A lot of good answers and I do see some explanation for this. Better product, better price.
No, that is wrong. Better price yes, but "better" product ... not exactly. US weapons are better than Russian... IF you have the money and education to maintain them.
But I still wonder why this should be so. We spend a fortune on our military. Something like 700 billion and that's probably not everything since they have lots of hidden classified stuff in the background.
And here comes the issue. A Russian tank, gun or helicopter is technically far behind most similar US weapons, but what the Russians understood long ago based on their experience in WW2, is that when fighting a war you need firepower not technology and certainly not technology that needs maintenance constantly.
Listen the Germans in WW2 had the best tanks on the planet. They had the most armor, best guns and so on, but they were also heavy and required quite a bit of technical knowledge to run and maintain and on top of that they required quite a lot of materials to make.. quality materials. Put such a tank in the muddy or dusty plains of Eastern Europe, and you have a problem.
On the flip side, you had the Russian tanks, which were inferior in pretty much every single aspect to the German tanks. But they did not require much maintenance and were easy to fix. They were also not as heavy, required less fuel, and could work in all sorts of weather. And on top of that they were easy to manufacture so they Russians out produced the Germans quickly. So what if Russian tank crews died far more often than Germans... plenty more where that came from... unlike the Germans.
And this is the attitude you need to have in a place like Afghanistan. You need machines that can easily be fixed by practically anyone with a little knowledge and machines that dont need 30 people to keep it going in a dust storm. This is the problem with the US military machine.. it is expensive because it is high tech and requires a lot of maintenance... something the Afghans cant afford or frankly due (lack of qualified people). A good example is the Apache helicopter. Fearsome piece of machinery, but when it went to Saudi Arabia in the first gulf war, they basically were grounded for weeks because the dust got into the filters and broke them. Once they got the right filters then they were fine for a while, but still required regular maintenance because of the dust. You see the Apache was designed for non-dust areas of Europe... not the dusty Middle East. Russian helicopters dont have that problem, because they were designed to fight in whatever area of the world that the Russians needed.
Someone objected to bloating defense contractors. Sure, who loves them? They have enriched themselves beyond measure. But aren't we just bloating a Russian defense manufacturer?
Not really. Russian "tech" is not bloated per say... the American is though.
Instead of giving away deals and freebies only to the very rich and very poor, wouldn't this have created jobs and kept those dollars circulating in America? Why do they buy $3000 toilet seats and then suddenly decide the Russians offer a better price? So what if our helicopters suck? They'll probably be used to fight us 10 years from now anyway. At least we would control the parts supply.
That is a good point. Look at Iran, they bought American weapons... had a revolution and had problems getting spare parts cause they hated America now. However chances are those "jobs" you think you are creating are not actually there but around the world.
When I was in Thailand in 1967, I wrote to Lyndon Johnson complaining (very politely) about the same problem. Staff cars made in Germany. Generators made in Czechoslovakia (sp?). Hammers from China? Assistant Managers (for the contractor I worked for) from the Philippines. They had a justification for every point I addressed. The cutes one was if we hired Filipinos, they would go back to the Philippines and buy lots of American products there. Huh? As thanks for my interest, the State Department called my employer (Philco-Ford) and asked them to fire me. I threatened to sue (I had a one year contract) and they backed off. But the point is that they really like to buy foreign and they don't want to hear no stinkin' complaining. Hasn't changed much in 47 years.
A very good question. You are forgetting the cold war. One of the main ways the US fought the cold war was via trade. By building up the allies economically, they kept those allies "in the bag" so to say. They pushed trade into countries, that also benefited US companies. Coca Cola is only big today because of it. Had Coca Cola not had a military contract to supply their stuff to US troops, then Coca Cola would have been nothing. They basically got cheap factories world wide on the US tax payers dime.
So, while I now understad the rationale, I don't agree with the procedure. Someone brought up the Glock as an example of so what. Good point. We can't make an American gun effective enough to supply ourselves. That's ridiculous! The only country where everybody can buy a gun - a huge market - a huge military - and we can't come up with a decent gun? What's wrong with us?
Look at the M16. Why did the AK-47 become the gun of the world? Because the M16 (early on) was unreliable and expensive. The AK-47 was made to last, easy to clean and repair ... and cheap.
American's tend to think that expensive = great product... and that is often far from the truth.