Chna has slowed its pace of defense spending increases in the past two years, potentially presenting Southeast Asian countries that chronically underfund their militaries with a window to narrow a yawning gap, a regional expert said.
China is winning the arms race against Southeast Asian democracies, Japan and Australia hands down, to according to William Bratton, author of "China's Rise, Asia's Decline", writing in the Nikkei Asian Review. China's acknowledged defense spending for 2020 came to $197 billion.
The increase in China's defense spending for 2020 was 6.6% above 2019, a slowdown from a 7.5% annual rise in 2019 and an 8.1% increase in 2018, according to Bratton.
While China far oustpends Japan ($50 billion) and Australia ($43 billion), it is also turning attention to resuscitating its economy after pandemic lockdowns last year.
China's defense spending as a percentage of its gross domestic product has slid every year since 2014 (12.2% of GDP) apart from a spike in 2018. China will announce its 2021 defense budget at the National People's Congress in March. Military analysts predict single digit growth, likely smaller than the 6.6% rise in 2020 due to the need to attend to more pressing economic needs.
China has long won its arms race against its Southeast Asian neighbors, which are traditionally taken to comprise members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) that are not its allies, said Bratton, formerly with HSBC equity research. Only Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar are China's allies in this economic bloc.
The rest, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, stand against China in varying degrees.
Individual ASEAN countries have instead continued reliance on the U.S. as a military counterweight to China in the region.
Military spending has shrunk in the past decade as a percentage of GDP in many of the ASEAN countries. The only exception is Singapore, which spent 3.2% of its GDP on defense in 2019. Singapore accounts for more than a quarter of Southeast Asia's defense expenditure and is committed to maintaining an advanced and well-equipped military.
China's defense spending has allowed it to rebuild the outdates People's Liberation Army (PLA) into a modern military force that should be able to meet the United States on the battlefield on at least equal terms by 2050. Of more concern to Asian countries, is the growing naval strength of China, which now leads the world in the total number of operational warships.
