The German military can be understood for feeling like the Rodney Dangerfield of European armies.
Its soldiers want to fight next to American GIs and French Legionnaires, but instead get sent to the Somalian bush to supply water to troops from India.Four years after unification, and despite Chancellor Helmut Kohl's insistence that the armed forces be a "reliable partner" for international peacekeeping, the military's mission is muddled, its budget tight.
"The soldiers are very bitter," said Col. Bernhard Gertz, director of the German Armed Forces As-so-ciation, a union for 265,000 professional soldiers.
"Someone has to analyze the security situation, decide on the shape of the army, then finance it. But everything is done the other way around. First they decide our budget, then what our mission is."
Before the Cold War ended, Germany never needed military policy. NATO took care of Western Europe and the constitution forbade German missions anywhere else.
Kohl has been trying to build a consensus for German participation in U.N.-backed missions overseas but meeting strong resistance among Germans who feel the military's Nazi-era crimes still mandate non-intervention of any kind.
After opting out of the gulf war, to the deep chagrin of leading officers, a military detachment was sent to help out in Somalia, but only under the condition it deploy to a safe area.
With American troops pulling out, Somalia isn't considered safe anywhere, and the Germans are leaving, they announced Monday.
Just as the German army was warming up for overseas missions, new doubts are arising about its strength at home.
Some officers say that with rising nationalism in eastern Europe, the focus should continue to be on Europe, especially if NATO's security umbrella is extended to include the Czechs, Hungarians and Poles, a proposal that was to be discussed at a NATO summit next month.
"The latest developments in Russia and the Balkans have opened the eyes of those who think that peace in Europe can never come to an end," said Lt. Col. Wilhelm Wolff, a staff officer at the 3rd Corps in Koblenz.
"And we can't neglect the defense of our own country."
In a statement apparently aimed at conservative voters, Wolfgang Schaeuble, Kohl's whip in parliament, said Monday that soldiers should help border police stop an influx of asylum-seekers from southeastern Europe.
With vastly different proposals floating around, an election year ahead, and no serious debate on the military's future, no one seems to know what the priorities are.
"The Bundeswehr (Germany army) is completely confused," said Michael Wolffsohn, a professor of history at the University of the German Armed Forces in Munich. "There is no global thinking, no regional thinking, only wishful thinking."
From a pre-unification high of 500,000, the German military has shrunk to 370,000, including 11,000 former East German commissioned and non-commissioned officers.
Last week, Defense Minister Volker Ruehe said budget cuts might force a new reduction of another 20,000.
Angry soldiers are likely to hold protest rallies next month unless Parliament moves to set clear goals for the armed forces and limits on how small it will shrink, Gertz said.
Not likely, said Fritz Fliszar, director of the conservative Friedrich-Naumann Foundation.