Armament

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In addition to the emphasis on Germany (and here only the time before the world wars), the article does not take into account the armament during other periods of human history. The article overlaps with the article arms race

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Armament describes the process of an increase in the military potential of a state or a military alliance . It is characterized by an increase in some or all of the armed forces (i.e., more people work or serve in the army, air force and / or navy). Increased military public relations work or propaganda can precede and / or accompany the armament.

Arms expenditure can also primarily serve to modernize war equipment. Old, existing war goods are then usually scrapped or sold to third countries once the new war goods are available (rarely kept ready for use).

Any upgrade can exacerbate the (always existing) security dilemma .

The arming of a state can cause another state or several other states to also arm. The latter is called retrofitting. If the first country to arm itself takes the retrofitting of others as an opportunity to continue arming, an arms race (= "arms race") can get underway. This happened z. B. after the Second World War between western states (which merged to form NATO , which was dominated by the USA) and the Eastern Bloc ( Warsaw Pact ).

The term retrofitting can be used and / or understood in a value-neutral or judgmental manner ( meliorative or pejorative ) .

Global military spending in 2007 rose to 1.340 billion dollars , an increase of six per cent in nominal terms over the previous year. In 2008 military spending was $ 1.5 trillion.

A special form of armament is when a country comes into possession of nuclear weapons , that is, when it becomes a nuclear power . Running a nuclear program can also be described as armament.

Upgrades can be operated openly or covertly. In the latter case, a country tries to conceal the amount of its armaments expenditure or to make only part of it publicly visible / known. There are limits to this in democracies; In dictatorships or central economies like the GDR this was easily possible.

Armament in Germany before the world wars

In the age of imperialism , the military was very important in the German Empire . Before the First World War there was a German-British naval competition .

In 1893 Wilhelm II dissolved the Reichstag in 1890 because it had rejected the armament of the army, which he had also requested. In the election campaign that followed, the supporters of Wilhelmine politics from the Conservative and National Liberal parties were victorious. The armament of the Imperial Navy propagated by Alfred von Tirpitz , which was quite popular with the people, was subsequently promoted by Wilhelm, although General Leo von Caprivi , v. Bismarck's successor from March 1890 to October 1894 was against it (he was decidedly friendly to England ).

German colonialism plans (see German Colonies and Protected Areas , Platz an der Sonne (1897)) also contributed to attaching great importance to an efficient navy. For example, Kaiser Wilhelm II sent the gunboat SMS Panther to Agadir in 1911 after French troops had occupied Fez and Rabat . The Panther , which arrived on July 1, 1911 , was replaced after a few days by two other German warships, the small cruiser SMS Berlin and the gunboat SMS Eber . The second Morocco crisis came about .

The armaments measures and expenditures caused budget deficits and national debt after 1906 . Chancellor Bethmann Hollweg tried to slow this process from 1909 to 1911 by making savings. The defense spending stagnated and went back in a year even. From 1912 on, armaments expenditure rose again; from 1914 onwards due to the entry into the First World War, exponentially. At the beginning of the Weimar Republic , the contingents, armament and organization of the Reichswehr were determined by the Versailles Peace Treaty. In spite of this, the government cabinet under SPD Chancellor Hermann Müller passed resolutions on personnel and material armament in 1929.

After the takeover of the Nazi party in 1933 which had rearmament of the Wehrmacht high priority. The armaments policy had a positive effect on the employment level; it was declared as job creation. The armament was - against the resistance of the Reichsbank President Hjalmar Schacht - financed primarily through new debt (see Mefo exchange ).

Situation in Europe

The EU Treaty on a Constitution for Europe (TCE), which was signed in 2004 but not entered into force, stipulates in Article I-41 (3): "The member states undertake to gradually improve their military capabilities." The 2007 Treaty of Lisbon succeeded the VVE ; it came into force on December 1, 2009.

According to the program "Monitor" from June 2014, there is a report by the US Court of Auditors, GAO, on further nuclear armament in Europe. It follows that there have been specific agreements between the USA and certain NATO partners. The report says: "The US Department of Defense and NATO allies agreed in 2010 on the key military features of the bomb ". According to the Court of Auditors, details such as "explosive power" and the "accuracy" of the new weapons were also discussed. Nuclear weapons expert Hans Kristensen from the Federation of American Scientists told WDR-Magazin that the so-called "host nations" in particular are "directly involved" in the project within NATO. These are countries in which US atomic bombs are stationed, i.e. Germany , Belgium, the Netherlands, Italy and Turkey.

Other examples

Mohammad Reza Pahlavi , the last Shah of Iran , ascended the peacock throne on September 18, 1941. On the same day, British and Soviet troops, which until then had only occupied the north and south of Iran, marched into Tehran and took control of the Iranian government. Later (and until the end of his reign in 1979) the Shah carried out a massive build-up of the Iranian army. He was able to do this thanks to the enormous oil wealth of his country. This armament contributed to the fact that Iran was able to quickly stop the surprise attack by Iraq in the Iran-Iraq war (September 22, 1980 to August 20, 1988) and in the following years mostly had the military upper hand.

literature

• Michael Geyer: German Armaments Policy 1860 to 1980, Suhrkamp, ​​1984, Frankfurt a. M., 245 pages

See also

• Permanent arms industry
• Military-industrial complex
• Stockholm International Peace Research Institute - Peace Research . Regularly publishes data and facts on armaments, rearmament and the like.
• Terminal High Altitude Area Defense , THAAD, planned weapon system in East Asia, installed in South Korea , in case of concerns about China , years 2016 ff.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Armaments expenditure increased worldwide - sueddeutsche.de ( Memento from June 10, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
2. ^ Article ( Military editions worldwide ( Memento from September 30, 2009 in the Internet Archive )) from Süddeutscher Zeitung
3. ↑ See the ubiquitous sailor suit for boys.
4. ↑ US nuclear weapons in the Eifel. Government closely involved in nuclear program ( memento from January 29, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) according to Monitor , June 19, 2014