According to the latest data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) on global military spending in 2025, there is, as expected, a sharp increase in overall military spending in recent years.. This increase is mainly driven by Europe, on the one hand, and by East and South-East Asia, on the other hand. Other regions of the world are seeing their military spending stagnate.
- Among the top 40 countries in the world in terms of military budget, it is unsurprisingly Ukraine which recorded the largest increase in its spending between 2016 and 2025.Â
- Behind, apart from Israel, only European countries have more than doubled their military spending over this period.
- Among European countries, France and Greece have recorded the lowest increase in military spending over the past 10 years.
- But the United States also experienced the second lowest increase in its military budget among these 40 countries, after Brazil.
- Iran is the only country where this spending has fallen over the past ten years.
In 2025, the United States still dominates this ranking by a long way, followed by China which clearly dominates Russia.
- Germany has now risen to fourth place in the world, with a defense budget almost twice that of France.
- While India overtakes its former colonizer, Ukraine rises to seventh place in the world and Saudi Arabia to eighth, ahead of France which is now closely followed by Japan.
The war against Iran, however, highlighted an important aspect: the comparison of military expenditure alone does not reflect the real power of the different armies.
- Iran’s military spending is in fact 14 times lower than that of its two adversaries combined. However, the United States and Israel did not succeed in defeating Tehran or overthrowing an already very weakened regime.
- Military salaries and equipment costs vary widely from country to country.
- The United States, in particular, buys very expensive equipment for its powerful military-industrial complex, without it necessarily being adapted to current combat conditions, as we saw during the war against Iran.
If we aggregate the military spending of European countries, at the level of the European Union or more broadly, also including the United Kingdom, Norway, Ukraine and Switzerland, the ranking is notably different.
- The United States still dominates, but the Europeans are close behind them and, together, they are well ahead of China and Russia.
- Even without the United States, Europe therefore has the means to counter Vladimir Putin’s attacks.
- But this requires that European militaries be closely coordinated, their equipment interoperable and gaps in their combined capabilities filled. However, this is not yet the case.
