German Army deploys ‘soft’ policy

Moves to offer creches for soldiers’ children and flexible working hours disturb military’s top brass

Germany is planning to modernise its armed forces by offering creches for soldiers’ children and limiting postings to match school term dates. Soldiers are to be allowed to work flexible hours and barracks accommodation will be refurbished with flat-screen televisions and minibars.

The measures are part of a 100 million ($161 million) scheme to make the army more attractive to new recruits.

Germany only gave up conscription in 2011 and ministers say it struggles to attract and retain volunteers. The initiative came from Ursula von der Leyen, who became the first woman to serve as German Defence Minister, when she took office in December.

But it has been criticised by army commanders. A senior serving officer speaking on condition of anonymity told Germany’s magazine they were policies for “sissies and wimps”.

General Harald Kujat, a retired former chief of staff of Germany’s armed forces, told that von der Leyen’s proposals were the ideas of a “good housewife taking care of her children” who has no idea of the military. In another interview, he said that the army’s badly out-of-date equipment was a more pressing concern.

But von der Leyen defended the plan, saying the army had to modernise to compete with businesses in recruitment. “In a society that is changing rapidly, so do the individuals’ expectations of work,” she said. “We have to react very flexibly as an employer, otherwise we will soon face empty hallways and an empty parade ground.”

The new scheme has been linked to the increasing number of women serving in the German Army, currently at 10 per cent and expected to rise further in coming years. But it may cause some consternation among Germany’s allies that the country has found 100 million for such measures when they want it to spend more on weapons and fighting capability.

US President Barack Obama recently urged European Nato members to increase their military budgets in order to defend against potential Russian aggression in Ukraine or the Baltic. Under a Nato agreement, members are supposed to spend at least 2 per cent of GDP on defence. Germany spends 1.3 per cent.

The new measures will also contribute to the German military’s image with some of its allies as “soft”. One British officer reportedly described the German Army deployment in Afghanistan as “an aggressive camping organisation”.

156,200 troops, the bulk of them American, British and Canadian, grouped mainly in five infantry divisions and three airborne divisions. Of that total, 132,700 arrived by sea. Another 23,500 arrived by air, of which 15,500 American paratroopers from the 101st and 82nd airborne divisions dropped behind “Utah Beach”, while 7900 paratroopers from the British 6th airborne division landed between the Orne and Dives rivers.

On June 6 alone, 11,500 aircraft, including 3500 gliders, 5000 fighters and 3000 bombers, flew over the Normandy beaches, dropping 11,912 tonnes of bombs on German coastal defence forces. Losses were low — 127 aircraft were lost and 63 damaged.

Operation Neptune involved 6939 vessels, the most ever involved in an amphibious landing. The actual landing force involved 4126 boats and landing craft, grouped in 47 convoys. Some of the vessels — LCAs or Landing Craft Assault boats — were carried across the English Channel on larger vessels and were only placed in the sea once off the beaches on which they were intended to land, while other kinds of landing craft crossed under their own power. They included LCIs (Landing Craft Infantry) or small troop carriers, LCTs (Landing Craft Tanks) which transported tanks and other vehicles, LCVPs (Landing Craft Vehicle, Personnel), larger LSTs (Landing Ship Tanks) as well as the famous “ducks”: amphibious vehicles driven by a propeller. About 20,000 vehicles and a thousand tanks were thus carried to France.

There were 736 auxiliary vessels and 864 cargo ships carried foodstuffs, munitions and floating hospitals to France. Among the cargo ships 54 were used as blockships that were scuttled to create protective reefs.

There were 137 warships including seven battleships, of which four were British and three from the US, around 20 cruisers, 221 destroyers, frigates and corvettes, 495 gunboats, 58 subchasers, 287 minesweepers, four mine layers and two submarines.

Just fewer than 150,000 soldiers of the 7th Army were stationed in Normandy, of which around 50,000 were in the landing zone. Near the beaches was a single armoured division, the 21st to the southeast of Caen, and six infantry divisions. Two other armoured divisions, the 12th SS Panzer Division and the Panzer-Lehr division were respectively near Evreux and Alencon-Le Mans. Three other units — the 1st SS Panzer Division, and the 2nd and 16th Divisions were based north of the Seine river, around Mons, Peronne and Senlis.

Fewer than 500 aircraft, of which a large number had just been sent to the eastern front, with only several dozen bombers and fighter planes.

There were 30 gun boats, four destroyers, nine torpedo boats, 35 submarines.