Iranian defense spending surpasses $10-billion mark

ANKARA (AA) - Iranian government defense spending has recently increased by almost 40 percent to reach $10.3 billion, according to a draft budget proposal that went to parliament this week, putting defense expenditure growth during Hassan Rouhani’s presidency at some 80 percent.

Despite political, economic and social conflicts, it is notable that Rouhani’s government and the Iranian Revolutionary Guards coordinate on foreign policy.

After he was elected president, Rouhani’s government gave priority to economic recovery and a landmark nuclear deal with the West.

He did not appear to object to the Revolutionary Guards’ role in the region, particularly in Syria.

Rouhani’s government raised Iran’s defense budget to above $8 billion in 2014 from $6 billion in 2013, during the presidency of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The Revolutionary Guards, which lead military operations in the region, received the lion’s share of this.

Coordination between Rouhani’s government and the Revolutionary Guards in the fields of security and foreign policy has been accompanied by an increase in the amounts allocated to the Revolutionary Guards in the official state budget.

The amount allocated to the Revolutionary Guards stood at $3.3 billion in 2013, $5 billion in 2014 and $6.1 billion in 2015.

While this amount later fell to $4.5 billion, the amounts allocated to Iran’s military and Defense Ministry were increased in the 2016 budget.

However, the amount allocated to the Revolutionary Guards in the draft budget for 2017 rose by 53 percent, reaching some $6.9 billion.

Amounts allocated to the military, the Revolutionary Guards, the Organization for Mobilization of the Oppressed (Basij) and the General Staff of the Armed Forces all rose by almost 80 percent since mid-2013, when Rouhani assumed the presidency.