This post first appeared at Com­mon Dreams .

The provision, according to the Times, immediately "raised concerns that the Saudis could gain access to technology that would let them produce their own versions of American precision-guided bombs—weapons they have used in strikes on civilians since they began fighting a war in Yemen four years ago."

In a move crit­ics warned could empow­er the Saud­is to man­u­fac­ture their own high-tech weapon­ry for use in their assault on Yemen, the Trump admin­is­tra­tion report­ed­ly wants to allow the Amer­i­can arms giant Raytheon to work with the king­dom to con­struct bomb and mis­sile parts inside Sau­di Arabia.

As The New York Times report­ed Fri­day, Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump’s emer­gency dec­la­ra­tion last month green­light­ing bil­lions of dol­lars in U.S. weapons sales to Sau­di Ara­bia with­out con­gres­sion­al approval con­tained a pro­vi­sion that per­mits Raytheon to ​“team up with the Saud­is to build high-tech bomb parts in Sau­di Arabia.”

The pro­vi­sion, accord­ing to the Times, imme­di­ate­ly ​“raised con­cerns that the Saud­is could gain access to tech­nol­o­gy that would let them pro­duce their own ver­sions of Amer­i­can pre­ci­sion-guid­ed bombs — weapons they have used in strikes on civil­ians since they began fight­ing a war in Yemen four years ago.”

“The move grants Raytheon and the Saud­is sweep­ing per­mis­sion to begin assem­bling the con­trol sys­tems, guid­ance elec­tron­ics and cir­cuit cards that are essen­tial to the com­pa­ny’s Pave­way smart bombs,” the Times report­ed. ​“The Unit­ed States has close­ly guard­ed such tech­nol­o­gy for nation­al secu­ri­ty reasons.”

In a detailed inves­ti­ga­tion pub­lished last month, In These Times found that the Sau­di king­dom has ​“ordered more than 27,000 mis­siles worth at least $1.8 bil­lion from Raytheon alone” since 2009.

“About $650 mil­lion of those Raytheon orders,” In These Times report­ed, ​“came after the Sau­di war in Yemen began.”

William D. Har­tung, direc­tor of the Arms and Secu­ri­ty Project at the Cen­ter for Inter­na­tion­al Pol­i­cy, warned that hand­ing the Saud­is the capac­i­ty to devel­op high-tech bombs on the lev­el of U.S. weapon­ry could have dis­as­trous con­se­quences for the peo­ple of Yemen, who are already suf­fer­ing from the world’s worst human­i­tar­i­an crisis.

“If Sau­di Ara­bia is able to devel­op an indige­nous bomb-mak­ing capa­bil­i­ty as a result of this deal,” Har­tung said, ​“it will under­mine U.S. lever­age to pre­vent them from engag­ing in indis­crim­i­nate strikes of the kind it has car­ried out in Yemen.”

Accord­ing to the Times, the Trump admin­is­tra­tion’s agree­ment with Raytheon ​“is part of a larg­er arms pack­age, pre­vi­ous­ly blocked by Con­gress, that includes 120,000 pre­ci­sion-guid­ed bombs that Raytheon is pre­pared to ship to the coalition.”

“These will add to the tens of thou­sands of bombs that Sau­di Ara­bia and the Unit­ed Arab Emi­rates have already stock­piled,” the Times report­ed, ​“and some in Con­gress fear the sur­plus would let the coun­tries con­tin­ue fight­ing in Yemen long into the future.”

As Com­mon Dreams report­ed in April, Trump vetoed a con­gres­sion­al effort — led by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I‑Vt.) and Rep. Ro Khan­na (D‑Calif.) — to end U.S. com­plic­i­ty in the Sau­di assault on Yemen by halt­ing mil­i­tary assis­tance to the kingdom.

A bipar­ti­san group of law­mak­ers is now plan­ning a series of votes in an attempt to block Trump’s emer­gency dec­la­ra­tion on Sau­di arms sales.

“We will not stand idly by and allow the pres­i­dent or the sec­re­tary of state to fur­ther erode con­gres­sion­al review and over­sight of arm sales,” said Sen. Robert Menen­dez (D‑N.J.), the top Demo­c­rat on the Sen­ate For­eign Rela­tions Committee.