The Pentagon wants to speed up US arms sales to foreign allies to better compete with China and replenish the arsenals of friendly countries that have provided military equipment to Ukraine, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, Reuters reported.

Last month, the Pentagon created a task force to examine the continued ineffectiveness of billions of dollars in U.S. arms sales to foreign countries, according to the newspaper.

Tiger Team will look for ways for the Defense Department to streamline parts of the program, the WSJ reported, citing a senior defense official.

According to the WSJ, the goal of the working group is to make the much-desired drones, weapons, helicopters, and tanks more quickly available to partners and allies.

Rising tensions with China and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have prompted an urgent review of how the US sells weapons.

The Pentagon manages much of the foreign arms sales program, but is overseen by the State Department, which uses $45 billion in annual arms sales as a foreign policy tool to bolster American influence. Congress gives final approval to all foreign sales of military equipment.

U.S. officials can provide guidance, for example, to countries requesting drones to better draft those letters, removing roadblocks that arise because the original request was too broad or raised other security concerns, a Defense Department official said.

“It’s about the mechanical steps of the process,” said a senior defense official. “How can we better eliminate the inefficiencies of a system that will apply to all countries?

While Russia has long been a major competitor in global arms sales, its military is now increasingly strained by Moscow’s war in Ukraine and sanctions. U.S. officials hope that Russia’s shortcomings on the battlefield in Ukraine, along with domestic pressure to replenish its own arsenal, will sway countries that have so far continued to look to Russia for arms to explore other markets.

China exported about $17 billion worth of conventional arms between 2010 and 2020, with more than 77 percent going to countries in Asia and nearly 20 percent to Africa, according to a report by the Washington-based think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Between 2010 and 2020, China was the world’s fifth largest arms exporter after the United States, Russia, France and Germany.