The U.S. remains "by far the world's biggest military spender" in 2015, according to a report released on Tuesday by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
According to the report, despite falling by 2.4 percent, a much slower rate of decline than in recent years, U.S. military spending was the highest globally at $596 billion in 2015.
The report pointed out that such a slower rate of decline was "the result of measures passed by the U.S. Congress to partially protect military spending from previously agreed budget deficit-reduction measures," and said that "U.S. military spending is projected to remain roughly level in real terms in 2016."
China was estimated to have spent $215 billion on its military, an increase of 7.4 percent, according to the report.
The reported 7.4 percent increase in China's 2015 military spending was justified as the nation's armed forces undergoes structural reforms to boost their combat capability and face an increasingly complicated military situation as a rising power, observers said.
Song Zhongping, a Beijing-based military expert, told the Global Times on Tuesday that a budget increase is necessary to meet the demand of the nation's armed forces, which is undergoing a high-profile reform.
Song partly attributed the spending increase to China's thrust to modernize its military equipment.
Echoing Song, Liu Feng, a Hainan-based expert on the South China Sea, told the Global Times that "the neighboring environment for China is complicated. China's development is likely to be influenced by outside forces, so it is necessary to reduce such risks."
Military expenditure in Asia and Oceania was up 5.4 percent in 2015 and 64 percent between 2006 and 2015, reaching $436 billion in 2015, said the SIPRI report.
Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam registered a substantial increase in military spending in 2015 - by 16 percent, 25 percent and 7.6 percent, respectively. Japan also began to increase spending in 2015 after years of decline, according to the report.
Military spending in North America and Western Europe has been dropping since 2009, largely due to the global economic crisis, and the withdrawal of most U.S. and allied troops from Afghanistan and Iraq.
