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The German military has seen more change in the last decade and change after the collapse of the Soviet Union than any of the other major western powers. Not only has the German military had to find a completely new raison d'etre it has had to absorb and or dispose of the East German military after the country reunified in 1990. Rebuilding the economically depressed and ecological damaged East Germany is still an ongoing proposition for the united Germany, causing friction at the highest and lowest political levels and absorbing a sizeable amount of the united Germany's economic and social rescources.
The deployment of the West German army from 1955 to 1990 was simple-its goal was to stop or delay the expected Warsaw Pact armoured invasion of Western Europe. Beyond that, it had little or no interests. The heavily armoured divisions trained and waited, but in 1991, with the sudden collapse of the Soviet threat, it quickly became apparent that the whole reason for the structure of the army, its major formations, and its deployment had been terminally undermined. As a result, the German army has been radically downsized and restructured in an attempt to create new mobile, high flexibility units. However, there are some doubts that this strategy has gone too far, leaving the present German army's combat capability dangerously eroded. The German military has been increasing its ties with France and jointly operates a Franco-German rapid reaction brigade of 6000 personnel, as part of a non-NATO European Rapid Reaction Force.
The present strength(2001) of the GermanArmy is 221,000 including 3000 women, with some 120,000 personnel avalable for front-line duty. Although the number of active units has been drastically reduced, and some of the emaining formations downsized, there has been a move to upgrade both quality and the reliability of equipment to raise the combat readiness of the remaining front-line units.
The present organization has
one Army Forces Command with
1 airmobile force command( division-sized)
2 airbourne brigades
1 commando brigade
1 army aviation brigade
1 electronic warfare brigade
3 Corps Commands have between them a total of
4 armoured divisions
2 armoured infantry divisions
1 mountain division
The Army is equiped with
1782 Leopard 2 main battle tanks(equivalent to an M1A1 without the depleted uranium armour)
800 Lepard 1A3/4/5 medium tanks
409SPz-1 Luchs armoured reconnaissance vehicles
114 TPZ-1 Fuchs armoured reconnaissance vehicles and 917 Fuchs armoured personnel carriers
2120 Marder 2 Infantry fighting vehicles
133 Wiesel airtransportable infantry fighting vehicles
2109 M113 armoured personnel carriers
49 PZH-2000 155mm self-propelled howitzers
571 M109A3 155mm self-propelled howitzers
154 MLRS 227mm self-propelled rocket launchers(the same as those in American units)
78 110mm LARS self-propelled rocket launchers
192 FH-70 towed 155mm howitzers
143 M101 105mm towed howitzers
18 GebH 105mm towed howitzers
515 Tampella mortors
394 120mm Brandt mortors
157 HOT anttank missile launchers on Jaguar armoured carriers
210 TOW antitank missile launchers on Wiesel armoured carriers
1606 Milan manportable antitank missile launchers
The German army also has a wide variety of homemade and imported manportable antitank rockets including the Panzerfaust 3 and the Armburst.
143 Roland self-propelled surface to air missile launchers
300 Stinger manportable surface to air missile launchers
380 Gepard 35mm self-propelled antiaircraft guns
1145 20mm RH202 towed antiaircraft guns
The Army aviation component has taken delivery of the first of its planned 80 Tiger attack helicopters but it will be at least another year before they become operational.
They also have
204 PAH-1s (Bo 105 attack helicopters armed with HOT missiles)
145 UH-1D transport helicopters
108 CH-53G heavy transport helicopters
90 Bo-105M support helicopters
The German army has been reluctant to operate beyond its borders but German forces have been involved in peacekeeping duties in the Balkans since the mid1990s.
Edited by Certifiably Cait, 26 August 2012 - 02:26 PM.
