Australia boosts military spending

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — The Iran war had greatly complicated the global strategic landscape, Defense Minister Richard Marles said Thursday as he announced a major increase in Australian military spending.

Marles released the latest two-year update of Australia’s defense strategy and said an additional 53 billion Australian dollars ($38 billion) in spending on defense was planned over the next decade. Australia’s defense budget would grow from 2.

8% of GDP this year to 3% by 2033 as “Australia faces its most complex and threatening strategic circumstances since the end of World War II,” Marles said.

Asked how much more complex and threatening Australia’s circumstances were since the United States and Israel attacked Iran in February, Marles told reporters: “I don’t think anyone could honestly answer that question.

” “It greatly complicates the global strategic landscape,” Marles said. “The world feels less safe. ” “Having said that, we do very much support the strategic objective of denying Iran a deployable nuclear weapon,” Marles added.

Marles said his government’s decision to increase defense spending to 3% of GDP was not a response to pressure from U. S. President Donald Trump’s administration. The Pentagon released its own National Defense Strategy in January that chastised U. S.

allies to take control of their own security. The Australian government was making its own resourcing decisions, Marles said.

“What that has yielded to date is, under our government, the biggest peacetime increase in defense spending that our nation has seen,” Marles said.