According to the recent findings by the Stockholm International Peace and Research Institute (SIPRI), the military expenditures in the world show a gradual increase to 1822 billion US dollars in total in 2018. These are the highest global military expenditures since 1988.

All three Caucasus states recorded a rise in their military expenditures in comparison to the preceding year 2017. Armenia spent 609 million US dollars in 2018 (444 million in 2017), while Azerbaijan and Georgia each spent 1.7 billion US dollars (1.6 billion in 2017) and 317 million US dollars (308 million in 2017) respectively. With that number Armenia makes it into the global top-10 in regards to relative military expenditures to GDP. Armenia's defense spending rose by 33% compared to last year and now stands at 4.8% of its GDP

Both Russia and Iran recorded a decrease to 61.4 billion US dollars (66.6 billion in 2017), and 13.2 billion US dollars (14 billion in 2017) respectively, whilst Turkey recorded an increase to 19 billion US dollars (17.9 billion in 2017) in comparison to the previous year (kann weg). The United States of America, China, Saudi Arabia, India and France are the biggest military spenders according to the report.

The SIPRI is an international institute based in Sweden, dedicated to research on conflict, armament-and disarmament as well as arms control. Established in 1966, SIPRI provides open source data, analysis and recommendations to policymakers, researchers, media and the interested public, /based on open sources, to policymakers, researchers, media and the interested public (weg). SIPRI's main publication, the SIPRI Yearbook, was first published on 12 November 1969. The Yearbook serves as a single authoritative and independent source to which politicians, diplomats and journalists can turn to for an account of what has happened during the past year in regards to armaments and arms control, armed conflicts and conflict resolution, security arrangements and disarmament.