What could be better than to spend a cold, rainy day in a military zone, with tanks roaming all around? But seriously, it doesn’t happen every day that one has the opportunity to visit a state of the art NATO training centre, and witness manoeuvres imitating situations which can and/or do happen on foreign missions.
“What we do here, that’s the high point of soldiers’ education,” explains an officer from Bundeswehr’s personal department, who does not wish to be named. Just like all the other people we spent the day with. “You weren’t here, you saw nothing, you heard nothing,” are the instructions we were given. We are in Gefechtsübungszentrum Heer in Letzlingen, in a thoroughly monitored area of 23 thousand hectares with no phone signal, where elite soldiers get to spend at least a year of their professional life.
It’s not just the Germans, however, who train here, the facilities are also used by other NATO partners like the Netherlands or France. We talk more about the practical aspects of the training, and it almost sounds like a real-life video game: Accurately designed maquettes of the actual weapons are being used, with the exact same weight and feel like the real ones, with the sole exception that instead of firing deadly projectiles, the only thing they fire are laser rays and signals to the nearby control centre. That’s the “brain” of it all, here are all the data processed and analyzed. “We go through everything that happened in the field and talk to soldiers about things that they should improve, we let them learn from their mistakes,” explains another officer. Virtually nothing can go unnoticed here.
Inside a tank
A welcome bonus half-way through is a peek into a real tank. For instance, the type that was used by KFOR is divided into two tiny parts, each barely big enough for one person. Now add two more people, close the lid.. and you get this maddening condition with only dim light all around, where space ceases to exist. One doesn’t need to be a diagnosed claustrophobic to feel pretty uncomfortable in such an environment. The other type of tank standing nearby, used in Afghanistan, is constructed for around eight people, and doesn’t look any more inviting.
Tough life of the tankists aside, we also had a chance to talk to high ranking officers about their opinions for a prospective European army, relationship between personal freedom and national security, or ongoing Russian agression. Again, neither of these generals with decades of service and experiences from Kosovo and Afghanistan shall be named. Without any personal details given, it is, however, safe to mention some of the things that have been voiced:
Europe could benefit from a common, collective army. It’s, however, essential that the public understands that this is necessary, and that it is also necessary to pay for it adequately. After the war, German army was in a kind of hibernation, now it’s time to accept a more active role in international coalitions – it’s not a good idea to disarm now. Although it’s not likely that conscription will be renewed, everyone should be willing to contribute to defend the society we live in. Because as we learn over and over again, democracy is not an easy thing to fight for.
Written as a blog post for the Medien-Mittler journalism program.
Der Artikel wurde auch auf Deutsch veröffentlicht.