German soldiers deemed 'too fat to fight'

"War is the domain of physical exertion and suffering." - Karl von Clausewitz

Folks,

I received this today from an active member of the armed citizenry, with this comment:

I couldn't help it...when I saw it all I could think of was the "militia". The "militia's" problems are not necessarily beer and sausage over fruits and vegatables, rather, standing around in 'gucci-flage' exhorting the attributes of the AK vs. Stoner system rather than putting one's ass down in the mud to crawl around, not submitting to adversity in training (banker's hours war training) such as programmed sleep and food deprivation to cause movement out of the pyschological comfort zone, etc.

Folks, this man is right. Start doing what you need to do today to prepare yourself for tomorrow.

Mike
III


December 3, 2008

German soldiers deemed 'too fat to fight'

Thomas Coghlan in Kabul

First they were accused of not wanting to fight. Then they were blamed for failing in their main mission to train the Afghan police.

Now Germany’s battered military reputation has received a further humiliating blow. According to official reports the 3,500 troops in northern Afghanistan drink too much and are too fat to fight.

A German parliamentary report has revealed that in 2007 German forces in Afghanistan consumed about 1.7 million pints of beer and 90,000 bottles of wine. During the first six months of this year 896,000 pints of beer were shipped to German forces in Afghanistan. British and US bases in the country enforce a strict ban on alcohol.

The physical condition of the soldiers was already in question after a German armed forces report found that 40 per cent of its soldiers aged 18-29 were overweight, compared to 35 per cent of the civilian population of the same age.

The report, published in March, concluded that the Bundeswehr lived on beer and sausages while shunning fruit and vegetables. It said that an overdeveloped bureaucracy was also contributing to a “passive lifestyle” on the part of the soldiers.

Reinhold Robbe, the parliamentary commissioner for the German armed forces, concluded: “Plainly put, the soldiers are too fat, exercise too little and take little care of their diet.”

“Yes, it is true, the German soldiers in Kunduz are allowed to drink two cans of beer per day,” Lieutenant-Colonel Rainer Zaude, a spokesman for the forces, confirmed.

Even more damning is the allegation from a senior officer that Germany is failing in its main mission to train the Afghan police. General Hans-Christoph Ammon, the commander of the special commando unit, the KSK, described the efforts as “a miserable failure”.

The Government is also reported to have banned any reference to Krieg (war), in press statements on Afghanistan. Caveats imposed by the German Government limit the forces to operations in the relatively passive north.

Twenty-eight German soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan since 2001, including two in a suicide bomb attack in Kunduz province last month.