The top Pentagon official in charge of overseas arms sales announced on Wednesday she was leaving a day after warning that U.S. limits on sharing technology had allowed strategic rivals to corner the market in selling military hardware to the Middle East.
Although Heidi Grant did not mention China by name in her remarks to the Association on Tuesday, she did not need to.
Earlier this week, the Pentagon's first chief software officer said he resigned in protest because he could not bear to watch China overtake the U.S.
The departures come with tensions high between Washington and Beijing, with both sides jockeying over the status of Taiwan.
Grant's departure was announced with a notice on the Defense Security Cooperation Agency website, saying she 'had been considering this transition for some time.'
But a day earlier she warned that the U.S. needed to consider whether blocking arms sales to allies would leave the market to 'strategic competitors.'
'We have to look at this and say, if we're not there, our strategic competition is going to fill the void,” she said, according to Defense One. 'And is that riskier than transferring our high-end technologies?'
Heidi Grant said she was stepping down as director of the Defense Security Cooperation Agency a day after warning that U.S. arms sales policy had let China gain influence in the Middle East. It comes after Nicolas Chaillan said he resigned as the Pentagon’s first chief software officer because he could not stand watching China overtake the U.S.
Before President Trump eased restrictions, the sale of large drones was generally limited to close NATO allies under the terms of the international Missile Technology Control Regime.
