Germany votes to bring in voluntary military service programme for 18-year-olds

“The change means that all 18-year-olds in Germany will be sent a questionnaire from January 2026 asking if they are interested and willing to join the armed forces. The form will be mandatory for men and voluntary for women.“ - all men have to fill out and return a form, I suppose this will work to increase recruitment. Doesn’t seem very controversial.

The problem here that this probably is only part of a larger society militarization plan.

The guaranteed next step is to offer the volunteers a long term paid contract at the end of their term. This would probably be well above what they would be paid elsewhere (young men with no university degree, desperate enough to volunteer in the first place).

Run the scheme for a few years, and you will have a large number of, young, high-school-level educated people that are financially dependent on the army. Thus, a militarized society.

What could possibly go wrong?

> Run the scheme for a few years, and you will have a large number of, young, high-school-level educated people that are financially dependent on the army. Thus, a militarized society

Finland, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Austria, Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Thailand each have active conscription [1]. The slippery slop you describe is far from inevitable.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription

You probably have no idea what you're talking about. Mandatory conscription (which I have personally served) is for a fixed term, so your livelihood is not tied to the army paying your salary. It's more of a semi-unpleasant mandatory intermission in your life plans.

Also, if you have decades of mandatory conscription then there is no slope to slip. Germany on the other hand is now on a slope, since they regress from a fully professional army back to conscription. How much down they will slip, remains to be seen.