Global military spending surges and reaches record high

VIENNA — Global military spending reached a new record of almost $2.9 trillion in 2025 − the 11th consecutive year of growth − even as the United States recorded its sharpest single-year decline in decades, according to new data published Monday by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

The main engine of growth was Europe, where expenditure surged 14% to $864 billion − the highest level SIPRI has ever recorded for the continent and, among NATO’s European members, the fastest annual increase since 1953. Germany crossed the 2% of GDP threshold for the first time since 1990, with spending rising 24% to $114 billion; Berlin has since pledged to reach 3.5% by 2029. Spain’s military budget leaped 50% to $40.2 billion, also crossing 2% of GDP for the first time since 1994, while Poland spent 4.5% of its GDP on defense − the highest burden among all NATO members.

The pattern repeated itself in Asia and Oceania, where combined expenditure rose 8.1% to $681 billion, the region’s sharpest increase since 2009. China’s spending grew 7.4% to an estimated $336 billion, marking its 31st consecutive annual increase. Taiwan posted a 14% jump to $18.2 billion − its largest rise since at least 1988 − as Chinese military exercises around the island intensified. Japan’s $62.2 billion budget represented 1.4% of GDP, the highest military burden the longtime pacifist country has carried since 1958.

Russia and Ukraine, now in the fifth year of war, continued to expand their military outlays. Russia allocated an estimated $190 billion − 7.5% of GDP and a record 20% of total government expenditure − while Ukraine spent $84.1 billion, equivalent to a staggering 40% of GDP and 63% of government spending.

The overall 2.9% real-terms increase is the smallest annual rise since 2021, though that’s largely an accounting artifact. The dynamic is almost entirely explained by Washington’s failure to approve new financial military assistance for Ukraine during the year − aid that SIPRI counts as part of the donor country’s expenditure. U.S. spending fell 7.5% year over year to $954 billion, primarily because no new supplemental appropriations for Ukraine-related Defense Department support were passed in 2025, compared to a cumulative $127 billion approved over the previous three years. Outside the United States, global military spending grew by 9.2%.

SIPRI researchers were blunt about the outlook: “The decline in U.S. military expenditure in 2025 is likely to be short-lived,” said program director Nan Tian. Congress has already approved over $1 trillion for 2026, with a potential further rise to $1.5 trillion in 2027 if President Donald Trump’s latest budget proposal passes.

In addition to providing the latest numbers, SIPRI researchers also raised a concern about transparency. The June 2025 NATO summit raised the alliance’s spending target to 5% of GDP by 2035, with up to 1.5% points of that allowed to cover loosely defined “defense- and security-related” expenditures. Researchers warned that vague definitions risk incentivizing “creative accounting” and cited Italy’s reported attempt to count the cost of constructing a bridge to Sicily as military-related spending as an illustration of the problem. Because NATO does not publish disaggregated data, independent verification is becoming increasingly difficult.

Total NATO spending reached $1.581 trillion in 2025, equivalent to 55% of the global total −a figure that, SIPRI cautioned, may not accurately reflect the alliance’s actual operational military capacity.

Linus Höller is Defense News' Europe correspondent and OSINT investigator. He reports on the arms deals, sanctions, and geopolitics shaping Europe and the world. He holds master’s degrees in WMD nonproliferation, terrorism studies, and international relations, and works in four languages: English, German, Russian, and Spanish.

维也纳——斯德哥尔摩国际和平研究所周一公布的新数据显示，2025年全球军费开支达到近2.9万亿美元的新纪录，连续第11年增长，而与此同时，美国军费开支却出现了几十年来最大的单年降幅。

欧洲是增长的主要引擎，其国防开支飙升14%，达到8640亿美元——这是斯德哥尔摩国际和平研究所（SIPRI）记录的欧洲大陆最高水平，也是北约欧洲成员国中自1953年以来最快的年度增幅。德国的国防开支自1990年以来首次突破GDP的2%，增长24%至1140亿美元；柏林已承诺到2029年将这一比例提高到3.5%。西班牙的军费预算猛增50%，达到402亿美元，同样自1994年以来首次突破GDP的2%，而波兰的国防开支占GDP的4.5%，是所有北约成员国中最高的。

这一趋势在亚洲和大洋洲重现，两地军费开支合计增长8.1%，达到6810亿美元，创下该地区自2009年以来的最大增幅。中国的军费开支增长7.4%，达到约3360亿美元，连续第31年实现年度增长。台湾的军费开支猛增14%，达到182亿美元，创下至少自1988年以来的最大增幅，原因是中国在台湾周边地区加强了军事演习。日本的军费预算为622亿美元，占GDP的1.4%，这是这个长期奉行和平主义的国家自1958年以来承担的最高军费负担。

俄罗斯和乌克兰的战争已进入第五个年头，两国继续扩大军事开支。俄罗斯估计拨款1900亿美元——相当于其国内生产总值的7.5%，以及创纪录的政府总支出的20%——而乌克兰的支出为841亿美元，相当于其国内生产总值的40%，以及政府支出的63%。

总体而言，实际增幅仅为2.9%，是自2021年以来最小的年度增幅，但这很大程度上是会计因素造成的。这一动态几乎完全归因于华盛顿方面未能在年内批准对乌克兰的新军事援助——斯德哥尔摩国际和平研究所（SIPRI）将此类援助计入捐助国的支出。美国军费开支同比下降7.5%至9540亿美元，主要原因是2025年没有通过任何新的与乌克兰相关的国防部补充拨款，而此前三年累计批准的拨款总额为1270亿美元。除美国外，全球军费开支增长了9.2%。

斯德哥尔摩国际和平研究所（SIPRI）的研究人员对前景直言不讳：“美国2025年军费开支的下降很可能只是暂时的，”项目主任南田表示。国会已经批准了2026年超过1万亿美元的军费开支，如果特朗普总统最新的预算提案获得通过，2027年军费开支可能进一步增加到1.5万亿美元。

除了提供最新数据外，斯德哥尔摩国际和平研究所（SIPRI）的研究人员还对透明度表示担忧。2025年6月的北约峰会将联盟的军费开支目标提高到2035年占GDP的5%，其中最多允许1.5个百分点用于定义宽泛的“国防和安全相关”支出。研究人员警告说，模糊的定义可能会刺激“创造性会计”，并以意大利试图将修建西西里岛大桥的成本计入军事相关支出为例，说明了这个问题。由于北约不公布分类数据，独立核实变得越来越困难。

到 2025 年，北约总支出将达到 1.581 万亿美元，相当于全球总额的 55%——斯德哥尔摩国际和平研究所警告说，这一数字可能无法准确反映该联盟的实际作战军事能力。

林努斯·霍勒是《防务新闻》的欧洲记者和开源情报调查员。他报道影响欧洲乃至全球的军火交易、制裁和地缘政治。他拥有大规模杀伤性武器不扩散、恐怖主义研究和国际关系三个硕士学位，并精通英语、德语、俄语和西班牙语四种语言。