Word: bundeswehr
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...powers, which allot part of their armed forces to NATO but keep command of the remainder, every single West German combat unit is under NATO command. Although a number of West German officers are mixed in with other allied officers in the NATO command structure, in practical terms the Bundeswehr is an extension of the U.S. Seventh Army. U.S. Lieut. General Donald Bennett, commanding VII Corps in Stuttgart, notes that Germany "is the only major country in the world that has agreed to put its self-defense into someone else's hands...
Motor Damage. Whether Innere Führung is at fault, or something else, the Bundeswehr is in bad shape. The No. 1 problem is manpower-the army is 3,500 officers and 32,000 noncoms short. Since German bureaucratic traditions dictate that all desk jobs be filled first, it is the field and training units that are the most undermanned...
...last year-and 81% of the exemptions were granted. West Berlin, where residents are draft-exempt, is increasingly used as an asylum for young men who want to avoid military service. They stay there as students or workers until they pass draft age. In recent weeks, three Bundeswehr officers-two of whom held sensitive positions-have defected to East Germany. There is an increase of minor sabotage, consisting largely of motor damage and destruction of weapon parts...
Unhasty Improvements. The Bundeswehr does have some friends of the kind that obviates the need for many enemies: the far-right National Democratic Party of Adolf von Thadden. In his convention speech at Stuttgart last month, Von Thadden spent 60 out of 90 minutes talking sympathetically about the Bundeswehr and deploring its problems. A number of officers are campaigning as National Democratic candidates in the September elections...
Defense Minister Gerhard Schroder surfaces every few weeks or so to promise improvements in the armed forces, but he inevitably adds that reforms must not take place too hastily. An extreme view has been put forward by Major Rudolf Woller, president of the Association of Bundeswehr Reservists. In a recent speech, he said: "If in the subconscious of the nation the impression takes hold that it is not really protected by the German contribution to the defense system, the leadership of the state could be forced to a change of course toward neutralism...