2. China
It’s hard to know exactly what the Chinese spend on defense, but we know it’s significant. Remember, this is the nation who keeps forming new islands for staging war in the Pacific. We do know they’ve expanded their spend by over 12% in the last year, something over $126-billion, but that’s an estimate. It may be higher. They’re also not above “borrowing” other country’s technologies, like the new F-35 design. What’s really impressive about China is the number of soldiers they maintain, 2.3-million, with as many reserves. That’s almost 5-million when needed.