German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius accelerates the process of restoring compulsory military service in Germany. According to the publication, he made an order to develop a model of German military service by April 1, which will be adapted to modern threats and plays a significant role in strengthening national sustainability.
Pistorius intends to make proposals for a model of military conscription. He considers the possibility of introducing a Swedish military conscription system.
According to the newspaper, the Minister of Defense of Germany ordered the development of a model of compulsory military conscription by April 1, which takes into account current challenges.
Compulsory military service was stopped in Germany in 2011. Pistorius explained that this has led to insufficient frames for the Bundeswehr. In Germany, military service is voluntary in Germany, and women have always been released from compulsory military service under the Basic Law of 1949.
The chairman of the German defense department noted that the introduction of the Swedish model provides changes in these rules. German military experts have supported this initiative, believing that it will contribute to the involvement of more people in the army and help overcome a personnel crisis.
It should be noted that compulsory military service has been restored in Sweden since 2017. In Sweden, all school graduates are required to military service, and then those who are suitable for military service are selected from the army. Sweden has managed to gather enough volunteers for the Armed Forces in recent years.
However, the exact implementation of this model in Germany is unlikely. In Sweden, about 10% of school graduates are involved in the army, which means training 40,000 annually. The military lacks barracks and simulators for this scale. A realistic figure for Germany would be a set of 3000 or 4000 conscripts, said Pistorius at one of the Munich Safety Conference.
Another problem with the restoration of compulsory military service is the issue of justice. In Germany, the Constitutional Court had previously decided that as many persons should be called as possible, not just a limited number.
Earlier, Lieutenant General Karsten Breer said that many Bundeswehr structures were hindering purposeful decisions. He pointed to the shortcomings in the preparation of the German Armed Forces for the defense of the country and NATO.
NATO has warned that bureaucratic red tape can cause serious delays in the movement of troops in Europe in the event of a conflict with Russia. In 2024, NATO plans to involve more than 40,000 servicemen. Joint workouts will be the largest since the Cold War.
