Poland Is Building a Defence Arsenal That Depends on More Than One Power

Poland is assembling one of Europe’s most ambitious military modernisation programmes, but its strategy is notable not only for its scale. Warsaw is deliberately building a force around several foreign suppliers, combining American strategic systems with South Korean land warfare equipment and European and Israeli technologies.

The result could give Poland greater flexibility than a force dependent on a single supplier. It could also create a new problem: integrating weapons designed by different defence industries into one operational architecture.

South Korea has become Warsaw’s second defence pillar

The scale of Poland’s turn towards South Korea is particularly striking. SIPRI data show that South Korea supplied 47% of Poland’s major arms imports between 2021 and 2025, compared with 44% from the United States. Italy was a distant third, accounting for 2.2%.

Poland was also responsible for 58% of all South Korean arms exports during the same period, making Warsaw central to Seoul’s rapid emergence as a major European defence supplier.

The relationship goes well beyond individual purchases. Poland has acquired South Korean K2 tanks, K9 self-propelled howitzers, K239 Chunmoo rocket artillery systems and FA-50 light combat aircraft. Warsaw has also sought to expand local production and industrial cooperation, turning procurement into a potential long-term defence-industrial partnership.

That approach reflects a practical calculation. South Korean systems have offered Poland access to large quantities of modern equipment at a time when European production capacity has struggled to satisfy rapidly rising demand. Speed has become an important factor in Warsaw’s procurement decisions.

Washington remains indispensable

South Korea has gained ground, but the United States remains central to Poland’s military architecture.

American equipment covers some of the capabilities Warsaw considers most strategically important, including F-35 fighter aircraft, Patriot air-defence systems and Abrams tanks. In June, Poland received its first F-35 under a procurement programme worth roughly $27 billion.

This creates a division of labour within the Polish armed forces. South Korean equipment is particularly prominent in the army’s conventional ground-force expansion, while American systems provide advanced air power, air and missile defence and other high-end capabilities.

The model also reflects a broader European reality. SIPRI estimates that the United States supplied 48% of all arms transferred to European states between 2021 and 2025. Among European NATO members, the American share was even higher, at 58%.

For Warsaw, therefore, diversification does not mean moving away from Washington. It means reducing the risk of being dependent on Washington alone.

Europe and Israel fill the gaps

The third layer of Poland’s procurement strategy is made up of European and Israeli technologies, particularly sensors, reconnaissance and other specialised systems.

This is where Warsaw’s emerging defence ecosystem becomes more complicated. A military operating American aircraft, South Korean tanks and artillery, European subsystems and Israeli sensors must ensure that these platforms can exchange information and operate together under a common command structure.

Interoperability is therefore becoming almost as important as the weapons themselves.

Poland’s challenge is not unique. Across Europe, governments are purchasing rapidly and from a widening group of suppliers because domestic production cannot immediately satisfy demand. Europe’s arms imports more than tripled between 2016–20 and 2021–25, making the continent the world’s largest regional arms importer.

But Warsaw has taken this diversification further than many European capitals.

Poland is becoming Europe’s procurement test case

Poland’s military expansion is driven by an unusually acute perception of the threat from Russia, combined with the experience of transferring older equipment to Ukraine and then having to replace it.

The scale of the response is reflected in the numbers. Poland accounted for 3.6% of global arms imports between 2021 and 2025, making it the largest arms importer among NATO members. Its imports were 852% higher than during the previous five-year period.

Defence spending has risen accordingly. Poland plans to spend around 4.8% of GDP on defence in 2026, the highest proportion in NATO. At the same time, Warsaw is using European funding mechanisms to expand domestic production, including major contracts backed by the EU’s SAFE programme.

This combination could eventually transform Poland from one of Europe’s biggest arms buyers into a significant defence-production hub.

The real test will be integration

Poland’s multi-supplier strategy offers clear advantages. It allows Warsaw to access equipment from suppliers with different production capacities, avoid excessive dependence on one country and accelerate the expansion of its armed forces.

But every additional supplier adds another layer of logistical and technological complexity.

Training, maintenance, ammunition, spare parts, software and command systems must all be coordinated. A fleet built around several technological ecosystems can become expensive to sustain if platforms cannot share infrastructure or if Poland becomes dependent on separate foreign supply chains for critical components.

That makes Poland an important test case for Europe’s broader rearmament.

The continent is buying more weapons, and increasingly from outside Europe. Yet the strategic question is shifting from how quickly Europe can acquire military hardware to how effectively different systems can be integrated into a coherent European defence architecture.