At the end of October, the Bundeswehr said it counted 181,383 soldiers in its ranks — that’s still some distance from the target of 203,000 that the German military hopes to reach by 2025. This has given rise to concern in times of Russia’s war against Ukraine, which has once again reminded Germans how quickly conflicts can erupt in Europe.
Since taking office at the beginning of 2023, Defense Minister Boris Pistorius has been thinking about ways to make the Bundeswehr more attractive as a career. He said he has received 65 concrete proposals from his ministry on recruitment and reforming training methods.
I thought Latvia reinstated military service to ensure enough trained people to resist a possible Russian invasion. Is that correct? And, if so, is this not a worthy cause?
Genuine question, since I live far away and don’t have to worry about being invaded by Russia.
That is the goal of reinstating the sevice, yes, and many of my countrymen would see it as a worthy cause. Idea is that mandatory drafting will only happen if not enough volunteers apply but I also read that they intend every (male) citizen to have some participation in this before 27.
I firmly reject this notion, however. There is no cause worthy enough to forego a persons individual freedoms.
There are no official exemptions for freedom of thought or religion (although our constitution should in theory allow this). Dodging is a felony, being a felon is an exemption however.
The whole ordeal is completely ludicrous too. The compensation is 300 euros (600 for volunteers(?!)) a month, the duration is 11 months. Obviously only men get drafted, women are for some reason exempt (MOD states this matter of factly that currently it is enough to draft only men).
And after finishing this military service you are forever in military reserves, which has its own obligations such as mandatory periodic training.
There is however some murky “alternative service”, which technically does not involve direct military service. There are no concrete details here but generally it is thought that this will entail working in some MOD office type deal.
The reasons for the uncertainty is that the first draft was filled with volunteers.
Thanks for replying. With Latvia being in NATO, why do you think the government is implementing the draft? To my mind, it seems extremely unlikely that Russia would attack a NATO member. And if Russia did attack NATO, it would be an absolute shitstorm involving every regular army in Europe, North America, and the UK. Implementing a draft in a NATO country seems like a great political risk to take for a very unlikely event.
It is hard to say, I do not follow politics closely enough to have real guesses as to the reasoning. The MOD official stance for this specific question is referencing NATO Northatlantic treaty Article 3 and also that “the situation in Ukraine has demonstrated the need for strong defensive military”.
Afaik the Baltics are seen as a strategic sore spot for NATO and in case of invasion it would be hard to defend, especially in a timely matter. Although that I think changes with our nordic friends joining NATO.