The record high defense spending foreseen in the 2025 budget will not change Poland's position among NATO countries – we already spend the most on this purpose in terms of GDP ratio. In nominal terms, Poland ranks fourth in Europe – behind Germany, Great Britain and France.
In the draft budget adopted by the government on Wednesday, defence spending next year is to amount to PLN 186 billion, which will constitute 4.7% of GDP. Polish GDP. This will therefore be another year of continuous growth in spending for this purpose.
According to the NATO report on military spending by Alliance member states from June this year, the estimates for 2024 for Poland indicate spending at the level of 4.12 percent of GDP, and for 2023 – 3.26 percent.
In relation to GDP, Poland spends the most
Our country meets the threshold of 2% of GDP set by allies from 2020, but this year it will spend the most on this purpose in relation to GDP among all allied countries.
The second one in 2024 will be according to the NATO report Estonia (3.43%), third – United States (3.38 percent), fourth – Latvia (3.15 percent), fifth – Greece (3.08%). At the same time, only these five countries will spend more than 3% of their GDP on defense.
While 23 out of 32 countries belonging to NATO will meet the minimum expenditure target of 2% of GDP this year, which will mean an increase of 13 countries compared to the previous year. The following countries will still be below the threshold: Belgium, Croatia, SpainLuxembourg, Canada, Portugal, Slovenia and Italy.
Fifth place in NATO, fourth in Europe
In nominal terms, i.e. in terms of actual spending, the leader is traditionally the United States, which according to NATO will spend 968 billion dollars on the army in 2024. All other member states will spend less than 100 billion dollars for this purpose, although Germany will be very close to this number, because its spending for this year is estimated at 98 billion dollars. The third after the USA and Germany will be Great Britainwhich will spend USD 82 billion on defense, and the fourth is France, which plans USD 64 billion for this purpose.
Poland ranks fifth in NATO (fourth in Europe) with nearly $35 billion in planned military spending. Italy will be right behind it, with plans to spend $0.5 billion less on defense than Poland this year.
Warsaw's spending increase for next year will mean that Poland will strengthen its position in the top five countries with the largest defence budgets in NATO.
Main image source: Marcin Obara/PAP