United States President Donald Trump has proposed a record defence budget of around $1.5 trillion for 2027, saying it would enable the country to build a “dream military” in “troubled and dangerous times”.
On Tuesday, Trump said he would seek to raise the military budget to $1.5 trillion (€1.3-1.4 trillion) in 2027 from $901 billion in 2026, which the US Congress had recently approved.
The massive surge represents an increase of nearly 50 per cent on the current year’s defence budget.
In a post on his social media platform, Truth Social, Trump wrote: “This will allow us to build the Dream Military that we have long been entitled to and, more importantly, that will keep us SAFE and SECURE, regardless of foe.”
The US president also stated that the “tremendous income” generated by tariffs to the tune of $600 billion would enable the government to “easily hit the $1.5 trillion number”.
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The US is currently engaged in a diplomatic spat with the world’s second-largest economy, China, over the former’s military action against Venezuela in which US forces captured former Venezuelan President, Nicolás Maduro. Maduro and his wife were brought to the US, where they face drug charges.
Most countries, including China, slammed the US move, with Beijing describing it as kidnapping.
The US also recently shifted its military focus to the Indo-Pacific in increased support to Taiwan, which China lays claim to. On the contrary, the US asserts South America to be in its own sphere of influence.
Meanwhile, China and Japan are also embroiled in a diplomatic face-off after Japan’s Prime Minister, Sanae Takaichi, said late last year that an invasion of Taiwan by China will invoke a military response by Japan.
Beijing launched military drills near the Taiwan Strait recently, in what experts describe was a warning to Taipei and the United States, especially after the Trump administration approved an arms sale worth a record $11-billion to the island nation.
In a new global order, the United States seeks to reassert its somewhat lost global dominance in a unipolar world while China advocates multi-polarity.
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