You have commented 339 times on Rantburg.

Your Name
Your e-mail (optional)
Website (optional)
My Original Nic        Pic-a-Nic        Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Bold Italic Underline Strike Bullet Blockquote Small Big Link Squish Foto Photo
Submit your comments on this article
Europe
Afghanistan Puts Germans Off Military Career
2008-08-29
The German army is facing a shortage of recruits. Demographics play a role in the problem, but so too do poor pay and conditions. However, army representatives say the biggest problem is the dangerous mission in Afghanistan.

German political pundits are fond of pointing out that, should Barack Obama be elected as the next president of the United States, it will be much more difficult for Germany to turn him down should he ask Berlin for help in the world's hotspots.
No, it won't be hard at all, as the Germans will show Obama ...
But recent statistics show that even should the political will exist, the German army might have trouble mustering the soldiers necessary.

According to a Friday report in the daily Die Welt, demographic trends in Germany may lead to a dwindling number of young Germans willing to join the military. Consistently low birth rates in Germany mean that the number of high school graduates in Germany will fall from 974,000 in 2007 to 781,000 in 2020 -- a drop of 20 percent.

That, though, isn't the only problem facing the Bundeswehr, as Germany's army is called. There are indications that the army is already losing its shine as a career choice, with the German Army Federation -- a kind of trade union for the armed forces -- claiming that the country's Afghanistan mission has led to a 50 percent drop in applications in 2008.
Apparently the army isn't a good career choice if it's going to, well, fight ...
The German Defense Ministry on Thursday dismissed these figures, but admitted that in the first half of 2008 it had seen 16 percent fewer applicants to become officers and 11 percent fewer for lower grades. The ministry argued that this was a normal fluctuation and that it expected application numbers for all of 2008 to be similar to the previous year. The ministry also said that while around 10 percent of officers break off their careers early, these numbers are consistent with previous years.

Still, the army is still facing that future demographic dip and Bernhard Gertz, the chairman of the German Army Federation, told the Frankfurter Zeitung that the Bundeswehr has to "draw serious conclusions from the growing problem of finding a younger generation."
It's not a demographic 'dip', it's going to continue. There is no evidence that native Germans are going to reverse the birth rate decline.
For Reinhold Robbe, the German parliament's military commissioner, demographics are not at the root of the problem. He told the Berliner Zeitung that it was more an issue of the "attractiveness" of a life in the army. He said that highly-qualified officers have to work under dangerous conditions and increasingly long hours, and at the end of the month they come home with less in their pockets than if they worked in the civilian economy.
You could fix that last part ...
"There has to be a sober analysis of who earns what doing which tasks," he said in comments published on Friday. Robbe, whose job involves speaking regularly to soldiers about their concerns, believes that another reason for the drop off in Germans pursuing a military career is the toll it takes on family life. "The Bundeswehr has obviously been too late in realizing that the balance between family and career is becoming increasingly important."

Gertz's deputy at the German Army Federation, Ulrich Kirsh told the Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung on Thursday that economic concerns are not the only reason for a drop in applications. A soldier serving in Afghanistan gets a tax-free bonus of €92.03 for every day served, he pointed out, "but pay isn't everything." It is the danger of the mission in Afghanistan that is making prospective soldiers think twice about a military career. He said that the latest German casualty in Afghanistan -- the death of a 29-year-old master sergeant in a bomb attack by the Taliban on Wednesday -- brought home the fact that death and injury was a part of that mission.
This is with the Germans serving in the 'safe north' of Afghanistan, and being prohibited from being in direct combat. If their current mission worries German officers and NCOs, imagine what a real fight will do.

Congratulations to the West, to NATO, to liberals and reds and greens: you've succeeded in emasculating the Germans ...
Posted by:GolfBravoUSMC

#18  Instapundit once noted that while Europeans obviously know where *babies* come from, they're not nearly as clear as to where *adults* come from.
Posted by: Seafarious   2008-08-29 23:16  

#17  Personally, I think we went too far in de-militarizing Germany, and the French Socialists went to far in de-militarizing France. It seems to me the French soldiers have always fought bravely and well when well-led. I have no quarrel with the Pouilus.
Posted by: Deacon Blues   2008-08-29 21:00  

#16  A strong military will rise again from the land we call Germany. It's just that, the next time it does, it'll be made up of men whose great grandfathers were called Ottoman Turks. Just to be clear, that's not a good thing.

Doesn't matter who the next president is. Given Europe's demographic trends, it's now time to figure ways of getting the nukes out of Europe while all is peaceful and not under undue muslim control or influence.

Posted by: MarkZ   2008-08-29 20:53  

#15  Them and what army? - JFM

Well, at their rate of population decline, it will be a pair of German shepherds and a company of old men in a few years.
Posted by: DarthVader   2008-08-29 20:20  

#14  This is as good a place to say it as any: I'm very grateful for the perspective our two regular French commenters, A5089 and JFM, bring to the 'Burg. Their remarks are always cogent and informative, they present observations that we don't get from anyone else, and they make me remember that there are still some Euros with whom we can proudly make common cause.

Well done, messieurs. Merci beaucoup!
Posted by: Jolutch Mussolini7800   2008-08-29 19:21  

#13  JFM, you're sounding more like TGF every day. But not as wistful.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble   2008-08-29 17:56  

#12   If Germany decides to invade France again, watch the enlistments soar

Them and what army? Whatever they were, the Germans
are no more: remember those _huge_ demùonstyrations "Better red than dead"?
Posted by: JFM   2008-08-29 17:00  

#11  Well, you know, the Afghans fight back - If Germany decides to invade France again, watch the enlistments soar.....snark
Posted by: Angererong Poodle8773   2008-08-29 15:46  

#10  Two world wars and a holocaust later, Germany is a nation of wimps and welfare mooches. Who says there is no justice?
Posted by: regular joe   2008-08-29 13:46  

#9  Also after decades of deriding patriotism in order to make way for the UE anyone wonders if peope no longer want to die for their counties?
Posted by: JFM   2008-08-29 12:32  

#8  Truly a double-edged development. Pathetic, yet welcome in its own unique way. It would be a bit more welcome if US officials would point out, and German officials acknowledge, that German views on big international issues facing the US lack credibility because of Germany's inability to carry its own weight. Their dependence and cowardice (nationally) ought to make them diffident - and nitwit American "critics" should be nuked when they cite German views on adult matters.

Sort of allows us to finally safely retire one of my old Cold War favorites: "I love Germany so much, I want there to be two of them"
Posted by: Verlaine   2008-08-29 12:00  

#7  I wonder how much rules of engagement play into this. Would you want to serve in an Army where you can't be proactive about stopping an ambush?

Al
Posted by: Frozen Al   2008-08-29 11:12  

#6  Even a former in the French Army whose service was in the command company of an engineer regiment in ana armored division was horrified after seeing german soldiers go in groups to supermarkets and buy beer in supermarkets while in uniform.

I know this doesn't necessarily reflect combat prowess but it gives an impression of German army becoming lax, lacking discipline and not caring about its image between the public (who sooner or later ends tranishing its image in siol;diers eyes).
Posted by: JFM   2008-08-29 11:08  

#5  A soldier serving in Afghanistan gets a tax-free bonus of €92.03 for every day served, he pointed out, "but pay isn't everything."

This is serious money. That's $4,000 per month served, on top of base pay.
Posted by: Zhang Fei   2008-08-29 11:01  

#4  I have a hard time believing that socialists would not intentionally make the army an unattractive career, by sabotaging its budget and working conditions at every turn.
Posted by: gromky   2008-08-29 09:26  

#3  Of course in the case of Germany this is not necessarily a bad thing.

I'll concur on that one.

...but so too do poor pay and conditions.

Yeah, that one too is a little hard for socialist bureaucrats to comprehend.
Posted by: Procopius2k   2008-08-29 09:03  

#2  German political pundits are fond of pointing out that, should Barack Obama be elected as the next president of the United States, it will be much more difficult for Germany to turn him down should he ask Berlin for help in the world's hotspots.

Wanna bet?
Posted by: tu3031   2008-08-29 08:20  

#1  Darwin was right. Two world wars killed off a disproportionate number of the historically courageous Germans leaving mostly the wimpier subspecies to reproduce. Of course in the case of Germany this is not necessarily a bad thing.
Posted by: Glenmore   2008-08-29 08:10  

00:00