All continents combined, military spending last year hit a new high of $2.24 billion (2,000 billion francs), or 2.2% of global GDP, according to a report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (CIPR) published on Monday. This is the eighth consecutive year that military investment has increased globally.
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“They are being pulled by the war in Ukraine, which is pushing up European budgets, but also by the unresolved and growing tensions in East Asia” between China on the one hand, and the US and their Asian allies on the other, said analyst Nan Tian, one of the study’s co-authors.
The cost of Kiev increases sevenfold
The European continent spent 13% more on its forces after adjusting for inflation in a year marked by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the report said. That’s the strongest growth recorded in more than 30 years, and in constant dollars — a return to spending levels the year the Berlin Wall fell in 1989. “This is unheard of since the end of the Cold War,” Nan Tian said.
Ukraine alone has increased its spending by a factor of seven, rising to $44 billion (39.2 billion francs), or a third of its GDP. That’s not counting billions in arms donations from abroad, Sibri notes.
According to his estimates, Russian spending increased by 9.2%. “But even if you remove the two warring countries, the cost in Europe has increased significantly,” Nan Tian said.
This European expenditure, which will reach 480 billion dollars (428.10 billion francs) in 2022, has already increased by more than a third in ten years and this trend should continue to accelerate in the next decade. The Sibri researcher estimates that we could “potentially” see growth levels similar to 2022 for several years.
Washington and Beijing are investing heavily
After falling significantly in the 1990s, global military spending has been increasing since the 2000s. First, driven by China’s large investments in its military, then renewed tensions with Russia after its annexation of Crimea in 2014.
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The US alone accounted for 39% of global spending last year. In China, number 2 (13%), they account for more than half of the world’s military investments. Next, Russia (3.9%), India (3.6%) and Saudi Arabia (3.3%) are far behind. “China is investing heavily in its naval forces, expanding its reach overtly towards Taiwan and beyond into the South China Sea,” Nan Tian underlines. Opposite, Japan, but also Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam and even further afield Australia are trying to keep up.
The United Kingdom ranks sixth (3.1% of the world total) as the top European, ahead of Germany (2.5%) and France (2.4%), data that includes donations to Ukraine. The United Kingdom, the second largest donor behind the United States, “has traditionally spent more than Germany and France, and given more than Germany and France,” Nan Tian said, underscoring its status as the number one European country in terms of military spending. .
In Europe, countries like Poland, the Netherlands and Sweden have increased their military investments significantly over the past decade. Modern but very expensive weapons, such as the US F-35 fighter jet, explain some of the jump in costs, as does Finland, which bought 64 planes last year.
Last month, another Sibri report showed that Arms imports into Europe almost double (+93%) by 2022Driven by massive deliveries to Ukraine, which has become the world’s third largest destination.
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