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International-UN-NGOs
World military spending: Europe down, Middle East up
2006-06-13
STOCKHOLM - Record overall military spending in 2005 masked divergent trends across the globe, with expenditure on the rise in the US and the Middle East but on the decline in Europe, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said on Monday.

The United States remained the biggest worldwide spender with 48 percent of the 1.118 trillion dollar (885 million euros) pie and alone accounted for 80 percent of the 33-billion-dollar increase in global spending, it said in its annual report.

But the Middle East was the region with the highest relative spending increase, mostly due to a massive increase in Saudi ArabiaÂ’s defence budget. Total military spending numbers for the region would have been even higher if Iraq and Qatar had not been excluded because of inconsistent data, SIPRI said.
Posted by:Steve White

#4  Record overall military spending in 2005 masked divergent trends across the globe...

Since when there were nation states or tribal kingdoms, has not military spending usually been on the top of the list of 'things to do'?

There is an unending list of 'neat' things to do across the globe since the earliest writings. So what? Feel guilty? That's your problem bud. My ancestors got their act together and made hard and often painful decisions, sometime written in blood. That's why I'm here now and you're trying to hit me up for some change. Maybe if you or those you are standing in for would make the same hard decision and pay the same price, you or they could do it on their own. I have no problem helping those who will help themselves, but I'm not going to throw good money down a blackhole just to get that loving feeling.
Posted by: Spomose Angick9582   2006-06-13 09:41  

#3  And how much of the US spending is actually spent directly defending others, doing for them that which they've chosen not to do themselves? The personnel, equipment, the GPS system, etc. and bases in Europe, SKor, etc... not to mention the US military is always on the scene at almost every major disaster, if allowed access, spending freely to provide transportation, manpower, fuel, materials, etc...
Posted by: flyover   2006-06-13 01:31  

#2  I like how they throw in all the US spending like that is all the US spends money on. We only spend 3-3.5% of our GDP. Tell you something? Oh, ya. The US is kicking the ever-loving crap out of the EU and the rest of the world economicaly. China and the other dictatorship countries spend a much higher % of their GDP and can't even come close to what the US spends, even though we use a very small amount of our GDP.
Posted by: DarthVader   2006-06-13 01:19  

#1  It tells me western Europe feels secure enough for the US to pull out all troops.
Posted by: ed   2006-06-13 00:45  

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