No threat to any country

Answering a NHK correspondent's queation, spokesman for the upcoming session of China's National People's Congress, Jiang Enzhu revealed that China's defense budget would rise 17.8% this year. Jiang answered 10 questions during the press conference, but only the increase in the defense budget was widely reported, by CNN, BBC, Reuters, AP, Al-Jazeera,...

The salaries of Chinese soldiers are a pittance, and even a colonel earns less than a secretary at a foreign company in China. Low salaries are an encouragement for corruption. How is a PLA Colonel supposed to pay for his child's education, not to mention anybody lower in the hierarchy? To build up a professional army China needs to spend more. What's so terrible about that? China does not have one base abroad, not one soldier in foreign lands, except in the framework of U.N. peacekeeping missions. China does not take part in any arms race and does not pose a threat to any country in the world.

Most of the budget increase will pay for higher salaries and better training, a little to improve the equipment, so the PLA's capacity to deter potential aggressors is kept at a plausible level.

The 2007 defense budget stands at 7.5% of the total budget, about the same level as in the past few years. In 2005 it accounted for 1.35% of GDP, compared to the 4.03% for the United States. China's defense expenditure accounts for only 6.19% of the military budget of the U.S., although China has a larger population and territory than the U.S.

Compare China's increase in its defense budget with George Bush's additional spending on the lost war in Iraq. Which budget increase is killing innocent civilians?