Military Spending - Ranking 1994

The 2025 World Bank data on military spending as a percentage of GDP reveals a stark divide between states in active or recent conflict and those with stable, non-militarized economies. Ukraine leads the ranking at 48.8751% of GDP, reflecting its ongoing war effort, while Israel at 7.9964% and Russia at 7.249% similarly allocate enormous shares due to regional security threats and protracted hostilities. At the bottom, Zimbabwe at 0.0381% and Haiti at 0.0389% spend almost nothing on their militaries, a structural consequence of severe economic fragility and limited state capacity to fund defense. The data underscores that high military burdens are driven by existential security crises rather than mere geopolitical ambition. As global power competition intensifies, the leaderboard could be reshuffled by a de-escalation in Ukraine or a major rearmament program in a currently low-spending region.