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> "We don't want to spend half a year of our lives locked up in barracks, being trained in drill and obedience and learning to kill," the organisers of the protests wrote in a statement posted on social media. "War offers no prospects for the future and destroys our livelihoods." Is the idea that it’s better for your livelihood to just start learning how speak Russian now?
“The change means that all 18-year-olds in Germany will be sent a questionnaire from January 2026 asking if they are interested and willing to join the armed forces. The form will be mandatory for men and voluntary for women.“ - all men have to fill out and return a form, I suppose this will work to increase recruitment. Doesn’t seem very controversial.
Just build nukes if you are afraid of Russia then nuke them if they try to invade. Ukraine is not as smart and gave up its nukes in the early 90s, and is now in the middle of a war for the last couple years.
I'm broadly sympathetic to the argument that the multipolar world we're in now makes a good case for nuclear weapons adoption. But Germany probably isn't the one Europe wants to arm itself. And even if it did, their Greens wouldn't allow it.
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> What I didn't see were any young Germans Seems ~20% of the population are immigrants ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg#Demographics ), some of the people you saw are Germans and some of them are not, but I think the main confusing part is how you mix up how someone looks and what nationality they have. I think maybe you're trying to say "white" instead, but for some reason avoided using that word?
Not sure what you are babbling about but, It's about ethnicity and not race. Plenty of third generation Turks still don't consider themselves German, then someone with black skin adopted as a child might consider themself German, it's about culture not race, we're not in last century anymore. Proportion of young people with immigrant background is high in many Westeuropean countries, if they don't integrate into society they won't be willing to defend it.
> "We don't want to spend half a year of our lives locked up in barracks, being trained in drill and obedience and learning to kill," the organisers of the protests wrote in a statement posted on social media. "War offers no prospects for the future and destroys our livelihoods." Is the idea that it’s better for your livelihood to just start learning how speak Russian now?
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Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why do they have to fill it in and return it just to say no? Could this be used against them at some time in the future? And why women instead can just ignore it? Usually HN is very wary of the consequences of the state collecting data about its citizens and restricting freedoms in small steps. Is it not the case now?
When push comes to shove, men and women aren't equal
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think a lot of young people look at all of the wars waged post-WWII and are rightfully opposed to fighting for their governments. Would you want to die for nothing in Vietnam? Probably not, and a lot of other people didn't want to as well. Some of them did anyway, and it was all for nothing. So please have some grace if today's kids have looked back at our miserable history and have decided that they'd rather not d…
Germany didn't fight in Vietnam.
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One, I'm not sure what American founding ideals have to do with Germany. Two, Germany, like most countries and frankly human populations, has a male surplus in its fighting-age population [1]. This is why, historically, large socities tended to wage war with men first. (Even those that e.g. held elite units in reserve, which undermines the usual biological argument.) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_…
The male surplus is a few tens of thousands, way to small to make up an army; and no, that is not the reason why men and not women go to war.
...why would you populate your army solely with the surplus? The point is you have a buffer that you can burn without immediately impacting your demographics for the long term.
> that is not the reason why men and not women go to war
It's a serious theory [1]. (It's more correct to say the surplus and it share a common cause.)
[1] https://link.springer.com/rwe/10.1007/978-3-319-19650-3_931