Europe Sees Military Troops Shortfalls 03/14 06:09

   

   BRUSSELS (AP) -- In the year after Russia launched outright war on Ukraine, 
NATO leaders approved a set of military plans designed to repel an invasion of 
Europe. It was the biggest shake-up of the alliance's defense readiness 
preparations since the Cold War.

   The secret plans set out how Western allies would defend NATO territory from 
the Atlantic to the Arctic, through the Baltic region and Central Europe, down 
to the Mediterranean Sea. Up to 300,000 troops would move to its eastern flank 
within 30 days, many of them American. That would climb to 800,000 within six 
months.

   But the Trump administration warned last month that U.S. priorities lie 
elsewhere. Europe must take care of its own security, and those goals now seem 
questionable. Mustering just 30,000 European troops to police any future peace 
in Ukraine is proving a challenge.

   Billions of euros are being shifted to military budgets, but only slowly, 
and the Europeans are struggling to fire up production in their defense 
industries.

   Beyond funding, tens of thousands more European citizens might have to 
complete military service, and time is of the essence. NATO Secretary-General 
Mark Rutte has warned that Russian forces could be capable of launching an 
attack on European territory in 2030.

   Concerned about Russia's intentions, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk wants 
to introduce large-scale military training for every adult male, and double the 
size of Poland's army to around 500,000 soldiers.

   "If Ukraine loses the war or if it accepts the terms of peace, armistice or 
capitulation ... then, without a doubt -- and we can all agree on that -- 
Poland will find itself in a much more difficult geopolitical situation," Tusk 
warned lawmakers last week.

   The scale of Europe's military personnel shortage

   The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute estimates that Europe, 
including the U.K., has almost 1.5 million active duty personnel. But many 
can't be deployed on a battlefield, and those who can are hard to use 
effectively without a centralized command system.

   The number of Russian troops in Ukraine at the end of 2024 was estimated to 
be around 700,000.

   NATO troops are controlled by a U.S. general, using American air transport 
and logistics.

   Analysts say that in the event of a Russian attack, NATO's top military 
officer would probably dispatch around 200,000 U.S. troops to Europe to build 
on the 100,000 U.S. military personnel already based there.

   With the Americans out of the picture, "a realistic estimate may therefore 
be that an increase in European capacities equivalent to the fighting capacity 
of 300,000 U.S. troops is needed," the Brussels-based Bruegel think tank 
estimates.

   "Europe faces a choice: either increase troop numbers significantly by more 
than 300,000 to make up for the fragmented nature of national militaries, or 
find ways to rapidly enhance military coordination," Bruegel said.

   The question is how.

   Making up the numbers

   NATO is encouraging countries to build up personnel numbers, but the 
trans-Atlantic alliance isn't telling them how to do it. Maintaining public 
support for the armed forces and for Ukraine is too important to risk by 
dictating choices.

   "The way they go about it is intensely political, so we wouldn't prescribe 
any way of changing this -- whether to go for conscription, elective 
conscription, bigger reserves," a senior NATO official said on the condition of 
anonymity because he wasn't authorized to brief journalists unless he remained 
unnamed.

   "We do stress the point that fighting with those regional plans means that 
we are in collective defense and likely in an attrition war that requires way 
more manpower than we currently have, or we designed our force models to 
deliver," he added.

   Eleven European countries have compulsory military service: Austria, Cyprus, 
Croatia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Sweden, and 
non-European Union nation Norway. The length of service ranges from as little 
as two months in Croatia to 19 months in Norway.

   Poland isn't considering a return to universal military service, but rather 
a reserve system based on the model in Switzerland, where every man is obliged 
to serve in the armed forces or an alternative civilian service. Women can 
volunteer.

   Belgium's new defense minister plans to write a letter in November to around 
120,000 citizens who are age 18 to try to persuade at least 500 of them to sign 
up for voluntary military service. Debate about the issue goes on in the U.K. 
and Germany.

   Confronting the challenges

   Germany's professional armed forces had 181,174 active service personnel at 
the end of last year -- slightly lower than in 2023, according to a 
parliamentary report released Tuesday. That means it's no closer to reaching a 
Defense Ministry target of 203,000 by 2031.

   Last year, 20,290 people started serving in the German military, or 
Bundeswehr, an 8% increase, the report said. But of the 18,810 who joined in 
2023, more than a quarter -- 5,100 or 27% of the total -- left again, most at 
their own request during the six-month trial period.

   The German parliament's commissioner for the armed forces, Eva Hgl, said 
that army life is a hard sell.

   "The biggest problem is boredom," Hgl said. "If young people have nothing 
to do, if there isn't enough equipment and there aren't enough trainers, if the 
rooms aren't reasonably clean and orderly, that deters people and it makes the 
Bundeswehr unattractive."

   At the other end of the scale, tiny Luxembourg has unique demographic 
challenges. Of its roughly 630,000 passport holders, only 315,000 are 
Luxembourgers. The number of people of military service age -- 18 to 40 -- is 
smaller still.

   Around 1,000 people are enlisted. That's small compared to some European 
powers, but bigger per capita than the U.K. armed forces. Recently, Luxembourg 
-- where unemployment is low and salaries are high -- has struggled to find 
just 200-300 military personnel.

   Military service comes with many challenges too, not least convincing 
someone to sign up when they might be sent to the front, and hastily trained 
conscripts can't replace a professional army. The draft also costs money. Extra 
staff, accommodation and trainers are needed throughout a conscript's term.