Word: bundeswehr
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...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...
First went the goose step, then the imposing steel helmet, then the snappy clicking of heels, a casualty of the West German Bundeswehr's switch from steel-capped heels to all-rubber ones. Last week the Defense Ministry proposed that yet another remnant of the old Wehrmacht be eliminated. Next to go will be "Herr"-the respectful title with which German officers have been addressed ever since Frederick William I forged a powerful officer corps from the Prussian nobility more than 200 years ago. Today's officers may lose their Herr (meaning Mr.) as a result...
...toward the Alps last week when it spun out of control. The pilot managed to eject at about 1,000 ft. and landed unhurt in a tree, but his plane plummeted into the black Bavarian soil south of Augsburg. It was the 100th Luftwaffe Starfighter to crash since the Bundeswehr adopted the hot but unforgiving aircraft...
...this were to happen, it would represent one of the supreme ironies of history. But then, nations do tend to get the kinds of armies they want. There is no doubt that for many West Germans, the Bundeswehr is an unwelcome reminder of the guilt-laden past, bothersome in an age of affluence, redundant in an era of seeming detente...