Military Power.net

Spainvs Turkey

On Global Firepower's 2026 index, Turkey (#9) holds a solid edge over Spain (#18).

  • Spain has aircraft carriers; Turkey has none.
  • Turkey fields 7.7× as many tanks.
  • Turkey fields 7× as many submarines.

Who leads in each area

  1. People and moneyTurkey leads 3 of 4
  2. Land forcesTurkey leads 5 of 5
  3. Air powerTurkey leads 6 of 7
  4. Naval forcesTurkey leads 5 of 7
  5. Nuclear weaponsEven, 0–0

Leads count raw numbers in each category. Larger is not always stronger: a modern fleet can beat a bigger, older one.

People and money

Who can be put in uniform, and how much is spent keeping them there.

$40.2B
Military spending
$30.0B
122K
Active personnel
481K
24K
Reserves
380K
78K
Paramilitary
150K

Spending is SIPRI's 2025 estimate in US dollars (Spain: 2.1% of GDP; Turkey: 1.9% of GDP).

Land forces

Armour and artillery: the weight an army can put on the ground.

298
Tanks
2,284
49K
Armored vehicles
98K
96
Self-propelled artillery
1,045
188
Towed artillery
635
0
Rocket artillery
237

Air power

Fixed-wing and rotary aircraft across all branches.

440
Total aircraft
1,101
136
Fighters
201
12
Attack aircraft
0
169
Helicopters
509
17
Attack helicopters
111
0
Tankers
7
51
Transports
84

Naval forces

Hull counts, from carriers down to patrol boats.

175
Total fleet
192
1
Aircraft carriers
0
0
Helicopter carriers
1
2
Submarines
14
0
Destroyers
0
11
Frigates
17
0
Corvettes
9

Nuclear weapons

Estimated warheads in military stockpiles, January 2026.

0
Warheads
0
0
Deployed warheads
0

Compare other countries

Related matchups

Profiles: Spain and Turkey. Sources: Global Firepower 2026, SIPRI Military Expenditure 2025 (Apr 2026), SIPRI Yearbook 2026: World Nuclear Forces.