Europe takes a second look at conscription

Conscription is back. After the Cold War, most European countries suspended mandatory military service, but now they’re rediscovering the institution that added muscle to the armed forces and some measure of social cohesion. The practice is often more a burden than an aid to the military. But with natural disasters and other emergencies increasing, what we really need is citizen resilience training.

“I can promise you one thing: We’ll have to discuss the issue of military service and national service very intensively again,” Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, secretary-general of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union, said in a video message released earlier this month. That sentence unleashed this summer’s biggest debate in Germany…

Though some nations would benefit from more military muscle, what it is more urgently needed is resilience. If Russia decided to attack another country tomorrow, by cyber or conventional means, the population might need to survive for several days without power or access to grocery stores. The same skills help communities deal with natural disasters.