Should Germany become a military superpower again?
This is a discussion on Should Germany become a military superpower again? within the Geo-strategic Issues forum, part of the Global Defense & Military category; I have noticed that ever since WWII the German military has decreased in size over the years almost non-stop too ...
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Should Germany become a military superpower again?
I have noticed that ever since WWII the German military has decreased in size over the years almost non-stop too so I was wondering. Should Germany re-arm its armed forces and increase its size to at least 1 million troops and even make its own fighters, bombers, tanks and ships? I have posted a poll as well to see what everyone here thinks?
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Actually, the German Military grew constantly between the late 50s and late 80s (1985: 500k active, 800k reserve plus 40k paramilitary). The Cold War plans drawn up in the early 60s - and severely reduced by the late 60s - called for 520k active soldiers, almost reached in 1985 to 1989 with constant increase until then.
Only post-Cold-War, troop numbers were reduced - and are still well above 50s levels today. Besides which, Germany is still subject to 2+4 and CFE - and hence limited to 350k soldiers, only 140% of the current level.
Besides which - what would you need 1 million soldiers for? Btw, Germany "does make its own fighters, bombers, tanks and ships".
That's three times the current US levels - or, even including the vast paramilitary forces, still twice the Chinese levels!
The world doesn´t need another superpower, nor there is a need for Germany for beeing one. The existing military powers make things bad enough quite now.
We could discuss if it wouldn´t be wise to keep more self-defense-capabilities, especially heavy equipment, apart from that Germanies economical power guaranties wealthiness and safety- what more should it need?
Wait what? I think he meant that 1 million men in the armed forces overall. And I don't think Germany has the population for that.
1 million soldiers in Germany would mean three times the engaged manpower per population in comparison to the USA currently, or twice the engaged manpower per population in comparison to China (when including the 4.5 million or so paramilitary forces).
Of course Germany has the population to support 1 million men at peacetime. We'd just need to extent conscription to the same length as Israel, and presto, 1 million men and women in the Bundeswehr.
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I mean there is a recommended demographic ratio of soldiers to population, and I can't be over 1% before the adverse effects start to compound on the economy.
Always depends. You can always feed back soldiers into economic processes, such as by taking over certain branch industries (construction is always a favourite of course), or you can try to get below such critical levels by engaging a good proportion of soldiers in more-or-less paramilitary uses.
Today in peacetime Israel is at 2.4%, Greece is at 1.6%, Turkey at 1.4%. West Germany in the late 80s with 500k soldiers was at a mere 0.8% (East Germany was at 0.9% during the same time), and even with 1 million soldiers today would still be well below Turkish levels.
On a somewhat lighter note, the 2002/2003 Lamy-Verheugen-Plan would have entered the Bundeswehr into a standing national 600,000-man field army at the time, with 150,000 combatant paramilitaries and wartime reserves pushing this to easily around 1.7 million relatively readily available. With 650+ fighter jets, a 250-unit navy, and 2,200 MBTs (without reserves).
On a somewhat lighter note, the 2002/2003 Lamy-Verheugen-Plan would have entered the Bundeswehr into a standing national 600,000-man field army at the time, with 150,000 combatant paramilitaries and wartime reserves pushing this to easily around 1.7 million relatively readily available. With 650+ fighter jets, a 250-unit navy, and 2,200 MBTs (without reserves).
Now that would have been a military superpower.
NO, IMO that only makes them a military power. To be a military superpower, you'd need to be mroe numerical superior, nuke's, and power projection capability with your navy and air force.
Wouldnt that bring germany into the level of UK and France? A superpower would need significantly more than that.
For a country as small as Germany that does not have the vast size of USA and Soviet Union, to be considered a superpower, it would need to have a huge power projection capability through its Navy and Air force to compensate for that.
