Defence expenditure around the world is rising rapidly. China’s military budget is growing especially quickly, while countries in the Middle East tend to spend a higher proportion of their GDP on the armed forces.
Although the end of the Cold War did bring about a significant scaling back of military expenditures throughout the 1990s, old habits have died hard and the world is again witnessing a clear and persistent rise in spending on defence – including national armed forces and military hardware and software. Worldwide, in 2011, some $1,630 billion – which works out at $4.5 billion a day – was spent on defence, with the clear leaders in the race being the USA and China.
While America tries to cut back, China is increasing its spending at about 12 percent a year, much faster than any other large nation. But it is in the Middle East where defence has taken on a distorted dominance over other budgetary concerns – most significantly in Saudi Arabia and Israel – and where expenditure regularly represents more than 4 percent of total national GDP; this year, Israel plans to increase its military budget by 6 percent to about $14 billion.
