Countries With the Largest Unofficial Military Forces

Russia’s most notorious paramilitary organization is the Wagner Group, believed to be owned and financed by Yevgeny Prigozhin, an ally of President Vladimir Putin. With tens of thousands of fighters, the private military has taken over fighting in some parts of Ukraine and is believed to be linked to mass killings, according to human rights observers. The U.S. has labeled the group a “significant transnational criminal organization.”

Government paramilitary forces are semi-military entities that can be used for a nation’s internal security or as an auxiliary force to a country’s military. Though not part of a nation’s military, they may have the structure of a military force.

While the term can be used for mercenary forces, rebel groups, militias, and more, in some countries paramilitary forces are officially part of the government. In these nations, these forces are tasked with border security, counterinsurgency, and law enforcement. In other cases, paramilitaries can be private contractors, regulated by some government agency, that can be called upon by the government to support military forces. But the number of paramilitary forces changes greatly between nations. (These are the countries where the most people serve in the military)

To determine the countries with the paramilitary forces, 24/7 Wall St. reviewed 2023 data from GlobalFirepower, an annually updated defense-related statistics website with information on 145 countries. We ranked countries by the number of paramilitary forces in each country and included the number of active-duty and reserve personnel for each country. From Stockholm International Peace Research Institute’s Military Expenditure Database, we included total military spending by country in 2021 and military spending as a percentage of gross domestic product. 2021 population figures come from the World Bank.

Many of the countries with the largest military budgets have expansive paramilitary forces, including India, China, Russia, France, and Saudi Arabia. Some even have more paramilitary personnel than active-duty military personnel. (These are the largest militaries in the world)

India has by far the world’s largest paramilitary force, which is almost the same size in the number as its combined active and reserve forces of 2.6 million, or roughly the same size as the other seven top global paramilitaries. But in an effort to rebrand its five central paramilitary forces, India dropped the word “paramilitary” and replaced it with “armed police” in 2011.

Russia’s soldiers of fortune are estimated to be equal in number to its 250,000 reservists, while the number of Ukraine’s paramilitary soldiers is estimated at 50,000. In fact, Ukraine’s far-right nationalist Azov Battalion, which began in 2014 as a paramilitary group, has since been incorporated as a special unit of Ukraine’s National Guard. 

The U.S. doesn’t officially use paramilitaries, but it has played a role in fostering and deploying private soldiers from its numerous U.S.-based security contracting firms.

In some places, governmental paramilitary forces have been linked to human rights violations and extrajudicial killings. The semi-official or unofficial nature of some paramilitary groups can make it easier for governments to deny responsibility for atrocities. 

Click here to see the countries with the largest unofficial military forces.

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