Swedish Minister for Defence Resigns Over Defense Cuts

Swedish Defence, In connection with the budget process for 2008, the leaders of the Alliance parties agreed to examine the prospects of reducing the Swedish Armed Forces' material costs while strengthening Sweden's capability to take part in international operations. This is a step towards completing the conversion process from a defence against invasion to a missions-oriented defence, and realising the Government's ambition to carefully weigh each krona of tax revenue in relation to its benefit to Sweden. 
 
The Government intends to appoint a working group that is to conduct a review of defence costs. There is a broad consensus, reflected in the last two defence programmes and elsewhere, that in comparison with other countries, Sweden has high costs for developing our own defence material, and that developing defence material on our own is, in many instances, not in line with the new role of the Armed Forces. 
 
The conclusion is that, in the long term, it is possible to reduce the level of Armed Forces' material costs by a total of about SEK 3-4 billion at the same time as the capacity to take part in international operations can be increased and strengthened. 
 
It is Mikael Odenberg's assessment that he cannot live up to the agreement made by the party leaders. As a consequence of this, Mr Odenberg today submitted his resignation to Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt. His resignation has been accepted.