Introduction
How is the Military in Armenia and how does it work to maintain Sucity and fight terrorism? In terms of Military and security forces, we have the Armenian Republic Armed Forces: Armenian Army (includes land, air, air defense forces) (2025).
In Armenia, the Armenian Armed Forces were officially established in 1992, although their origins go back to 1918; the modern military’s missions include deterrence, territorial defense, crisis management, humanitarian assistance, and disaster response, as well as socio-economic development projects; territorial defense is its primary focus, particularly in regards to tensions with neighboring Azerbaijan; Armenia and Azerbaijan engaged in open conflicts over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh enclave in 1991-94 and 2020; Azerbaijan seized the entire enclave in 2023
Armenia has traditionally had close military ties with Russia; it has been a member of the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) since 1994 and committed troops to CSTO's rapid reaction force until suspending its engagement in 2024; Armenia has relations with NATO going back to 1992 when Armenia joined the North Atlantic Cooperation Council; in 1994, it joined NATO’s Partnership for Peace program and has contributed to the NATO force in Kosovo, as well as the former NATO deployment in Afghanistan (2025)
Armenia has traditionally had close military ties with Russia; it has been a member of the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) since 1994 and committed troops to CSTO's rapid reaction force until suspending its engagement in 2024; Armenia has relations with NATO going back to 1992 when Armenia joined the North Atlantic Cooperation Council; in 1994, it joined NATO’s Partnership for Peace program and has contributed to the NATO force in Kosovo, as well as the former NATO deployment in Afghanistan (2025)
Security and military information of Armenia
| Military and security service personnel strengths | approximately 40-50,000 active Armenian Armed Forces (2025) |
|---|---|
| Military equipment inventories and acquisitions | the military's inventory includes mostly Russian and Soviet-era equipment; in recent years however, Armenia has looked to other countries besides Russia to provide military hardware, including France and India (2025) |
| Military service age and obligation | 18-27 for voluntary (men and women), contract (men and women) or compulsory (men) military service; contract military service is 3-12 months or up to 5 years; conscripts serve 24 months; all citizens aged 27-50 are registered in the military reserve and may be called to serve if mobilization is declared (2025). note: in 2023, Armenia approved six-month voluntary service for women, after which they have the option to switch to a five-year contract; previously, women served on a contract basis; as of 2021, women made up about 10% of the active-duty military |
| Military deployments | . |
| Military expenditures | |
| Military Expenditures 2024 | 5.5% of GDP (2024 est.) |
| Military Expenditures 2023 | 5.5% of GDP (2023 est.) |
| Military Expenditures 2022 | 4.3% of GDP (2022 est.) |
| Military Expenditures 2021 | 4.4% of GDP (2021 est.) |
| Military Expenditures 2020 | 5% of GDP (2020 est.) |
All Important Facts about Armenia
Want to know more about Armenia? Check all different factbooks for Armenia below.
