GERMAN DEFENCE minister Karl Theodor zu Guttenberg has called for the number of soldiers in the army, the Bundeswehr, to be reduced by one-third and for compulsory conscription to be suspended.
As part of the government’s austerity package, the defence ministry has been ordered to cut €8 billion from its budget. Yesterday the minister outlined five proposals to do so, and recommended one plan that would in effect suspend the post-war principle of conscription.
“The military will become smaller but better and more operational,” said Mr Guttenberg of a plan to reduce the number of soldiers by one-third to 170,000.
Rather than remove conscription entirely from the post-war constitution, he recommended making conscription voluntary rather than compulsory, with the option of reversing this later.
“I’m always amazed by those geniuses who know what the world will look like in the 20 or 30 years,” he said in Berlin yesterday.
“I don’t, and therefore believe we need the option of drafting young people if that becomes necessary.”
Conscription was introduced by west Germany’s post-war leaders as part of a “citizens in uniform” concept intended to prevent the rise of a military elite and a militaristic culture that had played a central part in the two World Wars.
But since the 1980s a falling birthrate and the rise in conscientious objection has left the Bundeswehr struggling to meet its annual recruitment goals. Only a minority of each year’s cohort opt for nine months’ military service – down to just six months since July – with the rest opting for social work in retirement homes and hospitals.
Mr Guttenberg suggested it was time to offer young people a “trial” period of between 12 and 23 months in the army, which could then lead to full-time recruitment in the professional army.
The minister’s remarks may boost his popular image as a straight-talking politician but will draw massive resistance from the ruling Christian Democrats (CDU), the last political defender of the conscription principle.
All opposition parties and the CDU’s junior coalition partner, the Free Democrats, have called for its abolition or suspension.
Chancellor Angela Merkel has said it is important to “think anew” about the military but has refused to be drawn on the issue in detail.
In characteristic Merkel style, she seems content to wait and see how the debate develops before taking a position in the issue.