The German debate over the military peacekeeping missions
Subtitle: the first step toward an eventual combat role
By:  Richard Michael Schmitz
Publisher: Naval Postgraduate School; Available from National Technical Information Service
Published: 1993
Place of publication: Monterey, Calif; Springfield, Va
Language: eng
Number of pages: 183
Description: This study analyzes the steps taken by the German Federal Government to transform the character of German security policy from the inner-German border to the strategic reality of the present. While this author believes quite firmly that the time is drawing near when German soldiers will participate in combat within the framework of collective defense and security in a future conflict, considerable obstacles to such a contingency remain. The study interprets the interaction of the elements of government, the military, political parties and the international system in the transformation of German defense policy since the shock of the Post-Cold War world has overwhelmed Atlantic security institutions. This thesis describes the strategic interaction of how Germany's political leaders have adjusted themselves to an unfamiliar and uncomfortable world of war and peace. In the process, Germany is discarding the security policy of so-called reticence, but what policy will replace it remains unclear.
Notes: Thesis advisor(s): Donald Abenheim.

"December 1993."

Thesis (M.A. in National Security Affairs) Naval Postgraduate School, December 1993.

Bibliography: p. 175-181.

Approved for public release; distribution unlimited.

US Marine Corps (USMC) author.