This has always been the case.
News this is not but it’s amusing to see the media pretend it is.
German defence minister says military is unfit for problems Europe faces – Boris Pistorius says Germany must be ready to confront Putin as he considers allowing non-nationals to join armed forces.
Yawn. Another “secret report” has been “discovered” somewhere. I hate public secret reports.
Especially when public secret reports like these are nothing other than plans. Normal military plans. Armies plan for everything, that’s what they’re supposed to do. Even when they aren’t real armies, like the Bundeswehr.
Germany ‘preparing for war’ as conflict between NATO and Russia ‘imminent’ – One of the founding principles of NATO is collective defence, which sees all members leaping to the defence of another country part of the alliance if it invokes Article 5.
Referring to a secret Bundeswehr document, a source told German daily Bild that an escalation between Moscow and the Western alliance could start as early as next month.
The confidential document details how the war may erupt, with events and incidents happening month after month.
That means conscription.
Germany mulls reintroduction of compulsory military service – The Bundeswehr is facing a dramatic shortage in personnel. Now Defense Minister Boris Pistorius has rekindled the debate over reintroducing conscription.
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.
Even conscription, something Germany ended in 2011, is also up for debate. “There were reasons at the time to suspend compulsory military service. In retrospect, however, it was a mistake,” Pistorius told newspaper Die Welt earlier in December.
About getting serious?
Don’t take that nonsense seriously, folks. I’m serious.
Wind of change: Germany gets serious about plans to make military ‘fit for war’ – The return of full-scale armed conflict to Europe has Germany dramatically reframing its security policy.
With Russia and Ukraine still locked in combat after nearly two years and a major Israeli-Palestinian conflict underway, the European Union and NATO are feeling their way into a chaotic new world security order – and Europe’s largest economy is shaking up decades-old ideas on what its military is actually for.
In German. “Was,” in English.
So that headline down there doesn’t make much sense – in my mind. The German army was never “was ready” and never will be.
Germany aims for a ‘war-ready’ military – It’s the most momentous shift in German defense priorities since 2011.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is forcing Germany to turn its military into a powerful and well-financed fighting force focused on defending the country and NATO allies, Germany’s chancellor said on Friday.
“Today, nobody can seriously doubt what we in Germany have been avoiding for a long time, namely that we need a powerful Bundeswehr,” Olaf Scholz said on the second day of a political-military conference presenting the deep change in Berlin’s strategic thinking.
“Our peace order is in danger,” he warned, also mentioning the war between Hamas and Israel and adding that Germany needs “a long-term, permanent change of course.”
That means fit for war.
The German army. Today. Fit for war? A small town police force in US-Amerika maybe, but the Bundeswehr? It’ll never happen and everybody here knows it. How ridiculous.
German military must be ‘fit for war’ – German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius has said that the country’s military must become combat-ready quickly. But that will require a major long-term overhaul, and experts doubt that will be easy.
Defense Minister Boris Pistorius warned on Sunday night that in the current global situation, Germany needed to be prepared for war and able to defend the country. But that required a fundamental re-think about what the Bundeswehr was for.
To Australia? I know. But she does seem to have a lot of time on her hands these days.
‘More than annoying’: German minister cancels Pacific trip after plane mishap – German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock was forced Tuesday to call off a foreign policy trip to the Pacific region after two failed attempts to fly from the United Arab Emirates to Australia on a government aircraft.
The canceled visit is just the latest in a string of trips by German officials to be affected by problems with aging government planes. Some experts have ascribed the problems to the policy of buying used aircraft to economize.
This is kind of like leading from behind. Or being led from a behind, if you get my drift.
Germany to unveil first-ever National Security Strategy – Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government is set to unveil Germany’s first National Security Strategy on Wednesday which aims to provide an overview of the country’s foreign policy and ensure a cohesive cross-ministry approach to security.
Germany has had policy documents in the past addressing security but Scholz’s three-way coalition agreed it wanted a more comprehensive strategy in its pact in November 2021.
This is not.
Uh, everybody knows this already. Is it still considered a leak if everybody knew it already? I mean, if it was already leaking? Like, heavily? Germany has never been able to fulfill its NATO obligations. That’s just what it does. That’s its business model.
Germany can’t fulfill NATO obligations, says army chief in leaked memo – A division promised to the transatlantic military alliance isn’t fully battle-ready.
To not be counted on.
Don’t thank us. It’s just what we do. Or don’t do, in this case.
German minister expects Bundeswehr shortages beyond 2030.
German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius has said the country’s military, the Bundeswehr, will not be able to bridge gaps in funding and supplies by 2030.
“We all know that the existing gaps cannot be completely closed by 2030… It will take years. Everyone is aware of that…”
Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced a special fund to raise €100 billion for the Bundeswehr last year, although this has not yet been put to use. The government last week also earmarked €12 billion over the next nine years to supply Ukraine with newly produced weapons and ammunition rather than from German stockpiles.
Observing Hermann 