In 2012 for the first time China spent more on the military than Europe

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Europe’s Shrinking Military Spending Under Scrutiny

In 2012, for the first time, military spending among Asian nations, in particular China, exceeded that of the Europeans.

Alarmed by years of cuts to military spending, the NATO secretary general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, issued a dire public warning to European nations, noting that together they had slashed $45 billion, or the equivalent of Germany’s entire military budget, endangering the alliance’s viability, its mission and its relationship with the United States.

Now, as President Obama wrestles with his own huge budget deficit and military costs, the responsibility for keeping NATO afloat has fallen disproportionately onto the United States, an especially untenable situation as priorities shift to Asia.

The United States finances nearly three quarters of all military spending among NATO’s 28 nations, up from 63 percent in 2001. And yet, across Europe, experts note, only the United States, Britain and Greece are meeting NATO’s own spending guidelines of 2 percent of gross domestic product. Even Britain and France - the two leading European nations willing to project military might – are slipping further. France says that by 2014 it may cut deeper still — to just 1.3 percent of G.D.P. down from 1.9 percent this year. By comparison, the United States spent 4.8 percent of its G.D.P. in 2011.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/23/world/europe/europes-shrinking-military-spending-under-scrutiny.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=0