Russia allocates more than one-third of its 2024–2026 draft federal budget to defense spending

Russia’s State Duma approved the draft federal budget for 2024–2026 in its second reading. The budget includes an approximately 3-percent reduction in classified expenditure, from 30 percent to 26.8 percent of all spending, reports the outlet RBC. The budget’s “national defense” section accounts for the bulk of this redistribution.

The unclassified portion of the budget has increased by 725 billion rubles (around $8.1 billion), of which 305.26 billion rubles (around $3.4 billion) will be allocated for the purchase of goods and services for the state’s needs in the “defense” sphere and for the military’s social security. Another 370 billion rubles ($4.1 billion) will go toward paying personnel in the armed forces.

The Telegram channel Faridaily, run by journalists Farida Rustamova and Maxim Tovkaylo, note that the authorities plan to spend more than 14 trillion rubles ($157 billion) on “defense” and law enforcement in 2024, accounting for around 39 percent of all federal spending. Rustamova and Tovkaylo called it “the most militarized budget in Russia’s modern history.”