News Review Special Edition

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International Developments, May 1 - July 10, 2003

SIPRI Charts Steeply Rising Military Spending In Post-9/11 Era

In Stockholm on July 17, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) released details of its 2003 Yearbook, a compendious survey of trends and developments on military spending and strategy. Subtitled 'Armaments, Disarmament and International Security', the report (available to the public from August 2003) chronicles the continuing rise in global military expenditure - a process underway for the last five years, but now given massive further impetus by the September 11 terrorist attacks on the United States.

Chapter 10 of the Yearbook - 'Military Expenditure', by Elisabeth Sköns, Wuyi Omitoogun, Sam Perlo-Freeman and Petter Stålenheim - opens with a crisp overview of the latest, hair-raising facts and figures accompanying this resurgent militarism: "World military expenditure, which has been increasing since 1998, accelerated sharply in 2002 - increasing by 6% in real terms to $794 billion in current process. It accounted for 2.5% of world GNP [Gross national Product] and was $128 per capita. The current level of world military expenditure is 14% higher in real terms than it was at the post-Cold War low of 1998, but is still 16% below its 1988 level, when world military expenditure was close to its Cold War peak."

Turning to the principal motive force behind this accelerating return to Cold War levels of spending, the authors observe: "The increase in 2002 is dominated by a 10% real increase by the USA, accounting for almost three-quarters of the global increase, in response to the events of 11 September 2001. Further substantial increases are planned up to 2009. Furthermore, the budgets for fiscal years...2003 and 2004 do not include the cost of the war in Iraq. ... The USA now accounts for 43% of world military expenditure... The top five spenders - the USA, Japan, the UK, France and China - account for 62% of total world military expenditure..."

In terms of the regional spending league, in 2001 (the last year for which comprehensive comparative data is available) the Middle East 'led' the way, devoting 6.3% of its GDP (Gross Domestic Product) to military expenditure. North America (3%) and Central and Eastern Europe (2.7%) also ranked above the global average of 2.3%; falling below this line were Africa (2.1%), Western Europe (1.9%), Asia (1.6%), and Latin America (1.3%). In 2002, for reasons outlined in the Chapter, both Russia and China opted to join the US in significantly boosting their defence budgets: "Russia's 12% real terms increase in military spending relates mainly to efforts at military reform and the maintenance of technological capability in Russian industry. China increased spending by 18% in real terms in 2002, also in pursuit of military reform and modernization."

In an incisive introduction to the Yearbook, SIPRI's Director, Alyson J.K. Bailes, questions the basic rationale underpinning this embrace of military power and prowess in an age of international terrorism and chronic human insecurity: "The new security debate triggered by the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 remains short of a solution. ... Carefully considered, the new sense of insecurity does not reflect a net increase in threats and conflicts... It arises rather from the correct perception that that terrorists, weapons of mass destruction and 'rogue' states can pose asymmetric threats even to the strongest nations - combined with an incorrect assumption that the sources of these threats are always interlinked. The decision of the USA to defend its eminence as sole superpower by actively seeking out, striking and, if necessary, anticipating those who would threaten has dominated global security perceptions for the past 18 months. ... The debate about whether the USA can be expected to act as an absolutist and unilateralist, or a lawful and cooperative hegemon, is one that agitates the USA's friends much more than its potential foes. Conflating might and right is a safe strategy only for a state that can be sure of its current supremacy in all directions and of keeping that supremacy indefinitely."

Note: on May 22, Senator Robert Byrd (Democrat) echoed many of these concerns in a powerful speech lamenting the scale of current and planned increases in US defence spending. Speaking during a Senate debate on the FY 2004 budget request (detailed elsewhere in this Review), Byrd commented: "Make no doubt about it, the sums that we invest in defense are enormous. According to the most recent CIA World Factbook, the world spent about three-quarters of a trillion dollars on arms in 1999, the latest year for which statistics are available. That same year, the United States spent $292 billion on its military - that is nearly 40 percent of all military spending on Earth. Our country spends more on defense than all the other 18 members of NATO, plus China, plus Russia, and plus the six remaining rogue states combined. Yet our defense budget continues to increase. This bill authorizes $400 billion for our national defense in the next year. In an age when we talk about smart bombs, smart missiles, and smart soldiers, any talk of smart budgets has gone out the window. ... The administration has charted a course now to increase defense budgets to $502.7 billion within the next 5 years. ... Instead of saving money by skipping a generation of military weapons, we are sending our country even deeper into debt a debt that will have to be borne by yet another generation of Americans who will be expected to pay for our defense largess. Let there be no doubt that we can and must provide first-rate fighting capability for our troops. But we can do so without committing to defense budgets that are set to spiral ever, ever higher. ... We are living in a time when the greatest threat to our national security is the threat of asymmetrical warfare. We learned that on September 11, 2001. We are in no danger of being outmatched militarily by any nation on Earth, but as the current orange alert status reminds us, we remain vulnerable to the very real threat of terrorists. Yet our Department of Defense is on a track to be the instrument - get this - to be the instrument of a doctrine of pre-emptive attacks: Ready and willing to invade and take over sovereign states that may not even pose a direct threat to our security. The name 'Department of Defense' is increasingly a misnomer for a bureaucracy that is poised to undertake conquests at the drop of a hat."

Reports: Speech by Senator Robert Byrd, D-WV, May 22, 2003, Council for a Livable World website; SIPRI Yearbook 2003 - Armaments, Disarmament and International Security, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) Press Release, June 17, http://www.sipri.org; War on terror accelerates world military spending, Reuters, June 17; US military budget heading towards Cold War levels, Inter Press Service, June 18.

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