I just read a short article in The Economist about military spending in several nations in 2005. It has been revealed that in terms of GDP percentage, Saudi Arabia spent the most among others nations on defence expenses, 8.8 % of its GDP. United States was placed on the second largest spender on military expenses which accounts for 4 % of its GDP. However, in the nominal level, US still way ahead compared with others nations. US spent $ 495.3 billion while Saudi Arabia only spent $ 25.4 billion. China is the second largest military expenses spender in 2005 nominal value which accounts $ 104 billion.
In my point of view, the figures is rather ambigous. Military expenses consists of several posts, namely military wages, operational expenses, weapon purchased expenses and many other components. It is unwise to compare a nation with huge number of soldier but a small amount of weapon with a nation with a small amount of soldier but a huge number of weapon availibility. Any comparison made between two particular nation can lead to a misconcept of what the strongest nation is. However, considering the availibility of the data, this is the closest estimation we can get.
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