The US-based Global Fire Power (GFP) annually publishes an analytical display of data concerning 138 modern military powers. The GFP ranking is based on each nation's potential military capability across land, sea, and air.
In its most recent review, the GFP has ranked Iran seventh in the vast continent of Asia in terms of military deterrence, while countries such as Russia, China, and India rank first to third.
The GFP report also adds that in terms of potential military strength, Iran is both superior to and has an upper hand compared to Israel and countries such as Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.
Iran's military budget, one-third of that of countries in West Asia
Studies show that these mentioned countries are the largest producers and buyers of military weapons in the region and their military strength is basically defined by this factor. For example, according to the GFP review, the military budget of Saudi Arabia in 2020 alone is estimated at $56 billion, while India’s defense budget amounts to $61 billion.
The Israeli army chief of staff recently announced that the Israeli government's approved defense budget was $29 billion and that the regime also received $38 billion worth of military aid from the US, which totals the budget to about $67 billion.
Meanwhile, Iran’s defense budget for this year was about 70 billion tomans or $14 billion, which is almost a third or even less than that of the total budget of the mentioned countries.
According to Iran’s 20 Year National Vision, the country must become the first military power in the West Asian region by 2025. Given the GFP’s recent report and Iran’s astonishing military progress despite the cruel sanctions, the country already ranks second in the West Asian region, and it seems to be achieving this 20 Year National Vision even sooner than was predicted.
Iran, 14th military power in the world
For 2020, Iran is ranked 14 of 138 out of the countries considered for the annual GFP review. The ranking of course has excluded the military strength of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The review considers several factors for the ranking, including the number of weapons, manpower, natural resources diversity, geography, logistics capacity, and indigenous military weapons.
The final ranking also considers 8 factors including manpower, financials, logistics, natural resources, geography, airpower, naval forces, and land forces.
However, the GFP adds that in cases where official numbers were not available (such as some data regarding North Korea), the review has given an estimation of the numbers.
Iran’s achievements in defense industry
Iran is ranked 7th in Asia in defense sector due to many achievements, the most important of which are categorized in areas such as "construction of indigenous advanced drones", "construction of indigenous frigates, tanks and helicopters", "construction of various kinds of missiles (cruise and ballistic)", "manufacture of light military weapons", "ranking as the seventh missile power in the world", "being one of the two countries in the world that manufactures supercavitating torpedos" and "being one of the five countries in the world that develop submarines”.
MNA/5002587
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