From 2008 to 2009, the U.S. authorized increasing sales of military shipments to the now-toppled Egyptian government of Hosni Mubarak and the embattled kingdom of Bahrain. But the U.S. reduced its defense sales approvals in 2009 to Moammar Gadhafi's Libyan government, which is now under a blanket weapons ban imposed last month by the Obama administration.

The $40 billion figure during the first year of the Obama administration reflects a rise in total approved arms sales over the final year of the Bush administration in 2008, when the State Department licensed $34.2 billion.

The latest figures describe sales of military hardware from missile systems to bullets that the State Department authorizes from private U.S. defense companies to other countries. The figures do not include direct U.S. military aid to other nations, providing a limited snapshot of the ebb and flow of American arms abroad. The figures also detail only proposed sales -- not actual shipments.

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