{"id":287408,"date":"2024-05-13T06:55:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-13T06:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=287408"},"modified":"2024-05-15T07:31:49","modified_gmt":"2024-05-15T07:31:49","slug":"germany-may-introduce-conscription-for-all-18-year-olds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=287408","title":{"rendered":"Germany may introduce conscription for all 18-year-olds"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jorg Luyken \u2013 The Daily Telegraph May 11, 2024<\/strong><\/h1>\n

Germany is considering introducing conscription for all 18-year-olds, as it looks to\u00a0boost its troop numbers<\/a>\u00a0in the face of Russian military aggression.<\/p>\n

Military planners in Berlin are in the final stages of discussing three options, two of which involve a form of conscription, according to leaked plans reported in the German media.<\/p>\n

Boris Pistorius, the defence minister<\/a>, is set to go public with the official plans by June.<\/p>\n

In one of the options being discussed, Germany would bring back a compulsory military year for young men once they turn 18, which was suspended in 2011, and apply it to women as well. This would require a change to the German constitution, but is seen inside the ministry as most likely to receive societal approval.<\/p>\n

Another option would only apply to 18-year-old men, but would not see everyone selected. They would be required to fill in an online form and could then be chosen for service, according to details leaked to Die Welt newspaper. This is seen by the defence ministry as \u201ca strong signal\u201d to both allies and rivals.<\/p>\n

The third option would avoid compulsory service, focusing instead on \u201coptimising\u201d the current system by engaging in\u00a0more proactive recruitment campaigns<\/a>.<\/p>\n

However, Mr Pistorious is believed to be against that route. During a trip to Washington this week, he said: \u201cI\u2019m convinced that Germany needs a form of military conscription.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr Pistorius, who polls regularly show to be the country\u2019s most popular politician, has previously described the decision to suspend conscription as \u201ca mistake\u201d.<\/p>\n

Its possible reintroduction comes as Germany\u2019s ageing society means the number of soldiers heading into retirement is outstripping the number of new recruits joining up to replace them.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Berlin has also set a target of raising the size of its armed forces from some 180,000 today to more than 200,000.<\/p>\n

The defence ministry is believed to be sceptical that this target can be met without some form of conscription.<\/p>\n

Opposition within government<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Mr Pistorius is likely to face considerable resistance to his plans from inside the German government, however.<\/p>\n

Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, has previously voiced his opposition to such a move, while ministers from junior coalition partners the Free Democrats and the Greens have also stated they would oppose it.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, momentum for reintroducing conscription is growing.<\/p>\n

At its party conference this week, the centre-Right Christian Democrats (CDU), Germany\u2019s main opposition party, reversed its stance by voting for a motion to support the \u201creintroduction of conscription in a step-by-step process\u201d.<\/p>\n

Mr Pistorius has signalled an openness to working across party lines, saying he was \u201cpleased that the CDU is on a similar path to the one I have been working on\u201d.<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Germany considers re-introducing conscription to address military manpower shortages and what it sees as a growing potential threat from Russia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":285170,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-287408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-Current_Affairs"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=287408"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287408\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":287411,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287408\/revisions\/287411"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/285170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=287408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=287408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=287408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}