NationStates Jolt Archive

I am new to the game and I was wondering how to make a military. I am not offensive. I just want to be able to defend my nation. Any help would be nice. Thank you for your time.

Go to international Indidents and search for Storefront threads and buy equipment.

Typically %5 of your pop is in the military, if your government is more warlike I suppose you could jump it 2 or 3 percent.

There is also realistic spending. if you are a 1 million man nation certainly you couldnt afford 1,000 M1A1's, justy keep is realistic.

For now I reccemond you invest in rifles and light ground equipment.


I am not sure, but I believe that the formula was something like this

GNP = PopX30,000

Govermnemnt Revenue = Tax % (which is always stated on your frontpage)
Military Budget = 5% to 10% of Revenue

Here's a calculator:

http://www.sunsetrpg.com/nsxmlparser.php

See the answers in this thread:

http://forums2.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=386427

Modern, peacetime militaries should be 1-2% of population; 5% is like, Total War conditions

It's more like 2-3% of the labour force (peacetime, modern western style army), but everyone here tends to use total population.

Well, its less fuss that way~ XD

IF you want a realistic understanding how nations spend money got to www.cia.gov

choose the cia world book and have a look at individual nations.

ie.

the US has a population of around 300 million federal budget of around 1.5 trillion and spends about 400 billion on defence, its GDP is somewhere around 10 trillion dollars (although some estimates have it as high as 40 trillion). thats the federal govt budget, then you have the state budgets which include police, also the defence budget may or may not include intelligence and paramilitary orgs such as the CIA/FBI/coast guard.

the US has around has about 5000 fighters plus support, supply refueling AEW, int/spy aircraft, it has about 1 million men under arms in the army, and 300 major surfact combat vessels with about 12 aircraft carriers, 2000 odd jets, and 100 odd submarines.

the US also has a marine core which combine air power, light carriers, armour.

the US also has a nuclear detterent of 10,000 odd nukes including ICBM, SLBM, field artilliary, cruise missiles and other bits and pieces.

Australia has a federal budget of around 150 billion AUD (120 billion US), and a GDP around 800 billion AUD (700 billion USD) defence spending is around $15billion and populaiton of around 20million. AUs is a relatively wealthy nation for such a small populaiton

it has about 15 major surface combat vessels which in 2010 will include 6 aegis destroyers, 4 anzac FFGs and 5 perry class FFGs, it has 80 FA18s and 35 F111 but will be moving to either 100 JSFs or 100 ATFs in the next decade, and it has about 30,000 regulars and 30,000 reserves in the army.

Aus forces are highly trained and well equiped.

In between you have a nations like france and the UK.

both have nuclear SSBNs and SSNs

france has 2 50,000 tonne carrier and about 100 surface combat vessels and maybe 200,000 troops and its own defence infrastructure.

the UK has 3 20,000 carriers and 1 20,000 assault ship but will be moving to 2 *50,000 carriers in the next decade and has about 200,000 men under arms including highly specialised forces such as the paras, SAS, SBS, RMs, gurkhas and its own defence infrastruture.

both nations ahve a population of about 60 million and spend about 100 billion on defence per annum..

so there are some numbers for you.

basically if your a wealthy nation of around 20 million you can base your defence around nations like israel or australia (one is a highly tactical army, the other a peacetime strategic force).

the UK/France if your a wealthy 60 to 100 million population nation.

or the US if your around 300 million.

you can also go for 'cheapie' options such as indonesia with a population of around 150 million people, they have a MASSIVE army, but maybe 30 odd major surface combat vessels and 250 odd jets, or an

emergent nation such as CHina and India who are both seriously upgrading their defence forces with capital spending (India is purchasing and retrofitting former soviet heavy carriers after using ex brit hulls for 50 odd years). both have nuclear detterents.

china has about 10million infantry and very little in the way comparitively in air force and navy.

the soviets at their peak had 600 major surface combat vessels, but they had no ammunition, little fuel, and spent upwards of 80% of their time in dock, while the US maintained at least 50% of their time on the sea, so the US effectively had 150 major combat vesselts capable of warfighting (ie not caught napping) while the Soviets maybe had 120 out at sea, mostly inferior in quality armament and technology to their US counterparts)).

hope that helps.