From the Liveblog of
Monday, April 28, 2025
Conflicts spur ‘unprecedented’ rise in global military spending; Israel sees steepest increase since 1967
Worldwide military expenditure saw its steepest rise in 2024 since the end of the Cold War, reaching $2.7 trillion as wars and rising tensions drove up spending, researchers say.
Military spending rose worldwide with particularly large increases in Europe and the Middle East, according to a new report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
Several European countries had seen “unprecedented” rises in their military spending, the report notes.
In real terms, spending rose by 9.4 percent globally compared to 2023, with 2024 marking the 10th year of consecutive spending increases.
More than 100 countries, including all of the 15 largest spenders, increased their military budgets last year, says the report.
The main contributor to the rise in expenditure was the European region including Russia, where spending rose by 17 percent to $693 billion.
Russia’s military expenditure reached $149 billion in 2024: a 38-percent increase on the previous year and a doubling since 2015.
Ukraine’s military spending grew by 2.9 percent to reach $64.7 billion.
Germany’s spending increased by 28 percent, reaching $88.5 billion, overtaking India as the fourth largest in the world.
The world’s largest spender, the United States, increased expenditure by 5.7 percent, reaching $997 billion. That alone accounts for 37 percent of worldwide spending and 66 percent of the military spending among NATO countries.
Military budgets also drastically grew in the Middle East to an estimated $243 billion, an increase of 15 percent from 2023.
As Israel continued its offensive in Gaza, its military expenditure surged by 65 percent to $46.5 billion in 2024. SIPRI noted that this represented “the steepest annual increase since the Six-Day War in 1967.”
In contrast, Iran’s fell by 10 percent to $7.9 billion in 2024, “despite its involvement in regional conflicts and its support for regional proxies,” the report adds.
“The impact of sanctions on Iran severely limited its capacity to increase spending,” says SIPRI.
The world’s second-largest spender, China, increased its military budget by 7.0 percent to an estimated $314 billion, “marking three decades of consecutive growth.”
China — which has been investing in modernizing its military and expansion of cyberwarfare capabilities and nuclear arsenal — accounted for half of all military spending in Asia and Oceania.
The Times of Israel Community.