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Greece owes extraordinary expenses for the strengthening of National Defense, with “injections” in human resources, updates and purchases of new equipment, despite the fact that theoretically its participation in international organizations – such as NATO – and in the European Union, should to secure its borders.
Discussions on the strengthening of the Armed Forces are already underway and information from the financial staff indicates that it is very likely, perhaps desirable, that part of the necessary expenses will be covered by the already deficit budget this year. The only thing that is certain is that these extraordinary expenses modify the financial plan for next year – and not only – and make it even more difficult to equate the preparation of the new Budget, since these expenses on the one hand cannot be linked to the effects of the coronavirus Therefore, they cannot be “deducted” from the budget result as, for example, Health spending, on the other hand, cannot be described as an “investment” and therefore cannot be financed by the Recovery Fund.
Turkey recklessly spends on military equipment
By looking at the SIPRI database, one can get an idea of the defense spending of the two countries, and the first effortless conclusion is that since 2015, Tayyip Erdogan has embarked on an arms race. In particular, in 2015 Turkey’s military spending amounted to $ 12.302 billion and a year later it had “flown” to $ 14.423 billion, while last year it had reached $ 20.448 billion, marking an increase! 66%!
Reduction of defense spending in Greece
On the other hand, Greece from 2009 experienced the restrictions of the memorandum in the field of defense spending. After all, it should not be forgotten that the IMF lobbied for the rationalization of relevant expenditures, with the abolition of the camps, the transformation of the Greek army into a purely professional one, the replacement of border units by chambers and the like. Of course, at a time when pensions and salaries have been through a “knife”, this approach by lenders should come as no surprise, although their logic was not only that “we spend a lot and indiscriminately on equipment” but also that there is no reason for the high costs since Greece is a member of the European Union, so its land and sea borders are secured.
In 2009 it closed with Greek defense expenditures at 9,628 million dollars, while in 2019 they had reached 5,732 million dollars, having decreased by as much to 4,880 million dollars (in 2014).
The picture changes if the two countries are compared, based on their defense spending as a percentage of GDP. Turkey in 2015 dedicated 1.8% of GDP to armaments and now the corresponding expenses absorb 2.7%. Greece entered the memorandum crisis with defense spending of 3.2% and what we see for the future is that although in absolute numbers spending is decreasing, as a percentage of GDP they remain stable, due to the “fall “of the economy. Therefore, until 2019, defense spending remains at 2.5-2.6% of Greek GDP.
Based on comparative data and the way Eurostat records defense spending, the figures differ slightly. Still, spending is almost double the euro zone average, while spending on health and education lags far behind.
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