Turkey is gearing up for a significant increase in its defense spending in 2025, Vice President Cevdet Yılmaz announced yesterday.
Some 1.6 trillion Turkish liras (~46 billion US dollars) will be allocated for defense and security according to the government’s plans. Of this amount, 913.9 billion liras will be earmarked for defense expenditures, and 694.5 billion liras will go toward internal security.
The country’s combined defense and internal security budget was at 971 billion liras for this year and at 524 billion liras for 2023.
These figures mean the defense budget for 2025 represents a 165% increase compared to the previous year. Taking into account the Central Bank’s inflation forecast of 44.1% for the end of 2024, the defense and security budget still reflects a notable real increase at over 120%.
Turkey remains 15th largest military spender in world despite drop in expenses
Turkey's defense budget also saw a record increase in 2024. The defense allocation for this year amounted to 40.6 billion dollars at the exchange rate at the time. This represented an increase of more than 250% compared to the previous year's budget, which was around 16 billion dollars.
The country's GDP was 1.02 trillion dollars in 2023, which means its defense spending made up about 1.3% of the GDP.
The government has recently sought additional financial resources for defense spendings. According to a draft bill that was withdrawn after public backlash, defense contributions would be collected from credit cards, tax declarations and various paperwork. (VK)
