Bangladesh has gone up 11 notches in the Global Firepower's 2019 Military Strength Ranking, becoming the third most powerful military in South Asia after India and Pakistan.
With a PwrIndx rating of 0.7156, Bangladesh advanced to 45th in the 2019 index from 56th place of the previous ranking.
The ranking assessed the militaries of 137 countries by using over 55 factors, such as geography, logistical flexibility, natural resources and local industry, to determine a country’s ranking and Power Index (PwrIndex) score.
A perfect PwrIndex score is 0.0000, which is realistically unattainable. The closer countries are to that number, the more powerful their military is. For example, the Power Index rating for the US is 0.0615.
Among other South Asian countries, India (4th) ranked most powerful military followed its neighbour Pakistan, which who comes at 15th place. For India, the Power index stands at 0.1065 and for Pakistan, it is 0.2798.
With the exclusion of the Maldives, the tiny Himalayan country of Bhutan has the least powerful military in the world while Nepal (120) and Sri Lanka (90) have the second- and third-least powerful military respectively in the region, according to the ranking.
BANGLADESH MILITARY STRENGTH
With an annual $1.59 billion defence budget, Bangladesh has a total of 160,000 active military personnel and no reserved force, according to the Global Firepower.
The country's total aircraft strength stands at 175 including both fixed-and rotary-wing systems with a total of 45 fighters and 59 helicopters.
Its land strength consists of 340 combat tanks, 340 towed artilleries and 36 rocket projectors while the naval strength is built with a total of 89 naval vassals including six frigates and two submarines.
TOP TEN MILITARY POWERS
Apart from this, the United States (0.0615) ranked top, followed by Russia (0.0639), China (0.0673) and India.
France, Japan, South Korea, the United Kingdom, Turkey and Germany are the countries that made to the top 10 powerful militaries in the ranking.
Recognized nuclear powers receive a bonus, but their nuclear stockpiles are not factored into the score. Landlocked countries are not docked for lacking a navy, but countries with navies are penalized if their fleets lack diversity. Helicopter carriers are included alongside traditional fleet carriers in the ranking.
NATO countries get a slight bonus because the alliance theoretically shares resources, but in general, a country’s current political and military leadership was not considered though financial health and stability are.