Re: This may be O.T but i was just wondering...
 

I was talking about the Bundeswehr. I heard that some units had a problem with morale. I also thought that Bundeswehr was the collective term for the whole military in Germany and that Bundesheer was the name for the army. My mistake.

Re: This may be O.T but i was just wondering...
 

I maybe wrong, but I think that what history thaught us with Viet-Nam or Iraq is that victory in a war is not a military but political problem. Soldiers won fights, General won battles and politicians won wars...

Just imagine what will if in Afghanistan there was a real war, OTAN will send 10.000.000 troops from USA, 4.000.000 from Germany, 3.000.000 for each Italia,UK and France ...etc... What would happen? I am sure that in one month there wont be any taliban alive. With such an amount of troops, you don't need to bombard anything, so, no collateral dammage. But in order to get such a deployment you have to justify a war and not only a 'peace-keeping/war on terror' badly defined and conducted operation.
That's why I don't like tha therm of asymetrical war: it's asymetrical but certainly not a war, because in a democraty a war involves the country and not only a little group of unlucky professionnal soldier...
But this clearly off-topic, so, shame on me... [img]/threads/images/Graemlins/Bomb.gif[/img]

Re: This may be O.T but i was just wondering...
 

Good point though. I never really considered it a war either. I don't mean any disrespect to the troops when I say that by the way. They are indeed in a war! Back at home in the UK and the other Nato states you really wouldn't think a war was on at all though.

It used to be the case that if a country was at war you could see that much in the streets, in the way people behaved and in the language used on the radio, tv and even in the language used by the people. But today in the UK and in Germany (and maybe even in the USA too, I heard someone saying that the USA didn't feel like it was at war) you really cannot tell at all.

The fact that everyone, and I mean everyone, has a bloddy opinion on wether the war is right or not or on how best to pull out etc also doesn't help create that unified fealing.

Re: This may be O.T but i was just wondering...
 

Yup! For them, the political problem doesn't matter. That's the problem of professionnal armys: only some take all the risks for everybody.

Re: This may be O.T but i was just wondering...
 

Oooh, them fighting words. Funnily enough we think you guys have compeltly gone down the drain. Last couple of joint exercises in the alps was your gebirgsjaeger (crack unit) against a normal dirt-infantry (jaeger) unit of ours - guess who won.

Austrian Army, 12th JgBN and then wonderfull wonderfull green slime duty.

Regarding the use of the Steyer in NZ / Oz, I heard from a colonel who did a stint as a G-1 that the improvement over the m-16 was so great that had to recalibrate the ranges complety. True? Also, how's the grenade launcher? You know the thing was designed for a "motor" type sitck-gernade that was never purchased. Still, the gas adjust feature is pretty handy for other nasty tricks, anyone use it ( if you know what i mean?)

Re: This may be O.T but i was just wondering...
 

I served in the US Army, 1966-1969. Guess that makes me an old fart compared to the rest of you.

Re: This may be O.T but i was just wondering...
 

They had to recalibrate the rages! Wunderbar! What do you Bundeswehr and Bundesheer guys think about all the so gennante "Skandals". I personally think its a load of fuss about nothing. Just a load of crap that the pacifists are cooking up to try and stop the Bundeswehr (and Germany) from taking a bigger role on the world stage.

Re: This may be O.T but i was just wondering...
 

slightly extreme wording and perhaps not completly attune to the reality of our history and culture...but yes http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smirk.gif

the joke is that the skull that was photo'd and all the fuss is about lie all about in afghanistan, litteraly by the road. so no oppening graves or anything like that.

also, i heard that one poor KSK chap was kicked out of the army for having purchased an ak and putting in his locker (in afghanistan - not germany).

OTOH, some of those KSK guys have been driving around with the the old DAK emblem. it's a bit of a tounge-in-cheak joke that, but so very un-PC that it could very easily be misunderstood.

Re: This may be O.T but i was just wondering...
 

Whoah - let's hope for those guys that no so-called journalist working for BILD is roaming around internet forums such as this one - their next cover-story would be made up, and some guys would be kicked out of the army, damaging its image once more! DAK then stands for Deutsches Afghanistan Korps, huh? Well, you can't really blame the guys who invented this, blame the acronym, as well as the commanders who let them put their sign on the vehicles, if this is true! But in a politically-overcorrect Germany (+ Austria), that's all you need to have another army scandal, with all consequences!

Re: This may be O.T but i was just wondering...
 

Don't blame anyone. Its not like the Bundeswehr in Afghanistan are going to assumt the personas of a bunch of DAK veterans and tear up the place is it.