Russia's military spending budget for 2023 is around 6.6 trillion rubles, which equates to approximately $85.8 billion, according to a new report from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
The budget represents about 4.4 percent of the country's forecast gross domestic product, SIPRI wrote. In 2021, before Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Russia's military budget represented about 3.6 percent of GDP.
The Swedish think tank added that Moscow's military spending in early 2023 "seemed to accelerate beyond the budgeted amount," but the rate of spending was still somewhat similar to that in early 2022 and "does not suggest any unusual surge."
However, SIPRI noted that Russia's lack of transparency means there is uncertainty about the country's true military expenditure.
"Analysis of Russia's military spending has become increasingly difficult as the government has limited the access to information on budget spending," the report said.
It continued: "In the spring of 2022, the Ministry of Finance stopped publishing details of budget spending broken down by chapters of the budget and by ministries and other government departments, revealing only the total monthly budget revenue and expenditure. The Federal Treasury also ceased its detailed reporting of budget spending, although with a brief relaxation that was later reversed."
The think tank was able to document an increase in military spending, even though it said Moscow "is attempting to restrain spending on the war to minimize the domestic impact and enable the pursuit of policy goals set before the invasion."
Dr. Lucie Béraud-Sudreau, a senior researcher and director of the Arms and Military Expenditure Program at SIPRI, told Newsweek that the institute's "total estimate for Russian military expenditure is comprehensive."
"It includes the official ministry of defense budget and additional budgetary lines from other ministries," she said, adding SIPRI's report also factored in spending on military pensions as well as payments to paramilitary forces like Russia's national guard and even Wagner Group forces.
"However, this does not include the total costs of Russia's war against Ukraine," Béraud-Sudreau said.
Left out were expenditures "such as spending for the annexed territories, border infrastructure for regions near Ukraine and spending on training for workers who join the arms industry," according to Béraud-Sudreau.
While Russia has faced sanctions from countries around the world as punishment for its invasion of Ukraine, it has offset these sanctions somewhat because of increased business dealings with such nations as China and India.
"The Russian economy can afford this level of [military] spending notwithstanding severe sanctions, while leaving open the possibility of increased war-related funding if the government considers it necessary in the future," SIPRI's report said.
Béraud-Sudreau said that even with the high military spending budget, Russia could still afford the war from a financial standpoint for the foreseeable future. She noted "Russia thus still has the economic resources to fund the war and even increase its military spending if it considers it necessary."
Earlier this year, Boris Grozovski, a Russian economics expert at the Wilson Center think tank, told Newsweek that Russia's military expenditures continue to rise rapidly and estimated that the cost of Putin's war could surpass trillions of dollars.
Grozovski said that the entire Russian government spending plan in 2022 was approximately 23.7 trillion rubles ($346 billion), of which approximately 3.5 trillion rubles ($46.1 billion) would be spent on the military and 2.8 trillion rubles ($36.9 billion) would go toward police and security services (FSB).
"We can estimate that [federal budget] spending could in 2023 total as much as in 2022, 11 to 12 trillion rubles," Grozovski said.
Newsweek reached out to the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs via email for comment.
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Jon Jackson is an Associate Editor at Newsweek based in New York. His focus is on reporting on the Ukraine ... Read more
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