises and contingencies. This can in turn create more options, more flexibility, more maneuverabil - ity and, therefore, more solutions and potential courses of action. Further - more, these relationships enable the most cost-effective and cost-efficient means to mitigate threats to person - nel, materiel, and national treasure. However, the geostrategic value of effective political-military relation - ships is exponentially greater than their operational value. Effective re -
lationships can check encroaching or advancing adversaries long before a situation that requires a permissive operational environment can de - velop. In this regard, the value of the political-military relationships devel - oped through FMS cases is greater than the value of the military ma - teriel, services, or know-how trans - ferred. At the strategic level, effective po - litical-military relationships can elim - inate threats by denying access and opportunity to an adversary. This is the fundamental intent and optimum result of all such relationships. Consequently, taking a deliberate, effects-based approach to FMS case
initiation by frontline security coop - eration officers (SCOs), who directly interface with Host and Partner Na - tion military policy decision-makers can yield increasingly valuable stra - tegic outcomes. This can prove true even when fiscal resources become less available. In mathematical terms, in almost every competitive scenario involving a near-peer adversary, the value ratio of strategic and operational advan - tages achieved through FMS cases, relative to the cost and effort in - volved, will be greater than the value ratio of the same strategic and opera - tional advantages achieved through kinetic operations against threats
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