SAF Budget

Ponders SG

When SAF buys things like F15 or new toys...

where in the Annual budget is this item placed?

I never see their one-time off purchases reflected on annual budgets leh.

Fairyland SG

I'm curious too.

Compared to the Home Affairs ministry....you can see allocation for patrol boats, Project Rampart etc.

Ponders SG

I also noticed that Ministry of Homa Affairs have detailed manpower strength like how many Police officers, how many Gurkhas,etc.

In Mindef's budget, only Mindef is detailed. SAF is just part of the military expenditure.

Look at line number 2900. http://www.mof.gov.sg/budget_2005/expenditure_estimates/toc.html

I am just wondering how do they "hide" big expenditures... they managed to maintain somewhat constant budget size every year...

but they can shop for

1) 1200 5- tonners... (if one SBS bus is about $300,000), using this figure... then 1200 5 tonners costs 3.6 billion.

2) F-15, 2 billion?

3) Apaches, 2 billion?

4) Chinook, 1 billion?

Hmm... i can't be bothered to check the exact amount but i guess it is in that region?

Orcishwarrior SG

if anyone knows how!! then it wouldnt be classified.Somehow its believe that SAF spend exceeding the figure given in yearly financial budget allocated to relevant ministries.

ditzy SG

That means the f-15 haven't order yet lor. Laughing

duotiga83 SG

contract has sign leh.....

Deportivo SG

MINDEF always gets around 4-6% of our GDP.

kelong70 SG

It’s great to see our defence budget increases every year. With almost S$10b, i doubt any country in SEA can match ours… Haha. That’s hell lots of money in terms of land mass.

Ponders SG

proportionately... i think singapore spend more than USA.

let me see.. USA during non-war time spends about US$260b, and their army active strength ... say about 950,000.

SIngapore spends about US$6b and our active strength 60,000.

260b/950,000 = 274 000 per soldier

6b/60,000 = 100, 000.

hmm. damn... they still spend more.

kelong70 SG

Your figures are very misleading leh.

(1) 1200 trucks at $300k each cost $360m not $3.6b.

(2) The F-15 cost $1b.

(3) Apaches cost under $1b.

(4) I reckon Chinook cost $1b, maybe around $500m. And purchase of chinook is sometimes back liao. Not recent.

The above 3 adds up surely lesser than $5b, given the trucks dun cost so much when bought in bulks. With $9.6b to spent on operation, we can still buy more toys.

Ponders SG

I warn you already mah.. i did not check up the real facts haha. I based it on what i thought i remembered.

But for tonners, 300k each is a very conservative estimate. because rumours i heard is they go for 500k each. So to make a good estimate i base it on a more or less similar vehicle for which i know the cost..

SBS bus is a Volvo chassis but singapore assembled shell. Significant cost savings there. Our tonner are fully German build and with, military grade transmission. I would say they are way over $300k.

300k x 1200.. hmm... yeah.. sorry.. my mistake. haha

but it shows i can be a good politician. Mr. Green

mrwonderful SG

An SAF Tonner cost half a mil

beavan SG

if i’m right,there’s a special budget for purchases of such equipment..this budget is outside of the budget that is allocated to the SAF for training and maintance of the unit strength..

fudgester SG

In absolute terms, the US of couse spends more on the military than anyone else.

In relative terms though, we actually spend more than the US. We spend about 4.79% of GDP on the military. Refer to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singapore_Armed_Forces

Meanwhile, the US spends about 3.7% of its GDP on its military:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_military_budget

Fairyland SG

Don't recall exactly, but I think ~$8billion is logged under operational expenditure.

More transparent if there is a breakdown on this huge figure.

Ponders SG

$4 billion to fund sai kang.

$ 4 billion to enlist ppl to do sai kang.

RaTtY81 SG

hmm will tis become another nkf ah? Laughing

|-|05| SG

I doubt they will ever be more transparent. I mean there are secret projects. And if they had a listing that states "secret projects" then they might as well dump everything in there.

donchoo SG

US is made up of voluntary professional soldiers, we're conscripts by law. But to spend 100, 000 on conscripts is still alot. What about defence spending in switzerland? anyone knows how much is it per man?

Ponders SG

From wikipedia..i dunno how accurate but the number seems too big.

they have 200,000 active strength. expenditures US$2.5billion (wikipedia is 1998 figure, latest CIA is $2.5b)

That's much less than singapore.

But i know their funding for navy is $0.