Global military spending has reached another record high. For the ninth year in a row, the figures exceed last year’s expenditure, according to a new report from the Stockholm peace research institute SIPRI, which was published on Monday.
According to this study, spending in 2023, adjusted for inflation, increased by 6.8 percent to $2.44 trillion (about €2.28 trillion) – the largest annual increase since 2009.
In 2022, this was still 2.24 trillion dollars (approximately 2.04 trillion euros). The ten largest donors have all significantly increased their spending. The US remains undefeated at the top. At 916 billion dollars (almost 859 billion euros), they alone accounted for more than a third (37 percent) of global military expenditure – about three times as much as second-place China with an estimated 296 billion dollars. Together, these two countries would account for approximately half of global expenditure in 2023.
Russia is in third place, followed by India and Saudi Arabia, as in 2022. Germany was again in seventh place among the highest spending countries – just behind Great Britain. Global military expenditure was equivalent to 2.3 percent of global gross domestic product.
The world feels less safe
One of the main reasons for the repeated increase is the war between Russia and Ukraine. “All the regions we map have increased. “This gives us perspective for a world that feels less safe and may resort to strict security measures instead of diplomatic means,” SIPRI researcher Lorenzo Scarazzato told the German Press Agency. A country experiences tensions and instability and therefore prefers hard security over diplomatic means, and can therefore invest more in military expenditure.
Source: Krone
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