German Bundestag,
Plenarprotokoll 19/193, pp. 24397-24398.
Frau President. Ladies and gentlemen.
It is conservative to defend things which work. Conscription
[Wehrpflicht] in Germany worked for 200
years. It united the armed forces with the people. It breathed a fresh spirit
into the barracks of our country. Young men from all regions and classes of
Germany came to the Bundeswehr. Many of today’s generals began as conscripts.
Without the Wehrpflicht, they would
have never found the way to the armed forces. The military leadership supports
in large parts today’s motion [Drucksache
19/24401] of the AfD for the re-activation of the Wehrpflicht.
Tobias
Lindner (Greens): What?
Tobias Pflüger (Linke): I do not at
all believe that!
The motion is the opportunity to correct a capital failure
of the Federal government. The Wehrpflicht
was much more than just the ensuring of personnel for the Bundeswehr. It
was an essential of our armed forces. Entire generations of young Germans thus
came together to serve a higher duty, to feel what it meant to place themselves
in service to our country, to learn to integrate into a society. For a few
months in a life, all were equal: No distinction of money, expensive clothes,
and background – a worthwhile matter. The Wehrpflicht
was not only an essential of the Bundeswehr. It created a social bond for
many generations.
The Wehrpflicht was
part of the DNA of our country. Who surrenders something like that, he is not
conservative. Who surrenders something like that is responsible for the
destruction of a basic pillar of our state and of our society.
Henning
Otte (CDU/CSU): Na, na, na!
And that, ladies and gentlemen, a conservative does not do.
The surrender of the Wehrpflicht
in the year 2011 is part of a destructive policy in Germany. It is part of
a policy at the end of which stands the abolition of our national state.
Alexander
Lambsdorff (FDP): O Gott! O Gott!
This policy destroys the mission readiness of the Bundeswehr just so as it places at disposal the energy security, the cultural identity and now the economic basis of Germany.
For it was always the duty of the Union to oppose the
leftist radical powers of Germany,
Tobias Pflüger (Linke): Eijeijei!
the business model of which is the fight against one’s own
national state. Instead, the CDU sacrifices a treasure of our national
civil-state, the Wehrpflicht. To the
greed for posts and power, much of the table silver of our Republic has already
been sacrificed. That is not conservative. That is dangerous.
Our Bundeswehr is now 65 years old. I thank all soldiers for
their service to Germany. It is not easy for them in these times. For this
jubilee, the Foreign Minister congratulates a Belgian on Twitter. The Defense
Minister greets in gendered terms the Bundeswehr’s soldiers of the year 1955.
And the Federal President in his address arbitrarily alters the form of the
oath. Our soldiers have not deserved such a government.
Stefan Müller (CDU/CSU-Erlangen): Oje!
Tobias Pflüger (Linke): Resign!
[trans: tem]
