Word: bundeswehr
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...most of the past decade, West Germany's Bundeswehr has been justly known as "the orphan army." Though its authorized strength of 460,000 makes it NATO's largest European land army, it has been plagued by poor pay, rundown garrisons, manpower shortages (the Bundeswehr is below strength by 2,600 officers and 25,000 noncoms) and inept civilian leadership. Reacting to the strident heel clicking of the Nazi era, the public held the military in low esteem-an attitude abetted by baggy, dull gray uniforms that made even generals look like sloppy bus drivers...
When Willy Brandt's traditionally antimilitary Social Democratic Party took the helm in Bonn last fall, the unhappy men of the Bundeswehr were certain that bad would go to worse. They were concerned when Brandt chose as his Defense Minister Helmut Schmidt, then the party's Bundestag floor leader, who did not even want the job because it was regarded as a political graveyard. Concern turned to alarm when Schmidt created a McNamara-like think tank headed by Dr. Theo Sommer, 39, an intellectual and deputy editor of the highly regarded liberal weekly Die Zeit; to some military...
White Book. Schmidt quickly set Sommer's brain trust to work probing every facet of life in the Bundeswehr. He was particularly interested in improving morale. As Sommer put it: "The soldier limps and lags behind society. He is in a dismal state. Propping up the morale of the army is not so much a question of pay as of living conditions and schooling." Last week the results of Sommer's study, in the form of a 211-page White Book, were debated in the Bundestag. The report discusses everything from weapons development to whether recruits should...