From 2023, China continues to grow its defense spending by 7.2% annually and this year its defense budget will amount to 1.78 trillion yuan (about $245 billion), as announced at the National Assembly of Representatives of the 14th convocation (an analogue of the Soviet Congress of the CPSU).
The plan for the continuous growth of the defense budget is part of the plan announced by Xi Jinping to radically strengthen the Chinese armed forces by 2027. This term is due to the fact that in 2027 there will be the 100th anniversary of the creation of the People’s Liberation Army of China.
It should be noted that China is currently considered the second country in the world in terms of defense spending. But it is many times behind the United States, which was supposed to spend $968 billion on defense in 2024. In third place is the Russian Federation, which, according to IISS estimates, spent about $146 billion.
But the fact is that the United States spends about 3.5% of GDP on defense, and China, according to various estimates, 1.5-1.7%. That is, Beijing can keep quite significant spending on its army without overburdening its economy at all and having a reserve for the possibility of increasing its defense spending.
Moreover, there is always the question of the ratio of the distribution of defense spending to specific goals. In particular, what share of the budget goes to salaries, and how much goes to the purchase of weapons, exercises, etc. And China is now demonstrating a really large-scale renewal of its armed forces in all areas, from armored vehicles and aviation, to the fleet and the expansion of nuclear weapons.
It is worth noting that the Chinese armed forces are about 2 million troops, of which about 1 million are ground forces. At the same time, China has carefully studied the experience of a real war between Ukraine and the Russian Federation at the strategic level.