The plan coincides with steps by Washington to move tens of thousands of U.S. troops from bases in Germany to other locations in the United States and abroad, as part of sweeping changes in Washington’s military. This “transformation,” as the U.S. Department of Defense calls this ongoing process, includes moving most of the U.S. forces currently in Western Europe toward the Middle East, Central Asia, and Africa, and a shift in their organization toward smaller and more mobile and lethal units poised for rapid deployment around the world.

The announcement by Struck is an indication that the only future for the militaries of imperialist powers is as specialized partners of the transformed U.S. war-fighting machine.

“Struck said the reductions were necessary to make a final break with the cold war,” reported the Tribune. “During that time, Germany, like other countries belonging to the Atlantic alliance [NATO], maintained large and inflexible armies trained for territorial defense that could withstand a conventional attack from the Warsaw Pact, the Soviet-dominated military alliance.”

As part of these moves, Berlin is seeking to take steps towards transforming part of its bloated military into effective combat units. Plans are on the table to establish a 35,000-strong elite combat force backed up by 70,000 troops designed for deployment in “peace-keeping” missions. The remainder, about 150,000 troops, would be slated for “civil defense.” The overall size of the German armed forces is being reduced from 285,000 to 250,000. The number of brigades will be slashed to 12, from 22.

The German military has proven incapable of playing an effective combat role in recent military interventions. In the war in Afghanistan, for example, Berlin was forced to send its troops part of the way by train because it lacked effective air transport for large-scale military missions abroad. Germany’s rulers have been under increasing pressure from Washington to structure their military to be capable of fighting alongside U.S. troops, taking specialized assignments under U.S. imperialism’s umbrella.

The German military was weakened in 1990 after the fall of the Berlin Wall, when the army had to absorb 175,000 troops from East Germany. This swelled the armed forces of the united Germany temporarily to 500,000 soldiers.

Struck announced that the final details of the troop and base reductions would be announced next summer, following “consultations with our U.S. counterparts.”

Washington has already carried out a sweeping reduction of its forces in Germany over the past decade and a half. In 1989 close to 250,000 of Washington’s 2.1 million troops were based in Germany. Today, of the 1.4 million soldiers in the U.S. military, only 75,000 are stationed in Germany. But that is not the end of the cuts being planned by the Pentagon.

“We are still situated in large part as if little has changed for the last 50 years,” said Donald Rumsfeld, U.S. secretary of defense, in a September 23 presentation to the Senate Armed Services Committee. “As if, for example, Germany is still bracing for a Soviet tank invasion across its northern plain.”

Two heavy divisions, the First Armored Division and the First Infantry Division (mechanized), are slated to be moved from Germany to bases in the United States. Smaller, more agile units will replace what is left of the huge armored force that had been stationed in Germany since the end of World War II.  
 
 
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