German politicians and military chiefs call for return of conscription
- Defence minister Boris Pistorius said phase-out of conscription was a ‘mistake’
- From 1956 to 2011 German men had to perform some form of civic service upon turning 18
Political and military figures in Germany have called for a return of compulsory military service.
It comes after the new defence minister Boris Pistorius called the 2011 phase-out of conscription a ‘mistake’ that assisted in alienating the public from civic institutions, according to The Guardian.
The German parliamentary commissioner for the armed forces, Eva Högl of the centre-left SPD, encouraged the government to ask itself whether some type of compulsory military service was necessary to stop staff shortages in the German army’s ranks.
‘We definitely need more personnel in the Bundeswehr,’ she told the Augsburger Allgemeine newspaper.
Meanwhile, the chief of the German navy, Jan Christian Kaack, recently proposed a return of compulsory military service based on the Norwegian model – where men and women undergo an examination when turning 19 but only a small percentage of each group is drafted into the army.
The new defence minister Boris Pistorius (right) called the 2011 phase-out of conscription a ‘mistake’ that assisted in alienating the public from civic institutions
Mr Pistorius said it was the wrong decision to phase out conscription more than 10 years ago
Political and military figures in Germany have called for a return of compulsory military service
Kaack said: ‘I believe that a nation that needs to become more resilient in times like these will have a higher level of awareness if it is mixed through with soldiers.’
The government has meanwhile tried to calm the debate. But the finance minister, Christian Lindner, told Süddeutsche Zeitung: ‘All of our efforts have to be concentrated on strengthening the Bundeswehr as a highly professional army.’
Steffan Hebestreit, a spokesperson for the government, called the debate ‘nonsensical’ on Monday and said that turning the Bundeswehr from a conscript to a professional army ‘could not be reversed from one moment to the next’.
READ MORE: Vladimir Putin will lengthen conscription period for young Russian men from one to two years as his forces get bogged down in Ukraine war
The dispute started during an interview in which Boris Pistorius, the new defence minister, said it was a mistake to phase out conscription more than 10 years ago.
Between 1956 and 2011 German men were required to perform some form of civic service upon turning 18, with youths not wanting to serve in the army having the choice to carry out Zivildienst in civic institutions such as hospitals or homes for elderly people.
After the fall of the Berlin wall, staffing requirements of a smaller army shrunk, and both services were suspended under Angela Merkel’s rule in 2011.
But a clause was allowing the state to put men into the armed forces remains part of the German Basic Law.
Now, army officials have complained of their difficulties in filling the ranks of a Bundeswehr no more than 183,000 strong.
When Pistorius called the phase-out a mistake, the defence minister was explicitly referring not to the threat faced by an aggressive Russian state, but the social acceptance of armed forces in German society.
He said that back in the day there was a conscript ‘at every second kitchen table’, meaning there was ‘always a connection to civic society at large’.
Pistorius added that people have lost awareness that they are part of the state and of society themselves in regard to attacks on firefighters and police officers.
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