US President proposes to increase defense budget to $740 billion
US President Donald Trump has proposed to increase the US defense budget to $ 740 billion (about Rs 52 lakh crore). He is believed to have increased the defense budget drastically to accelerate the Army’s program of modernization in view of the challenges the US is facing from China and Russia. The defense budget of 2021 proposes to spend $ 28.9 billion for nuclear modernization. They have proposed $ 18 billion for space, $ 10 billion for cyber and $ 57 billion for airspace.
In India, the Finance Minister presents the budget in Parliament, but in the US, the President issues a budget proposal. This proposal is sent to Parliament. It is voted on after a long debate in Parliament. The White House has asked Parliament to raise the budget of the US Space Agency to $ 25 billion (about Rs 1.78 lakh crore). The budget of this agency has been declining for the last several years. The bulk of the budget is estimated to be spent on NASA’s lunar and Mars missions.
This increase is also significant in terms of India and China. In 2019, China’s defense budget has been Rs 12.6 lakh crore, while India has increased only 6 percent in the budget of defense sector in the budget of 2020-21. It has been increased from 3.18 lakh crore to 3.37 lakh crore as compared to 2019-20. 1,10,734 crore has been allocated to the Army for the purchase of new and modern weapons. If defense pension is also included in this budget, then this time budget is about 4.7 lakh crores.
