Russia doubles cost of aggression: war with Ukraine will cost Kremlin USD 100 billion per year

The authorities of the terrorist country of Russia by mid-2023 spent the entire military budget approved for the year and are forced to double the amount they plan to spend on the army thrown to "conquer" Ukraine. This was reported by Reuters with reference to closed materials of the government of the Russian Federation on the implementation of treasury expenditures.

In the first six months, Kremlin defense spending amounted to RUB 5.59 trillion, or 37% of all money spent by the budget, the agency reports. At the same time, the law on the budget for the year included RUB 4.91 trillion under the article "National Defense" - 1.5 times more than a year earlier.

The new plan for annual defense spending is RUB 9.7 trillion, or USD 102 billion at the current rate, Reuters reports. This is almost double what was originally planned, and accounts for a third of all budgeted spending - RUB 29.06 trillion.

For comparison, for the social security of the population, including the payments of pensions and benefits, RUB 7.343 trillion is allocated in the federal budget (that is, a quarter less than the updated defense spending plan). Allocations to support the national economy should be RUB 3.5 trillion rubles (three times less), for education - RUB 1.3 trillion (7.5 times less).

In total, for the first half of the year, the budget spent RUB 14.97 trillion - RUB 2.44 trillion more than a year earlier. At the same time, 97% of the additional costs went to the production of weapons, the army and related items. Almost RUB 1 trillion was spent on salaries of military authorities in January-June alone - RUB 543 billion more than in the same period last year, according to Reuters data.

As a result, the share of military spending in the budget reached the maximum for all time available statistics. Between 2011 and 2022, Russia spent 14% to 23% of the budget on defense.

More than a year ago, the Russian Ministry of Finance stopped publishing spending data on specific sections in the monthly report on the implementation of the federal budget, explaining this by the threat of additional Western sanctions. And in June this year, the authorities closed the latest public data on budget expenditures from the single portal Electronic Budget, where the current information of the treasury flocked.

The latest data published by the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation showed that in January-February alone, RUB 2 trillion was spent on defense. As of the end of May, department statistics recorded a 10-fold jump in secret spending - up to RUB 3.9 trillion.

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