The United Kingdom plans to increase defense spending to 2.5 percent of its gross domestic product by 2030, U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said Tuesday.
According to the prime minister, the allocation will result in an additional $94 billion in defense expenditures in the next six years and $109 billion in annual spending by the end of the decade.
Speaking alongside NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, Sunak said the country’s fully funded spending plan provides a new benchmark for European allies, noting that regional security has reached “a turning point.”
The increased defense expenditures are “a generational investment in British security and British prosperity, which makes us safer at home and stronger abroad,” he added.
Sunak identified three focus areas in the U.K. plan, with investment in the country’s defense industrial base as one priority. Modernizing the British armed forces and supporting Ukrainian defense is central to the planned defense budget increase.
A U.K. government statement on the premier’s speech noted that hostile states such as Russia, Iran and China are increasingly cooperating and investing more in their military and cyber capabilities, adversarial moves that are a threat globally.