Germany’s conscription fight turns ‘never again’ inside out

Germany’s conscription – When Germany’s parliament voted in late 2025 to reinstate military service, protests erupted outside the Bundestag and across the country—turning a post-war taboo into the centre of a new cultural fight. More than 3,000 young people marched in Berlin behind a

On the morning the German parliament voted in late 2025 to reinstate military service, the streets outside the Bundestag filled fast. Chants and placards stretched across Berlin and then beyond it, hours-long and insistent. Inside the building. lawmakers argued about a security framework; outside. protesters treated the moment like a break in the country’s moral weather.

The decision landed with force because it was unthinkable only a few years earlier. In a political culture long defined by military restraint and the post-war mantra of ‘never again’. Germany has spent decades turning violence into a taboo. More than 80 years after the fall of the Nazi regime. the vote made the taboo suddenly contested—not in theory. but in the daily choreography of protest.

In Berlin, more than 3,000 young people joined what organizers called a ‘school strike against conscription’. They marched behind handmade signs and chanted: ‘We don’t want to spend half a year of our lives in barracks. be trained in drill and obedience. and learn how to kill.’ The mood felt disciplined and earnest. closer to a climate rally than a Cold War-era anti-war march. For many participants, the protest style was familiar, repurposed for a new political moment.

Yannick Kiesel recognized that repurposing immediately. A long-time environmental activist and 32-year-old geography graduate, he had once urged students to skip school for Fridays for Future. Now he was marching again—this time with the German Peace Society–United War Resisters. or DFG-VK. a historic pillar of German pacifism.

Kiesel said the point was constitutional as much as emotional. During the Cold War. the DFG-VK helped guide a generation of young Germans through a legal right that exists almost nowhere else: the right to refuse military service on moral grounds. West Germany enshrined that right in its Basic Law as a direct response to National Socialism and the crimes of the Wehrmacht—meant as a safeguard to ensure the state could never again compel individuals to kill in its name.

Over time, conscientious objection did not remain a clause on paper. It grew into a socially anchored movement, supported by churches, unions, student groups and, later, the Green Party.

After reunification, with decades of relative peace, climate activism eclipsed the peace movement as the dominant cause among younger Germans. But the war in Ukraine reshaped Europe’s security order. fuelling debates over rebuilding Germany’s depleted armed forces. and the DFG-VK noticed interest surge again. On that December day. Kiesel urged protesters to reclaim what he says many see as a distinctly German constitutional right—and to reject the new law.

“For me, it’s the same thing,” he said, standing beneath banners reading ‘The youth are not cannon fodder.’ “This is Fridays for Future – applied to peace. Climate protection and peace belong together. Without peace, there is no climate justice.”

Kiesel views the legislation not as a pragmatic security measure but as a symbolic breach of a post-war taboo. He argues it points toward compulsory service in an army he considers underfunded, outdated and morally compromised. Rearmament. he said. reflects misplaced priorities in a country where social inequality is growing and funding for education. youth programmes and social services is under strain. Young people, he added, are being told they must ‘do something for Germany’.

“No,” Kiesel said. “I won’t defend my country, because I don’t know what there is left to defend.”

To the protesters, the mass rallies were never only about one law. They exposed a deeper fault line—rooted in Germany’s post-war history and an unsettled relationship with military force—colliding with a rapidly deteriorating security environment in Europe.

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine shattered assumptions that had seemed stable only a few years earlier. It pushed Berlin into its most ambitious rearmament effort since the Cold War. The shift was formalized when former Chancellor Olaf Scholz labelled it a Zeitenwende. or change of era. after he announced a 100-billion-euro investment in the armed forces days after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

At the centre of the new effort is the Wehrdienst-Modernisierungsgesetz, or Military Service Modernization Act. The law marks Germany’s most significant move towards rebuilding military manpower since conscription was suspended in 2011.

The legislation establishes a new framework for military service with a volunteer-first model, mandatory questionnaires and health assessments for 18-year-olds. It also allows parliament to activate a needs-based form of conscription (Bedarfswehrpflicht) if volunteer numbers fall short.

The aim is to identify potential recruits more efficiently and reverse a steady erosion of personnel that has left the German military. the Bundeswehr. short-staffed and overstretched. With incentives including higher pay. free driver’s licences and bonuses for longer service. the government hopes to raise troop levels from roughly 180. 000 towards the NATO target of 260. 000 by the early 2030s. while expanding the reserve force from about 50. 000 to 200. 000.

The law passed only after months of one of the most acrimonious national debates in recent memory. It is described as a difficult compromise: far more cautious than Chancellor Friedrich Merz suggested months earlier. Standing alongside NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe. General Alexus Grynkewich. Merz spoke of turning the Bundeswehr into Europe’s strongest conventional army.

But the legislation stops short of reinstating a full draft. It does explicitly require lawmakers to revisit compulsory service if too few volunteers step forward.

Still. the government has struggled to explain to a largely pacifist society—particularly younger Germans—what it is that Germans should be prepared to defend. The argument has been that defence should again be understood as a shared civic responsibility rather than the task of a professional minority.

Critics on the left. including many members of the Social Democratic Party. have treated military service as a symbolic breach of a post-war taboo. They warn it risks sliding towards conscription without first addressing why the Bundeswehr remains unattractive to many young people. Most conservatives. by contrast. have argued mandatory service is the only realistic way to build a force capable of meeting Germany’s obligations.

Supporters of the compromise say the volunteer-first approach buys time to rebuild recruitment systems, housing, training facilities and infrastructure dismantled after the draft was suspended.

Public opinion shows how tightly this tension is braided into the Zeitenwende itself. While support for higher defence spending has increased, only 38 per cent of Germans say they would be willing to take up arms to defend the country.

For many observers, that number is the argument. For others, it is the opening of a longer one.

Roland Bösker, a long-time reservist, frames the law less as a staffing fix than as a shift in mentality. He calls it an attempt to break Germany’s long-standing ‘friendly indifference’ towards the Bundeswehr—the assumption that ‘somebody. somehow protected freedom and peace’. Generations raised on peace and the imperative of ‘never again’ never had to confront military service directly. Bösker says the new law ‘makes people think’, and in Germany that alone is already a turning point.

Michael Harsch. an associate professor of national security at the Eisenhower School of the US National Defense University. sees the legislation as the latest step in a longer and uneasy evolution: from an army designed to limit power to one expected to anchor Europe’s defence in a major land conflict; from a society shaped by pacifism to one being asked to confront war as a lived possibility.

“The stakes, he said, are high. NATO’s Eastern Flank measures readiness in months, not decades. As Poland and other frontline states accelerate rearmament, Europe’s strategic centre of gravity is shifting eastward and Germany’s window to close its capability gaps is narrowing.

‘If successful,’ Harsch said, ‘Germany may complete its long journey from a country that associates power with guilt to one that understands power as responsibility in a changing geopolitical environment.’

The unease surrounding Germany’s defence debate is not new. For years after the Second World War, the very idea of a German army was morally fraught. The Wehrmacht had been dissolved. the country lay in ruins. and a reckoning with Nazism brought not only physical devastation but a profound moral collapse. Militarism and nationalism had led to catastrophe. Rearmament was not merely controversial—it was taboo.

From that reckoning emerged a strategic culture of self-limitation. later called Kultur der Zurückhaltung—a culture of restraint infused with distinctly German pacifism. Avoiding the use of force was seen not as weakness but as responsibility. Power was something to be distrusted, tightly bound, and constantly justified.

During the Cold War. West Germany fielded one of NATO’s largest and most capable forces. peaking at more than 500. 000 active troops and spending up to three per cent of GDP on defence. It rarely deployed soldiers abroad. Military power was accepted as a necessity, not embraced as a tool of statecraft.

Resistance began to take shape. especially in the 1970s and early 1980s. when the legacy of Nazism. the Cold War. rearmament and a rebellious younger generation collided. Peace and conscientious objection became central political issues. For many young Germans, the new state appeared morally unconvincing when it once again began recruiting soldiers.

The German Peace Society–United War Resisters built directly on that sentiment: conscientious objection was framed as an individual consequence of collective guilt. Peace groups argued that rearmament would make Germany a target. After 1945. the right to conscientious objection had ultimately been recognized as part of freedom of conscience and enshrined in the constitution.

Then came the shock of reality. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine shattered assumptions overnight. Days later. Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced the Zeitenwende backed by 100 billion euros to modernize the Bundeswehr and meet NATO spending targets. Scholz’s rhetoric was historic; the reality, observers say, was sobering. Ammunition stocks were low, while major systems were unserviceable. The army’s chief reportedly described the Bundeswehr as ‘more or less naked’.

Defence Minister Boris Pistorius sharpened the message: Germany had to become kriegstüchtig—ready for war—not just militarily but socially and mentally.

Spending rose rapidly. By 2024. Germany met NATO’s two per cent benchmark and became the second-largest military donor to Ukraine after the United States. But recruitment lagged. readiness targets slipped. and the culture of restraint—embedded in society and in Scholz’s own party—proved stubborn. Scholz’s coalition collapsed later that year. When Friedrich Merz took office in May 2025, Germany was still halfway through its defence reckoning. The Bundeswehr remained undersized and partially operational, even as pressure mounted from Washington and NATO’s Eastern Flank. Merz vowed to build Europe’s strongest conventional force.

His first move was fiscal. He loosened Germany’s constitutionally anchored debt brake, clearing the way for a 500-billion-euro defence and infrastructure fund. Berlin signalled that nearly one trillion euros could be mobilized over a decade. Merz pledged to meet NATO’s five per cent benchmark by 2035. “Whatever it takes,” he said.

Money, however, did not buy societal buy-in. An increasing number of Germans acknowledge the threat posed by Russia, but few say they would take up arms themselves. In a recent poll. just 16 per cent said they would ‘definitely’ defend the country. while another 22 per cent said they ‘probably’ would. A large Bundeswehr survey showed similar results, particularly among young men. Support for defence spending is broad, but support for personal obligation is not.

That tension erupted in June. when senior Social Democrats published a controversial Friedenspapier—a ‘peace paper’—outlining an alternative vision for Germany’s security policy. The paper stopped short of rejecting support for Ukraine but criticized what its authors described as a headlong rush into militarization. urging diplomacy. arms control. and eventual dialogue with Russia. The backlash was swift. Critics accused the authors of naïveté and Cold War nostalgia. Analysts saw it as evidence of how deeply pacifism remains embedded in German political culture.

Inside the offices of the German Peace Society–United War Resisters, the phone rings more often than ever. Kiesel said they actually have many older people who refused service in the 1960s. 70s and 80s. and they are coming back now seeking advice. “They bring their experiences with them,” he said. “They want advice. They bring their experiences with them – as if they somehow senses their stories would be needed again.”.

Most calls, he said, come from families. “Mothers, grandparents who are worried,” Kiesel said. “We get calls from grandmothers calling on behalf of their grandchildren – 13, 14 years old.” He said they can only apply for conscientious objection at 17 and a half, but the fear is already there.

Kiesel described a paradoxical situation: a peace movement shaped by two poles—the old, who speak from experience, and the young, who act out of uncertainty. “The middle is missing,” he said. “The generation that grew up in peace never felt the need to actively stand up for peace.”

At the same time. the Bundeswehr is recruiting more aggressively than ever. with posters. YouTube series. influencers. and around 100 uniformed recruiters visiting schools. Kiesel said the army still struggles because it is not an attractive employer. “The moment you have to hold a rifle and shoot at someone who looks human, the romance is over.”.

He also challenged the story he hears from political campaigns—that Germany is defending ‘our freedom’ in Ukraine. For him, the line doesn’t hold. “People in Ukraine are dying because they are defending their own country, not our freedom,” he said. “That’s a fallacy politicians keep returning to.”

The new military service law. designed to bridge the widening gap between Germany’s defence ambitions and public willingness to serve. has ignited one of the country’s fiercest debates over security in decades. In mid-January 2026, the defence minister tried to project momentum. Pistorius told reporters that the Bundeswehr had reached its highest personnel level in more than a decade.

“We have the best recruitment results since the suspension of conscription,” Pistorius told reporters. “Young people are increasingly willing to contribute to Germany’s external security.”

But beyond official optimism. much of German society remains undecided about what contribution should look like—or whether it should be expected at all. That hesitation has expanded the debate beyond parliamentary committees and military briefings and into classrooms. protests. conference halls. and conversations like the one Kiesel helped spark outside the Bundestag.

At a packed audience at a conference at Berlin’s Nordic embassies. just days before student protests erupted against the new service law. Florian Constantin Feyerabend of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation argued that civil defence is not only about soldiers and weapons. “It’s about everyday citizens – preparedness, volunteering, resilience.”.

The event. titled ‘Civil Defence and Societal Resilience – Lessons from Russia’s War of Aggression and the Nordic-Baltic States’. was part of a push to shift Germany’s defence debate away from troop numbers and hardware and toward the resilience of society itself. Germany may have grown accustomed to peace. Feyerabend warned. but Moscow is waging a hybrid war that targets societies as much as armies.

“Resilience is not optional,” he said. “Ukraine shows it is essential for survival.” He said the Nordic and Baltic states offer models Germany has barely begun to absorb—approaches that fuse military readiness with social cohesion, trust, and a deeply rooted security culture.

In Finland, Sweden, and the Baltics, defence is treated as a societal project. Civilian preparedness, crisis communication, and resistance to disinformation are core elements of national security. The experience of Russian occupation—or proximity to it—has made defence existential. Citizens are trained to respond to emergencies. protect infrastructure. and support the state in crisis. reducing the burden on overstretched militaries.

Germany, Feyerabend said, dismantled much of its civil-defence infrastructure after the Cold War, betting that peace was permanent.

A Ukrainian political scientist now at the University of Duisburg. Germany. Oksana Huss. told the audience that evening: “In Ukraine. resilience isn’t something the state hands down. It’s built horizontally.” She explained that after the 2014 Revolution of Dignity. local self-organization rewrote the social contract and that networks later kept towns functioning during Russia’s full-scale invasion. In Germany. she added. many still expect the state to handle everything. and “In a real crisis. that won’t work.”.

Huss and Feyerabend both pointed to how hard it is to change mindset. Feyerabend said at a workshop titled Resilient by 2030: Is German Society Ready for Defense?. that the will to defend is there. but political leadership and society have to turn that will into real capability. including in the information space. He warned Germany must move from a full-service state mentality toward shared responsibility—strengthening cognitive resilience against disinformation without tipping into panic.

For Roland Bösker, the tension is personal and generational. Fresh out of high school in 1989, he decided to do military service and later trained as a reserve officer. When he proudly showed his uniform to his grandfather, the reaction was brutal. The older man had fought at Stalingrad, lost a leg, and carried shrapnel in his body for life.

“He said, ‘Son, you’re an idiot. I lost my leg in a bloody war – why the hell do you want to be a soldier?’”

Bösker’s response came from the wars that were unfolding in the Balkans. “In Bosnia, innocent people were being slaughtered,” he recalled. Turning away was not an option. After completing his service. he trained as a reserve officer. serving in places that include NATO’s Enhanced Forward Presence in Lithuania after Russia annexed Crimea. working alongside Baltic and Nordic forces for whom defence and societal resilience are existential realities. not abstractions.

For his grandfather, military service was inseparable from loss and guilt. Bösker insists his aim is not conquest but protection. One person may defend with a weapon; another in the fire brigade, civil defence, emergency relief, or elderly care. All contribute to resilience.

“The Zeitenwende is not a decision,” Bösker said. “It is a process – a societal process. What matters is not uniformity, but participation.”

He speaks openly about scenarios: NATO’s operational plan for Germany. the movement of hundreds of thousands of troops towards the Baltic states in a crisis. civilian hospitals treating the wounded. and bottlenecks affecting everyday life. Bösker returned to a point that sits beneath nearly every argument in this debate: Germany dismantled much of its civil-defence infrastructure after the Cold War. betting that peace was permanent.

Deterrence, he said, is not created through silence, but through preparedness. “The greater this awareness is,” Bösker said, “the more resilient society becomes – and the less likely war is.”

He believes that awareness is growing, even if not quickly enough. In the end, he said, the decisive question is not how many young people join the Bundeswehr, but that they are forced to confront the question at all. “The Zeitenwende is not over,” he said. “It has just begun.”

Germany conscription military service Bundestag Zeitenwende DFG-VK peace movement conscientious objection Bundeswehr protests Yannick Kiesel Roland Bösker NATO civil defence societal resilience