US increased spending to $684.6 billion, up 6.6 percent from the previous budget China"s defense budget rose to $181.1 billion, up also by about 6.6 percent MUNICH: Global spending on defense rose by 4 percent in 2019, the largest growth in 10 years, led by big increases in the US and China, a study said Friday. The International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) said the rise was fueled by growing rivalries between big powers, new military technologies and rumbling conflicts from Ukraine to Libya. Beijing’s military modernization program — which includes developing new hard-to-detect hypersonic missiles — is alarming Washington and helping drive US defense spending, the IISS said. Its annual “Military Balance” report said the increase alone in US spending from 2018 to 2019 — $53.4 billion — was almost as big as Britain’s entire defense budget. “Spending rose as economies recovered from the effects of the financial crisis, but increases have also been driven by sharpening threat perceptions,” IISS chief John Chipman said, launching the report at the Munich Security Conference. Both the US and China increased spending by 6.6 percent, the report said, to $684.6 billion and $181.1 billion respectively. Europe — driven by ongoing concerns about Russia — stepped up spending by 4.2 percent, but this only brought the continent’s defense budget back to 2008 levels, before the global financial crisis brought cuts. European NATO members have been seeking to increase spending to placate President Donald Trump, who has accused them of freeloading on the US. The mercurial president’s anger over spending has fueled concern about his commitment to the transatlantic alliance, culminating in an explosive 2018 summit where he launched a blistering public attack on Germany. Giving the opening address at the annual security gathering, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier warned that Trump’s “America First” strategy had shaken up the international order and fueled insecurity. “We are witnessing today an increasingly destructive momentum in global politics,” Steinmeier said. “Every year we are getting further and further away from our goal of creating a more peaceful world through international cooperation.” Key elements of the international order that developed after the Second World War have come under increasing challenge. The collapse last year of the Cold War-era Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty and the doubts surrounding the renewal of the New START arms reduction treaty, which expires in 2021, have contributed to the mood of instability, the IISS report said. China’s program of military modernization — described by the IISS as “striking for its scale, speed and ambition” — has unsettled Washington and its allies. In October, Beijing showed off its DF-17 hypersonic glide vehicle — designed to deliver warheads at huge speeds so as to avoid interception. Russia, pursuing its own modernization project, has already announced the entry into service of its own hypersonic missile system. Hypersonic missiles are worrying Western officials, because they are so fast and so manoeuvrable that they make existing defense systems useless and give almost no warning of attack. A senior NATO official warned that in a hypersonic missile strike, it may not even be clear what the target is “until there’s a boom on the ground.” Elsewhere, spending in Asia is booming as the continent’s economic success has allowed countries to invest more in their militaries.