Conservatives in Germany look to reintroduce compulsory military service

Brussels – In Germany, there is talk again of compulsory conscription. That, at least, is the preferred recipe of some Christian Democrats to revive the Bundeswehr, the German army that has been in decline for decades and which Chancellor Friedrich Merz has said he wants to make the most powerful in Europe. However, there are structural shortcomings that the government in Berlin will have to address, assuming the coalition partners can agree on the political plan.

The “epochal turning point” (Zeitenwende) announced by Friedrich Merz on defense – to make Germany the first continental military power – will also possibly have to pass through the forced conscription of young Germans. So far, only voluntary measures have been discussed to swell the ranks of the army, which now numbers around 181,500 soldiers.

However, such interventions have not had the desired effect; quite the contrary: instead of increasing, the number of personnel in the armed forces is decreasing. Thus, several conservatives are reportedly considering, with increasing seriousness, the reintroduction of compulsory conscription, abolished in 2011 during the chancellorship of Angela Merkel.

According to Thomas Erndl, leader of the CDU delegation to the parliamentary Defense Committee, “it will be necessary to introduce compulsory elements” in the enlistment of the Bundeswehr if the army’s needs “cannot be met through a purely voluntary model,” especially in the light of the new goals that
are about to be agreed upon in NATO (the summit in The Hague on June 24-25 is expected to give the green light to an increase military expenditure to 5 percent of GDP).

The fundamental problem is that the German Armed Forces are in feeble health. For historical and cultural reasons, defense has never been a priority of the chancellors since the post-war period. Thus, the Bundeswehr today suffers from chronic under-investment, which makes Germany an economic giant with feet of clay in the strategic field.

However, the political hurdle may be complicated to overcome. For now, these considerations are mainly circulating among the Christian Democrats. The other partner of the ‘grand coalition’ in power in Berlin, the SPD, is colder on the issue. The government contract between conservatives and social democrats only says that the new model of national military service will be “initially” voluntary, a vague formulation that leaves leeway for different interpretations.

The Minister of Defense, Boris Pistorius, appears to have outlined the SPD’s stance: the Bundeswehr is undersized and needs a robust injection of new personnel. However, in its current condition, it would not even be able to absorb new conscripts. Before compulsory conscription, the Social Democrats reason, it is necessary to increase logistical “capabilities” to support an expansion of personnel in the armed forces. More housing, better-equipped barracks, and adequate facilities are needed.

In short, the enlistment scheme should remain voluntary until there is a satisfactory level of infrastructural readiness. Several voices within the SPD would like to make military service so “attractive” that it could recruit conscripts in large numbers without needing to return to compulsory conscription. It remains to be seen how.

Conservatives and social democrats have seemed in agreement up until now ​on the need to restore Berlin among the Old Continent’s bigwigs in the strategic sphere along with Paris (with whom Merz intends to strengthen the defense cooperation), London, and Warsaw (which wants to acquire a nuclear arsenal as a deterrent against Russian aggression). Recently, the Bundeswehr allocated an armored brigade in Lithuania, marking the first permanent deployment of German troops abroad since 1945.

In the direction of Germany’s rebirth as a military power, important economic decisions are also to be taken, like suspending the constitutional debt constraint (Schuldenbremse) and the activation of the stability Pact safeguard clause as part of the ReArm Europe plan launched by the EU executive.