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Sweden brings back military conscription

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Sweden brings back military conscription

#61

Post by eCa »

thedevil wrote: post #13

I'm not sure why Sweden would be concerned. I read Russian news/propaganda occasionally. Over the last few years, Russian news/propaganda prepared Russian minds for interfering in Ukraine. And the propaganda includes arguments to justify a military buildup. And it seems to be preparing Russian minds for a possible invasion of Baltic states one day. But I don't think I've even seen Sweden mentioned in Russian news/pro…

Sweden is probably not a target in and of itself, but the island of Gotland is pretty much an aircraft carrier in the middle of the Baltic Sea. If Russia invades the Baltic states they probably don't want NATO based on it.

Re: Sweden brings back military conscription

#62

Post by pinum »

robert_foss wrote: post #44

So to add some needed background information to this: Every 18 year old has been forced to submit a form stating if they want to be conscripted. That's about 100k people every year. Out of the 100k, about 20k state that they do want to be conscripted. Out of the 20k that say yes, 4k are selected during a screening process that evaluates physical and mental fitness. So there are no less than 2 points where you can opt…

That doesn't sound like conscription, then. If they didn't have enough people saying yes, do they start drawing from the "no" pile?

Re: Sweden brings back military conscription

#63

Post by zzzcpan »

Nullabillity wrote: post #16
mikeash wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article says, "The aim is to encourage them to become military professionals or to join the reserves." I'm not quite sure if that's reasonable, but it's a bit different from just forcing people to fight.

So... 9 month brainwashing camps? That doesn't exactly sound like a good idea either. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-35456535 : > "I always had a dream to come back as an officer and to do it here on Gotland and establish a new unit, it's perfect," he tells me. That's exactly the kind of people who have no business even being in charge of what they themselves eat for breakfast. This mess makes me ashamed of my…

No army can exist without brainwashing. The only difference between volunteers and conscripts is that volunteers are not threatened/tricked into joining, but are incentivized to do so. Plus there is always a lot of government propaganda pushing "patriotism", trying to make military look "cool", shaming those avoiding service, etc, making some more willing to volunteer and some conscripts not opposing to it as much.

Re: Sweden brings back military conscription

#64

Post by mzs »

zilean wrote: post #49
mmmBacon wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

War is not something that can be controlled once it breaks out. Non-aligned militaries that come into close proximity is something that's very dangerous. At the very least an incident between militaries can cause a diplomatic crisis or at worst start a minor war. The very presence of military forces in the Baltic is a deterrent for that reason. Also Russia has continually violated Swedens air space. Russian pilots ha…

https://www.rt.com/news/346287-sweden-russian-submarine-hunt... Russia has nothing to gain in baltic that it doesnt have with Kaliningrad. Same goes for Ukraine w/o Crimea.

Russia Today? It would be nice for Russia to have a swath from Crimea to Dontesk up through Latvia, just look at a map.

Re: Sweden brings back military conscription

#65

Post by tormeh »

chrisseaton wrote: post #6

How do you motivate a conscript? When I was in the British Army, which is volunteer only, commanding a basic training troop if someone was wanted to give up we could say to them 'if this isn't for you then you can go home' (of course we did coach and mentor people to help them, I mean in cases where people just give up and stop soldiering when an exercise gets tough). They usually worked extremely hard to get into th…

Been a conscript myself. Brainwashing is still a science in the military. And it works kind of well. Of course, some people are just generally not suitable for the military, and they should be let go faster than the Norwegian army did when I was there. Of course when push comes to shove and you need meat for the meat grinder then things are very different. I know nothing about that.

Re: Sweden brings back military conscription

#66

Post by muninn_ »

DamnYuppie wrote: post #55
BurningFrog wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A credible deterrent in 2020 is not 200k dudes with guns. It's air and naval power. Expensive and complex hi tech death machines. Of course, a 10m country will never have a really credible defense against nuclear super power Russia by itself.

You don't need massive air and naval power to be very tough to attack. All you have to do is see the Afghan wars, both Russian and American, for great examples. They had no airforce and no need for naval forces. A large armed and mobile force is very able to put up solid resistance to pretty much anything you can throw at it save for nukes which will likely never be used.

Whatever military force was in Afghanistan never posed any sort of credible threat or resistance against the US military. The "resistance" that the US military faced came in terms of the US military wanting to try and recreate the society there, and having troops attacked while just driving around or facing resistance while conducting raids. If the US military wanted to, they could have easily destroyed every single living being and human structure in Afghanistan without much effort, they just didn't because they don't do that kind of stuff as a matter of policy.

Re: Sweden brings back military conscription

#67

Post by mzs »

macintux wrote: post #35
mzs wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cause Norway is? https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/2017/03/norway-moves-milit...

Norway is part of NATO and thus is absolutely a target.

Outside Stockholm:

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2014/10/20/1413790933744_wps_...

Also Sweden is has been aligning more with UK in particular lately and Russian media has noticed.

Re: Sweden brings back military conscription

#69

Post by weavie »

hackermailman wrote: post #22
chrisseaton wrote: post #6

How do you motivate a conscript? When I was in the British Army, which is volunteer only, commanding a basic training troop if someone was wanted to give up we could say to them 'if this isn't for you then you can go home' (of course we did coach and mentor people to help them, I mean in cases where people just give up and stop soldiering when an exercise gets tough). They usually worked extremely hard to get into th…

South Korea you do 3yrs mandatory service or 2yrs jail and life long shame so motivation isn't a problem. After basic it often involves just working at a desk somewhere only a few stay as professional soldiers rest are moved into cheap civil service labor. I suspect Sweden has brought back conscription to try and integrate it's new massive foreigner population as a way to make them more Swedish not because of any she…

Balkans =/= Baltic

Re: Sweden brings back military conscription

#70

Post by BurningFrog »

mkohlmyr wrote: post #43
BurningFrog wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sweden is maybe the only country in the world that has no independence day.

Not exactly true, imo https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swedish_War_of_Liberation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Day_of_Sweden

Yeah, the Kalmar Union is the one debatable exception.

You can either view it as Sweden being ruled by Denmark, or a EU style union between equals, in which case 1523 is more of a Brexit situation.

There are decent arguments on both side. I lean towards the latter view.

Instituting a National Day in to remember it is more a modern way to try to keep up with the neighbors. All other countries have a national day, so we should get one too, even though we're not really sure what to do with it :)

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