The Ministry of Defense is planning for a significantly increased Bundeswehr reserve. As in the Cold War, this should be trained and equipped so that it can reinforce or replace the active troops in combat, said Lieutenant General Alexander Hoppe, Deputy Inspector General and Commissioner for Reservist Affairs, to the German Press Agency.
The aim of the military planners is to have up to 60,000 men and women as reservists in a so-called basic order in the future, who are planned and qualified for a fixed task in this status. Hoppe said: “I am convinced that we have to adapt the reserve completely to the current security policy challenges so that it can properly support the Bundeswehr in carrying out its task of national and alliance defense.”
The military expects that around 10,000 retiring temporary or professional soldiers per year could be recruited for this basic order. There are currently around 44,000 men and women on basic orders.
The ministry is also examining the number of people who could be called up and suitable for service in the event of a defense (“unordered reservist activity”). This refers to citizens who have served in the Bundeswehr but have not been called up. This group is large, but has been shrinking since conscription was suspended in 2011.
“There are different figures. We assume that there are about 800,000 who can still be called up under military law. In principle, that includes everyone who has served in the Bundeswehr at some point and has left and is within the age limits, including the last generation of conscripts,” said Hoppe.
An additional problem will arise in the coming decades: “But if you consider the age problem, then you also know that the number is decreasing every year. It is shrinking every year. That means we have to counteract this and also find and recruit additional staff for the reserve.”
However, for NATO’s revised defense plans, the Bundeswehr, which has shrunk to 181,500 soldiers last year despite a so-called personnel offensive, will have to grow significantly. NATO’s plans will mean an increase in the personnel target from the current 203,000 soldiers to “a trend well over 272,000” men and women in the armed forces, reports “Spiegel”. The reserve can only be one building block in this process.
Defense Minister Boris Pistorius (SPD) will explain his proposal for a model of conscription on Wednesday. “We need military service as a basis for rapid growth and the staying power of our armed forces in the event of a defense,” said Pistorius on Friday at an event organized by the industry association of family businesses in Berlin. The reserve must also be significantly increased.
“It doesn’t work without reserves. We’re seeing that in Ukraine,” said Hoppe. That has to get into everyone’s heads. The structures have to be such that these reserve units can be integrated into the active troops. “All of that existed during the Cold War, but it has been neglected for 30 years and simply no longer exists. There are still a very few who still know that. We’re tapping into them in order to reflect the capabilities,” he said.
The aim is to equip and train reserve companies or reserve battalions so that they can be seamlessly integrated into the operational leadership of a brigade. “If you look at Ukraine, we simply do not have the sustainability or the capacity to grow as we currently stand. For this we need a reserve that is able to completely replace forces,” said Hoppe.
Specialists are needed, but “also simply masses”, for example for tasks in homeland security, i.e. for securing the infrastructure, transport routes and military installations in Germany. For some time now, volunteers who were not previously in the Bundeswehr have also been trained for this purpose.