The following analysis is a working draft that attempts to provide an initial graphic overview of the comparative strengths of the world’s three major powers: The United States, China, and Russia. It highlights the radically different spending patterns and resources of each major power, and it compares the balance each state has established between the size and development of its economy and the size and cost of its military forces.
The analysis shows that Russia is now a relatively minor power in economic terms and in terms of the resources it can spend on military forces. It also shows that Russia relies heavily on its inheritance of a massive number of nuclear weapons for its increasingly tentative status as a superpower. In contrast, China has succeeded in carrying out a massive expansion of its economy, technology base, and its military forces, and it is far more able to compete at a civil level as well.
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