{"id":3010,"date":"2025-10-04T06:40:13","date_gmt":"2025-10-04T06:40:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.markus-schall.de\/?p=3010"},"modified":"2026-04-27T16:51:43","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T16:51:43","slug":"when-duty-becomes-duty-again-a-kind-of-essay-by-mr-von-loreot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.markus-schall.de\/en\/2025\/10\/when-duty-becomes-duty-again-a-kind-of-essay-by-mr-von-loreot\/","title":{"rendered":"When duty becomes duty again. A kind of essay by Mr. von L'oreot."},"content":{"rendered":"

Considerations on the possible return of compulsory military service<\/h2>\n

A kind of essay by Mr. von L'oreot on a possible state tension<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\n

Latest news on the topic<\/h2>\n

27.04.2026<\/strong>A reader of the NachDenkSeiten recently caused a stir: At the age of 91, he quickly volunteered for reserve duty<\/strong><\/a> - including a reference to \u201ereal frontline experience\u201c from the Second World War and a remarkably sober description of what war actually means. What was intended as a satirical reaction to the debate about higher age limits for reservists reads like a bitterly serious document:<\/p>\n

Nights of bombing, hunger, loss - and the quiet question of whether you really want to go back there again. Or should.<\/p>\n

For Mr. von L'oreot, this should settle the matter once and for all: When duty becomes duty again, a sprightly ninety-year-old is apparently enough to make the absurdity of the situation visible. And while elsewhere people are still thinking about \u201eflexible models\u201c, this letter provides a much less flexible, but all the more forceful reminder of what war actually means.<\/p>\n

\n

Chapter I: An unexpected phone call<\/h2>\n

It was a Tuesday. Or a Wednesday. I'm no longer sure. All I remember is a thermos flask of filter coffee, a sandwich with liver sausage - and a phone call.<\/p>\n

\"Hello, this is the Bundeswehr Career Center! You have been flagged for re-enlistment. Reactivation of compulsory military service. You understand.\"<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Career center? German Armed Forces?<\/a> I didn't understand anything at first. I had become accustomed to a life in which people left me alone as long as I didn't provoke them. A life with warm water, calculated tax assessments and a certain inner aversion to running through the woods in wellies.<\/p>\n

So now I was to be \u201ecaptured\u201c again. Not in the spiritual sense, but apparently in a very concrete way - by name, physically and, if necessary, with storm luggage.<\/p>\n

The lady on the phone was friendly. Almost too friendly. The kind of friendliness that makes you instinctively look for the escape route.<\/p>\n

\"This is initially only a measure of the national defense readiness survey preliminary structure.\"<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I asked for a repeat. The lady sighed and read the word again, this time in slow official German.<\/p>\n

I dutifully noted it down on a shopping list, between \"toothpaste\" and \"crumble cake\". It seemed to me to be of comparable importance.<\/p>\n

Chapter II: The duties of the state and the duty of the citizen<\/h2>\n

In an ideal Germany - one in which mustard never runs out and the neighbor doesn't play leaf blower - there is a clear division of labor:<\/p>\n