LONDON, June 25 (UPI) -- Though the U.S. military is pivoting its focus to the Asia-Pacific, the United States is in decline in terms of the global arms trade, Jane's Defense finds.
Analysis published Tuesday by IHS Jane's Defense said defense budgets in the Asia-Pacific are expected to overtake those of the United States and Canada by 2021.
The U.S. military is preparing to shift about 60 percent of its assets to the Asia-Pacific region within the next 10 years. The realignment is part of a so-called pivot strategy focusing on threats from North Korea and others in the region as Middle East military commitments wind down.
IHS said it expects defense budgets from Asian economies will reach $1.6 trillion by 2021, a 9.3 increase from 2013 levels.
China, meanwhile, is relying less on imports to prop up its defense arsenal. Chinese exports of military equipment are on the rise, with Iraq looking to Beijing to bolster its defense structure in the wake of the U.S. occupation. The United States, meanwhile, is starting to look to more imports of defense equipment.
"The global arms market is about to get very turbulent," Jane's analyst Guy Anderson said in a statement from London. "We may already have reached 'peak defense' with the U.S. dominance of the global defense market under threat."
