Just yesterday, Japan, which is seen as one of the most pacifist countries of the world, has announced biggest ever defence budget in its history. Meanwhile China, India, Russia are all increasing their defence spendings. But, the situation looks bad in Europe as defence budgets are shrinking. Altough NATO members have pledged to spent at least 2% of their GDP for defence budget, these countries (except USA) have difficulty in honoring this commitment. USA is calling again and again to its European allies to increase defence budgets.
There are very disturbing numbers; for example, between 1995 and 2015, main battle tank numbers in Europe dropped from around 25.000 to just under 8.000, while fighters and ground attack aircraft decreased from 5.400 to 2.400. I was very surprised to see that even my country, Turkey, which is seen as a highly militarized country, is only spending 1,25% of its GDP for defence (will be increased to 2.2% next year to meet NATO requirement). This is very disturbing as Russia is spending 4,5% of its GDP for defence.
I know that military spending is a very unpopular concept. But, do you think that Europe can stay as powerful without a modern military? Is trusting to USA to defend Europe against external threats forever makes sense? In today's world Europe still faces external threats; like ISIS, Libyan extremist rebels, Russian imperialist ambitions. How can we respond to these threats without modern armies and assert Europe's position in the world?
[IMG]
[/IMG]
http://ift.tt/1PmsDAo
http://ift.tt/1PmsFbr
This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service - if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at http://ift.tt/jcXqJW.
European defence budgets and challenges in today's world