Latvia to start conscripting men for mandatory military service, starting 2024 | Hacker News Reader

Latvia to start conscripting men for mandatory military service, starting 2024

loc.gov

44 pointsacadapter102 comments

It is sad that such a gender discriminatory law is passed. In this day and age for the state to base mandatory requirements on gender is unfortunate.

I agree, such blatant discrimination. I fully expect the feminist garde to be on the streets protesting this awful move.

> According to the Journal of Exercise Physiology, women generally produce about two-thirds the amount of total strength and applied force that men produce.

Wars are not a matter of physical strength, being biologically weaker wouldn't prevent a woman from, say, operating a drone.

Agree. But we have to keep this limitation in mind. There could be situations where you have to carry a drone or batteries from place to place for example.

Sure, we use a couple of Hanks for that. Sherley and Melinda will catch the bullets just fine.

If you are sitting in a air condition office in Germany operating drones, it doesn't matter much.

In a war, if you are anywhere near the frontline physical strength is of vital importance.

In the most basic form, can you pick up a fallen soldier and carry that soldier out of harm's way?

However, I know many women who are far stronger than me, and would be more useful in the frontline than me.

Gender is not the only factor.

So with suitable technology we should have our womens’ armies ready to march in no time. Can’t wait. Gender neutrality is a worthy and lofty goal.

I hear they are better communicators too. I see no downsides.

Women are also harder to hit targets - and women can operate most guns quite easily.

> and women can operate most guns quite easily.

No they can't, assault rifles are made for a male build and strength, women have significantly harder time using them. I was in the military and the women had a really hard time passing the basic tests for assault rifles since they had shorter arms and weaker upper body strength.

Can women do it with training? Yes, but basically every man can do it without training, I've seen it myself. And if those women doesn't keep up that strength as civilians they wont be able to use the assault rifle properly if they need to.

Edit: As for being smaller, being able to wear body armor is more important. Level 3 body armor is standard for combat situations and that is heavy, ammunition is also very heavy. Typical combat gear is about 20-30kg in total, that is heavy even for men and untrained men get significantly slower from it but they can still operate. That is for a basic infantryman with just combat equipment, no food or anything, that is the minimum to fight.

Yes, I can sort of understand an existing law staying in place because of inertia, but introducing a new law in this day an age just seems weird.

You are literally asking men to pay more towards the state (in time) than women.

With retirement ages being the same, but women living longer they are in reality asked to pay more in time as of part of total... Men are hugely discriminated. And no one is protecting their rights...

In Russia the retirement age for women is 5 years lower despite women having a longer expectation of life than men.

You could argue that an equal retirement age is equality though.

Otherwise anyone with a health condition that shortens their life span could argue that they should be able to retire earlier.

Some of my colleagues discuss politics sometimes, and I have tried to discuss things like these.

I am stunned by the lack of interest to discuss male issues with the same kind of enthusiasm that women have when discussing women's issues.

Very few seem to be interested in even acknowledging that we men on average have a worse attitude to the concept of risk. I have tried to use a non-political topic such as extreme sports (just to try to carry the topic in a different way), with very few constructive discussions.

Even if we disregard the gender discrimination aspect, the draft is the most blatant violation of human rights present in (some) developed countries.

how should a country under existential threat defend itself if military training of male population hurts someone's feelings?

Firefighters defend against fire, doing a regular job for a wage, employed under circumstances based on consent.

We need to stop this ritualization of the work that the military does. It is, after all, just a type of work.

I would say that the "mental conditioning" and strict disciplinary system of the military is unique among lines of employment.

Even more reason that it shouldn't be mandatory.

Existential threat is pretty hypothetical at the moment. There was no reason so far to have doubts on deterring capacity of NATO Article 21.

During peacetime my answer would be by increasing military spending and attracting more people to military careers and voluntary reserve. During wartime everything goes of course - it's still should be non-discriminatory though.

If a country can't find enough young men and women willing to take up arms in its defence, it has already lost.

Who would you defend in not you children and wives?

Poland woke up a while ago, now others are following. Russia is a major threat to European security.

Sweden woke up in 2014. Probably not enough waking up but the invasion of Crimea changed a lot here.

Not really. The Swedish armed forces are still incredibly underfunded and understaffed.

What do you mean? There's no mandatory conscription in Poland since 2010.

It already had a healthy % of the GDP dedicated to defense, and is increasing further.

Russia has been made into a major threat to European security …

Sure, all Europeans asked to be invaded after all! I'm pretty confident it could be a continent of crazy sadistics who wants to die and live in slavery ...

IMHO you should elaborate, sentences like this are easily misunderstood

According to the Latvian minister of defense, Inara Murniece, the adoption of the Law on State Defense Service is “[t]he Latvian response to new regional security challenges, and is aimed at strengthening all defense capabilities and developing comprehensive national defense service.”

This has to be because of Russia, right?

It says in the previous paragraph that this is because of the war in Ukraine. So yes, Russia.

That's a safe assumption. I found this article an interesting take on Latvian defense policy: https://www.fpri.org/article/2020/06/latvias-new-state-defen...

That is an interesting document. In particular, the focus seems to be on preventing Latvia from being suddenly and completely invaded as happened in all three Baltic states last time. This includes gear and forces dedicated to detecting enemy operations, relatively high tech gear and systems like anti air missile defenses, and also the capability to keep the government functioning such as fortification and relocation.

One take away from all of this is that many of the actions being proposed for defense appear to be just as suitable for female service members as males. Operating detectors and signal scanners, staffing drones and anti air missile batteries, and keeping the government functional are all tasks that require awareness and training but not necessarily physical strength or robustness.

Not only. A visibly weakened continental western europe, russia, turkey, discontent within the eu (ie austria increasingly resurgent), an increasing domestic risk, all pose a real threat to european stability. The situation is likely to blow up soon.

How is Western Europe weakened? Of anything the war in Ukraine showed the power of the European countries if they want something done.

The following is true for many European countries:

1) citizens do not receive military training so they will be unable to defend the country in case of invasion

2) there is not enough weapon and ammunition

3) the border is not properly fortified and supervised, so it is possible to advance fast and capture large territory with a surprise attack, and it will be very difficult to take it back

> war in Ukraine showed the power of the European countries

No. The war showed that it is easy to capture large territory with a well planned surprise attack and it is difficult (or maybe even impossible) to take it back once there are trenches, minefields and other fortifications. Also the war showed that Europe is unable to provide necessary amount of ammunitions.

A surprise attack on Ukraine - when and where did that happen? Russian troops were massing for quite a while.

Probably people were thinking that it was a bluff and there would be no invasion. If you look at the map, most of the territory was captured in first days, and then, after Russia has built trenches and minefields it takes lots of resources and time to take back even a single village.

So what we should learn from this is that if you want to take a land from some other country (for example: Finland, Sweden or any non-NATO country) then this "surprise attack" strategy is working. You advance 50-200 km into enemy's territory within several days while your enemy is unprepared and then entrench and now your enemy has to storm your well defended positions, go through the minefields, losing many times more soldiers and equipment than you. And you can just sit and wait until they exhaust and surrender.

If you don't want that happening to your country then you should fortify your borders and build minefields and trenches first.

The US was very clear in their view that Russia was going to attack, for example.

It really depends on who you are facing if you even get to entrench. For example: NATO's old plans against the Warsaw Pact pretty much always called for the use of nuclear weapons, so no entrenchment there (with the assumption that the larger Warsaw Pact forces would be able to rapidly advance initially, despite some preparation to block progress).

Of course they were clear because they knew. Putin made a speech and presented an ultimatum[0]. Big powers know this stuff. NATO & US would never agree to any of the points in the ultimatum so the only move forward for Russia was to invade. That's how big powers played throughout the history. Nothing really changed.

[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_December_2021_ultimatu...

It also showed how weak the supposed second military of the world is.

And how little ammunition and equipment West can provide to their allies when they need help.

It's not like Russia is swimming in ammo either. Reminds me of the head of Wagner (currently dead, killed most likely to to his coup attempt) rants about it.

Wether it was due to general shortage, logistical issues, or them bein targeted is irrelevant.

Unfortunately arrogance leads to denial. Thats why you are getting downvoted.

>Of anything the war in Ukraine showed the power of the ~~European countries~~ United States if they want something done.

FTFY

A cost of living crisis started after that war (ordinary people having trouble with bills), showing how much effort had been exerted in solidarity with Ukraine (whose people are the victims and underdogs in the war). That makes the results of EU efforts unimpressive to me for all the effort they expended. I would have expected something like from them for all that effort.

Actually it started before the war in Ukraine. Energy prices started going up in summer 2021. For example, in Dec 2021 energy prices were higher than today[0].

[0]https://www.statista.com/statistics/1267500/eu-monthly-whole...

In what world is Austria resurgent? It has about zero power projection on its own.

Lol right, you forgot that evil Germany is starting to rearm and no doubt will soon invade Poland again /s

Well that just goes without saying.

No need - see Germany has already achieved its goals by controlling the EU. Also who's going to supply the oil? This time Romania's run out of it, and Russia is not particularly keen.

Yes, just sounds more formal than "Russia prob gonna get us so let's get ready".

In Swedish Military we have this term about "Fiende Röd från Öst" (Enemy Red from the East). Definitely not about Russia.

Thinking of Sweden-Russia relations reminded me of this (https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2022/06/06/how-a-nondescr..., where people were mocking Sweden for not giving food to others’ kids who are guests.

I seem to recall Swedish authorities followed up on the claim, checking if it’s propaganda from Russia, but they failed to find any links (their conclusion was that it’s wholly unconnected). Does anyone else rem this latter part as well or am I misremembering?

I dont understand how they can achieve this. They have given themselves an extreme short timeline.

Military bases must be built or at least extended. Barracks. kitchens, medical services, bunks. recreation Uniforms, shoes, Camping / field equipment for everyone. Aquisition of weapons and weapon systems for the recruits, A wide assortment of training grounds needs to be prepared. Instructors need to be trained and dedicated to the task. and a lot more.

I would think that would take years not months.

It does say in the article that they had mandatory service for men that ended in 2006.

If they were really smart, they have kept up maintenance and upgrade for all the infrastructure they needed back then and its ready for use. That would be an outstanding achievement for any western government.

Retaining all the instructors and other personal would have been smart to but I bet they did not do so.

I guess the big question would be "how many soldiers per year". Are they requesting everyone to show up for recruitment and will only pick a few for service. That woud make it a lot easier.

If they take everyone they have a close to impossible plan.

I don't think retaining the old instructors would be a good idea. Their training methods were probably very heavily influenced by the Soviet times, which will not work well with modern approach to warfare.

Of course there are other aspects of being in the army.

It requires like at least 10 clerks, logistics workers, cooks, drivers, etc for each “fighting man” in the army in modern times - warfare is largely applied logistics.

I’d suspect that a lot of the conscripts will get some basic weapons training and then end up in a “rear” role while the professional soldiers and best of the conscripts are assigned to the “combat units” and train more rigorously

There’s an alternative civil service route and several different ways you can complete your military service - along with a whole host of exceptions.

I’d suspect a relatively large number of conscripts will be diverted to the civil service route on basis of fitness, choice, suitability, etc initially - doing work such as driving ambulances, fire service, auxiliary policing work, working in care homes, being porters in hospitals, etc.

It also sounds like there’s a route similar to ROTC for university students?

> I dont understand how they can achieve this. They have given themselves an extreme short timeline.

I don’t think the state is under any obligation to conscript everyone they possibly can. Towards the end of mandatory military service in Sweden the armed forces simply became very selective. In the last few years it was enough to just say you didn’t feel like it and they wouldn’t conscript you. I would expect the same to happen now in Latvia, but in reverse.

It is a choice as to how you believe you can resist an invasion.

One model is the citizen soldier. The model Norway used to have. Everyone is trained, and everyone is in some manner ready to go to war The benefit is that occupation becomes quite difficult. A strong resistance is guaranteed.

The other one is the professional soldier. Great for going to war in other countries. Great if you can repel the invasion quickly.

As we see in Ukraine, the number of soldiers you can mobilize becomes important as well.

And in other to have many to mobilize you need a lot of trained soldiers. Or its just a canon fodder.

I’m assuming they probably didn’t demolish everything when mandatory service ended in 2006, they maintained an active (though smaller) professional force and have been hosting NATO rotations, so there’s likely additional capacity to host conscripts.

> The law provides for two categories of service — military service and alternative (civil) service — prescribing the rules and procedures for performing these obligations.

The alternate civil service route is understated and extremely useful, I think.

It’s not reasonably possible to draft and train all men who turn 18, so you make a bunch of exceptions and then an alternate route doing stuff like acting as ambulance drivers, firemen, reserve police (think: PCSO/Specials in the UK), even just fucking wrangling paperwork or whatever.

It’s not a bad system, as these things go.

It's still a penalty based on what half of the population you were randomly born into.

Male lifespan is on average shorter, and this burden is yet another thing on the minus side.

That doesn’t bother me, as a man.

Will you be affected though? You're probably old enough to avoid it anyway.

My country doesn’t (and never has had) conscription, so it’s largely academic for me.

I’m also too old.

It does seem like a years service isn’t the worst burden though, especially in peacetime, with an option to do civil service as an alternative to military service.

Conscription is slavery.

I wish leaders would settle their differences in a game of CS2, instead of using the old meat grinder.

> The application and evaluation processes for women and men are identical and do not distinguish between them. The Center for European Policy Analysis reports that Latvia has “comparatively good female representation within the Latvian National Armed Forces.” At present, women make up 16.5% of the army’s 6,700 military personnel.

They could easily boost that number by conscripting women. My "military service" in nearby country consisted mostly of wiping arses of elderly patients in hospital. Anyone can do that!

Latvia sees the writing on the wall

War is absolute shit. Nobody should have to go. I've never served and I don't know what is best for the security of a country, everyone fighting or all the women not fighting, what I know is that Svetlana Alexievich's book "The Unwomanly Face of War: An Oral History of Women in World War II" gave me a bunch of insights into how it works to have women in War from first hand oral accounts. Highly recommend it, she got a Nobel prize too.

Unfortunately this needs to happen in all nato countries. The bells of war in europe are ringing again.

Sweden already did this in 2914 as a response to the annexat0on of Crimea.

It's comforting to know we will be alive in 2914.

Yeah, no. There is no way I'd ever sign up to fight somebody else's war requirements. Let those who dream it up make the sacrifice with their male heirs. My life it too important, short in length, and valuable for such garbage.

Upvoted from a super fast downvote; same here.

All those who served or fought before are idiots? Nothing ever worth defending?

There are countless examples of wars were many have sacrificed themselves for nothing. WW1 is probably the prime example.

Of course, while it all was happening, it was commonly described as the most important thing to do.

And there were other wars where sacrifices are not seen as pointless. So, never defend anything?

What about a war to not let communists come into power in a country across the ocean? Is it worth dying for?

Depends, certainly how South Korea looks like today, you could say that was a success by some measures. I don't think you can really get utilitarian here, but rather societies form views around their wars.

The point of war usually is not to make a country successful; the point of imperialistic wars is not to let the enemy have the country.

The UN approved military action in Korea was an imperialistic war?

Your view is also very short-term, not sure everyone subscribes to that.

World War I is frequently depicted as a pointless war in e.g. the UK and France because of the massive number of deaths in trench warfare for just a few meters of ground. However, some Eastern Europe peoples view the war as quite a benefit due to the terms that were imposed on the losers. The modern Czech Republic, Slovakia, Croatia, Serbia, Romania, etc. would not have existed if the Austro-Hungarian Empire hadn’t lost the war.

Well maybe then Slovaks should have fought for Slovakia independence and not Englishmen or Russians?

They did, tens of thousands of them.[0] There were analogous movements among the other peoples chafing under Austro-Hungarian rule. But these were minority peoples up against a whole empire, and they wouldn’t have won the day if the war hadn’t brought in enough other powers to completely defeat Austro-Hungary.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Czechoslovak_Legion

From the perspective of Serbia's population, WWI was more of a catastrophe, even though it had a positive political outcome (the disappearance of the Habsburg Empire).

> fought before are idiots?

I don't think they had a choice and the deads don't speak, do they

There were sometimes more, sometimes less choices. Btw., the living speak (and we also know a good deal about what the dead thought) - not everyone dies in a war.

> not everyone dies in a war.

Survivorship bias. What you will hear will be mostly skewed towards it not being so bad because the guys who speak about it survived and ended up having fuller lives. The dead would probably have a very different opinion if they could say anything.

As I said, we know a lot about what soldiers thought, including the ones who died. (And by far not everyone who fought in a war and survived thinks it wasn't so bad - not sure how you even think that.)

That's where the "mandatory" in the mandatory military service comes in (btw, I agree with your sentiment that it is stupid, the point is that you can't just not do it, you will be forced to).

Nobody can force me to fight. Maybe I would get imprisoned, maybe I would get executed, but whatever happens, it's my moral duty to ensure that whoever attempted to force me into military slavery does not benefit from the attempt, and as a conscript I would have very little to lose.

So basically you'll wait for Russian occupation and then get conscripted to Russian army.

> The bells of war in europe are ringing again.

They are only ringing if you agitate the bell

I bet emigration of young people, especially men, from Latvia will accelerate again.

I bet it won't. All the nordic countries have it.

Nordics have extremely high standards of living and low conscription rates. Latvia has been losing people to emigration to other EU countries since years, and now they have given people yet another reason to move.

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