How much should India spend on defence?

[karakoram]

5-10%，preferably 15%，of GDP。

Your economy is 2 trillion by your logic 300 billion allocation for defence :-D paa jee PK ho kya

 

[Luca1]

Just like how North Korea spend on defense.

 

[The_Sidewinder]

Just like how North Korea spend on defense.

Robin Lawley Fat & Ugly.

On topic: 2.5 % spending on defence plus leaner IA will go miles towards lagging defence modernisation.

 

[Skull and Bones]

Just like how North Korea spend on defense.

No body gives a shit.

 

[SR-91]

Increase to 2.5% defence budget is a very interesting idea. Nothing wrong in making it permanent.
I also wanna see a big increase, maybe extra .5%, to our intelligence services and R&D.

 

[ito]

This is a very tricky subject as I understand the demands on the national budget are extensive and I would like to make it clear that the economy and spending on infrastructure is paramount and should be the first priority of the GoI no matter what. However in the past few years an alarming trend has crept in wherein India is now spending around 1.8% of its GDP on defence, this is the lowest levels for many decades. For comparison's sake Pakistan spends around 4-5% of its GDP on defence, China around 2%, the UK and France around 2% also with the US around 3% of GDP. NATO requires all partners nations to spend a minimum of 2% of their respective GDPs on defence, I know India is in no way associated with NATO but I am using this as a benchmark.


I have just done some very quick and back of the envelope calculations, if India were to spend 2% of GDP on defence for the next 5 years its defence budgets would look like (assuming an average rate of 8% GDP growth):


2016- approximately $50 billion USD
2017- approximately $54 billion USD
2018- approximately $58 billion USD
2019- approximately $63 billion USD
2020- approximately $68 billion USD


Considering the state the Indian military has been allowed to get into thanks to a decade of neglect and even before that there was the so-called "lost decade" in the 90s, I would propose a hike to 2.5% of GDP temporarily for the next 5 years before the defence budget can be reduced back to the 2% of GDP annual figure thereafter. In such a scenario the defence budgets would look like:


2016- approximately $62 billion USD
2017- approximately $67 billion USD
2018- approximately $72 billion USD
2019- approximately $78 billion USD
2020- approximately $83 billion USD



As one can see this is quite a considerable difference we are talking about and that extra funding would be a great boost to the CAPEX budgets of all three forces and would certainly get the Indian military's modernisation drive back on track for 2020.





All (constructive) thoughts are welcome, thanks guys and girls






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GDP is calculated based on nominal measures, while GDP growth rates is measured in real terms. So defense budget as a percent of GDP will be much higher than the figures you have calculated as inflation will also be included

On topic, I agree with you that India should increase its defense spending to 2.5% of its GDP given the threats India faces and our ambition to be a IOR power .

 

[bloo]

We still spend less than "some" countries, if anything we should increase it to match our counterparts.
People talk about how our money should go in to eradicating poverty etc, but we have more than enough money to do that, its just that we are not utilizing our resources properly, it will only take time.

 

[PARIKRAMA]

Increasing defence spending to say 2.5% or 2.8% to max 3% can be done if and only if

1. The substantial spending will be done in purchase of arms which are truly Indigenous. This ensures total ploughback into the economic system of our country via military industrial complex and also supports the employment of our youth and skill enhancement.

2. IF the dependency is still on foreign vendors then its better we limit our defence spending to 2% only. And utilize the money freed (2.5%-2.0% = 0.5% GDP) on our people to better the social, economic and industrial capability.

India atm needs to focus on the domestic setup at many levels. Its true that we have a young population but we do require a massive employment, clearance of stagnation causing hurdles at policy, economy and sectorial levels. Education is a right now but just imparting education with no assurance of a future job is not gonna help folks in future. So also the healthcare aspect which is still not very advanced in reaching to every class of the society. So we have lots of work to do.

Yet spending a good 1% more on defence is not a bad idea as long as its indigenous. Bcz that way it supports the country and its folks towards a better tomorrow. This is where our DPSUs, OFBs, DRDO, ADA, HAL etc plays a very important role. They have to make a product which meets the requirement of IA,IN, IAF and is competitive to foreign competitors. or else the additional spending helps no way in ploughing back money into our system as it ends up in a foreign country's economic system.

A big growing country with economic might is good but its a wastage if its not having a proportional military might also. Of course its needed just for self protection and not for any galactic invasion,,

 

[Azz Kikr]

20% at least. Otherwise none of us will take you seriously.

you guys have still long way to go before we take you seriously

i think our defence budget is sufficient to meet the requirements of our armed forces, we do not need any significant increase in our def budget.

 

[micky]

This is a defense forum, people here will generally prefer a large defense budget for their country.

And I agree with them.

Being rich without having military strength will just lead to a Century of Humiliation.

yes rightly said,,,,,, reminding us the past invasions to our country,,,, once we were the richest country and now see how we are struggling .........

Robin Lawley Fat & Ugly.

i dont understand this what is this robin lawley, i saw the reply from some members also.......

On topic: 2.5 % spending on defence plus leaner IA will go miles towards lagging defence modernisation.

 

[longewala]

Looks like I pushed all your buttons.

don't worry about our button dear, it's your country who are spending every penny on defense. Don't you love the look of respect on their faces when you approach immigration in another country and they realise it's a Pakistani passport, "oh look they spend 9% on defense, aren't they nice"

On topic, we spent a peak of 3.7% on defense in the late 80s. No need to go back there, question is simply how much we need to
1. Balance our capital spend, versus expenditure on salaries, which is too low. right now it's just 15% out of 2% of gnp, so just another 0.2% is enough to almost double capital outlay.
2. Beef up the china border which means more rafale / fgfa, howitzers and equipping the strike corps. Again, 0.2% is enough.

Also important to focus that incremental amount entirely on china - because, face it, our beloved western neighbours are bankrupt, out of baksheesh and don't have the guts to try anything other than cowardly terrorist attacks on civilians. 100 lca mk2, a couple of hundred Arjuns and some new howitzers, that's it, everything else should be directed towards china.

 

[Manindra]

My opinion is current 1.75% of the GDP is quite good & reduced it to 1.5% of the GDP from 2025 & then 1% of the GDP from 2050.
Rest can you manage by cut the size of Army from current 1.3 million to 1 million , Add 50,000 marine in Navy, give equal share of defence budget to all three services & throttle the economy to get budget increase.

 

[longewala]

My opinion is current 1.75% of the GDP is quite good & reduced it to 1.5% of the GDP from 2025 & then 1% of the GDP from 2050.
Rest can you manage by cut the size of Army from current 1.3 million to 1 million , Add 50,000 marine in Navy, give equal share of defence budget to all three services & throttle the economy to get budget increase.

Reducing manpower and spending the savings tobuy better equipment is the right step, but also a brave one - can't see our generals agreeing to that, I am afraid

 

[tsinga]

I would recommend spending 2% for the next 3 years i.e till 2017.

This so that the Govt has time to fix the current broken economy and treasury and get it back on the high growth path with high infrastructure spending.


From 2018 onwards, GoI should increase it to 2.5% and hold it for a decade.

 

[Manindra]

Reducing manpower and spending the savings tobuy better equipment is the right step, but also a brave one - can't see our generals agreeing to that, I am afraid

We need to choose one.
1.3 million soldiers with WW2 era gadgets or 1 million soldiers with armed to the teeth with latest highly advanced gadgets.