Laurent Kretz

China’s military spending will rise by 17.6% in 2008 to reach almost $60B. China has a 2.3 million-person army, the world’s biggest standing force.

“Foreign security experts in the United States […] say Beijing’s real military spending is two or three times the announced figure. They say these sustained increases have put China on track to become a major military power and the country most capable of challenging American dominance in East Asia.”

If we believe this comment, it means the spending could be of $120B to $180B … !

Risk 

I love that game. I try to play once or twice a month, and each time have a lot of fun with my friends. We all have various techniques, or habits when playing.

Olivier usually plays fast, tries to get as much territories as possible, prefers attacks to consolidation. Ritu consolidates for ages. I make up plan to take over the world, try to conquer a continent that will allow me to get my stream of new armies to pursues my mission elsewhere …  and usually am beaten by Olivier ;)

However, in any situation, everyone always starts by comparing his own armies with neighboring armies. So let’s do that now.

Money. So this article places China’s spending at officially $60B, and potentially (unofficially) at $180. This compares to $620Bfor the US, only 3.5 times more than the unofficial number for China. According to this wrap-up by Wikipedia, France spends $73B, the second biggest “spender” after the U.S. (sounds strange to me …). Then comes the UK ($68B), China ($60B), Germany ($45B), Japan ($42B) and Russia ($40B).

The numbers for Russia ($40B) and China ($60B) are the least easily controllable …

Strength. China has a 2.3 million-person army. 2.3 millions !!! This list by Wikipediagives an overview of the global forces around the world, and it is frightening … China is followed (from far) by the U.S., India, Russia and North Korea, countries with armies between 1.4M and 1.1M. Further down the list are Germany (285K, 19th on the list), France (260K, 20th), Japan (239K, 22nd) and the U.K. (195K, 28th). According to this list, there are in total about 19.5M soldiers in this world, and more than 1 out 10 is Chinese (for more than 100 armies …).

Equipment. China and the U.S. have approximately the same number of Tanks: 8,000 (still according to the same list). Russia, however, has 23,381 tanks, 4 times the entire U.S. inventory !

It’s also (very !) interesting to note that, on earth, one tank out of 5 (21.5%) is in the middle-east (Egypt, Turkey, Syria, Israel, Iran, Jordan, Lebanon, … represent 20,000 tanks !!). And one tank out of four is in Russia.

Nuclear. This has always been a touchy subject, as the real count of nuclear heads and stockpiles is not something nations want to disclose publicly. Nuclear weapons are dissuasive weapons: pretend you have xto make sure your neighbor and long time enemy with y will not attack you - this is the story of the cold war, a poker game.

There are around 20,000 active nuclear weapons worldwide, mainly in Russia and in the U.S. Though China has the nuclear weapon, they only have about 200 of them. China is part of the 5 declared countries with the weapon and member of the NPT.

Conclusion ?

Could there really be one ? Maybe a dramatic one: China is about the become the most powerful country on earth economically speaking, and many think the 21st century will be China’s century. If China happens to also become a military super-power (which is the path they’re taking), it will for sure shake up the world balance and the U.S. dominance as a world police.

Some will answer that China is only pursuing and strengthening a local (read: asian) dominance. And to those, I will say: be reminded that China has borders with 14 nations, including Vietnam, Russia, Pakistan, India, Afghanistan and North Korea. Does this remind you some of the CNN headlines we see quite often ?

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