FAQs

 

Frequently Asked Questions – the SAM Database

1. How do I find data for a specific country, program or region?

First, select the type of assistance you would like to see - Military Aid, Economic Aid, Arms Sales or Trainees – using the drop down menu in the “Show data for” menu in the top box on the data page. Then, you can choose to display assistance totals “by country” or “by program.”

If you are looking for a breakdown of one aid program’s assistance to multiple countries, first organize the database by country in the top gray box, and then use the bottom box to select the program of choice.

To display the amount of assistance one country received through all programs, first organize the data by program in the top box, and then use the bottom gray box to focus the data on the country.

In both cases, you can filter the data further in the lower gray box by selecting a region, a date range and “program type,” which allows users to see programs grouped together based on shared sources of funding or areas of interest: Programs funded by the Defense Department, found in the State Department’s Foreign Operations Appropriations, programs authorized by the Foreign Assistance Act or Arms Export Control Act, or programs focused on counternarcotics.

For step-by-step instruction on how to filter the data, please view our screencast.

Selecting different assistance types:

Selecting a specific country or program:

2. How do I narrow my search to specific programs and countries?

In addition to a search bar, which lets users quickly search for a country, program or item in a given data table, there is also an interactive filter that can be accessed on the top left corner of the trends chart. This is a more sophisticated filtering option than the gray boxes discussed in the previous question. Using this feature, you can filter the data in more advanced ways by choosing which specific countries and programs you wish to display. We recommend only focusing on the “country,” “program” and “year (year)” filtering options.

Click the “Filters” tab to the top left of the graph. Select the checkbox for “country” and “program” from the menu and click “Show.” A list of all countries and programs will appear. Selecting countries or programs will display data only for these countries or programs. You can also “exclude” specific countries and/or programs from the dataset by selecting “exclude selected” from the dropdown at the bottom of the menu. Click “reset all” to return to previous settings.

When you use this option, the graph will still only display one line – the total for your selection. For example, if you want to show International Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement program totals for Colombia and Mexico, the line will display the trend of INCLE aid to Mexico and Colombia combined for each year. The table below the graph will break down the data by country or program (depending on how the dataset “view” is set. See the above answer for more info on setting the dataset “view.”).

For step-by-step instruction on how to use the interactive filters, please view our screencast.

Using the data tables’ search function:

 

Using the interactive filters:

 

 

3. Can I get more detailed data than the totals?

Yes, from any of the main tables, you can click on a cell to see a breakdown of the total. If the table is set to view by country, clicking on the cell will display the assistance totals by program for that country and year. If the table is set to view by program, clicking on the cell will display the assistance totals by country for that program and year.

Default military and police aid data table:

A new data table that shows a breakdown of military and police aid to Jordan in 2009:

You can often continue clicking through military and police aid, arms sales, and trainee data to access additional details, such as the quantity, type and cost of items sold to another country in a given year. Trainee details often include the title of the U.S. training course, the location of the training, the foreign military or police unit trained, and the U.S. unit that conducted the training.

While the vast majority of arms sales and training programs have these itemized breakdowns, U.S. government reports do not always provide details for military and police aid programs. If you click on an amount and no further details are available, you will reach a table that reads “No data available in table.”

For step-by-step instruction on how to access an itemized breakdown of the data, please view our screencast.

The initial breakdown of military and police aid to Jordan in 2009:

A table with additional details about Coalition Support Funds assistance to Jordan in 2009:

4. How do I download and cite data from the Security Assistance Monitor database?

To download a trends chart, click on the downward arrow in the bottom-right corner of the chart, and select your desired format -  PNG, JPEG, PDF or SVG. To download a data table, click on the Excel or PDF icons in the top-right of the table.

While we encourage all of our users to download these charts and tables, we ask that you please cite Security Assistance Monitor and include the date of download if you use our information in a publication.

5. How do I find the source for the data?

Each data value is sourced to a U.S. government report, a link to which can be found in any details table (see question 2 about how to drill through the data tables). To access the U.S. government report online, select the URL that appears in the source field. Without releasing the mouse, select Command C (on a Mac) or Ctrl C (on a PC) on your keyboard to copy the URL. Then paste the URL into a new browser window