China’s defense spending is to rise 7.2 percent this year, the same as last year, Beijing said yesterday, as its armed forces undergo rapid modernization and eye deepening strategic competition with the US.
The country’s expenditure on its armed forces has been on the rise for decades, broadly in line with economic growth.
China has the world’s second-largest military budget, but lags well behind the US, its primary strategic rival.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Despite that, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) surpasses the US military by number of personnel.
Beijing’s 1.78 trillion yuan (US$245.3 billion) defense budget for this year is still less than one-third of Washington’s.
China’s military spending last year made up 1.6 percent of its GDP, far less than the US or Russia, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute said.
However, its defense expansion is viewed with suspicion by Washington, as well as other powers in the region, including Japan, with which Beijing has a territorial dispute over islands in the East China Sea.
China has also increasingly flexed its muscles in the South China Sea, which it claims almost entirely despite an international arbitration ruling that declared its stance baseless. Taiwan also has claims in the South China Sea.
Beijing’s spending boost is also a cause for concern for Taiwan.
The hike took place in the context of “growing uncertainties in China’s external environment and domestic security priorities,” National University of Singapore associate professor Huang Chin-hao said.
“The defense budget increase reflects the need to maintain and upgrade the PLA’s military capabilities to keep pace and be ready for all contingencies,” he said.
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