Mandatory military service abolished 20 years ago

Parliament decided to abolish conscription already in 2002, but the changes to the Military Service Act still set down training of conscripts until the end of 2004.

The 2 September 2003 regulation then enabled citizens aged 18 to 27 to engage in voluntary military training for at least three months for which they would get paid.

Seven days after the regulation entered into force, PM Anton Rop and Defence Minister Anton Grizold announced full abolishment of the conscription system.

This meant that the last three generations of conscripts did not join any mandatory military training.

Sudden abolishment result of declining interest in military service

The then defence minister, Grizold, a defence expert, justified the abolishment of conscription by saying young men were increasingly not interested in serving.

Major General Ladislav Lipič, chief of the general staff in 2001-2006, has now told the STA this happened after SDS leader Janez Janša and LibDem leader and PM Janez Drnovšek said in 2002 that Slovenia no longer needed conscription.

"Politicians were a bit to quick to communicate this to the public and did not think about what such statements could do."

Lipič explains that to "get 650 recruits respond to conscription, the administration had to send out over 3,500 conscripts, and then a significant number of individuals would further drop out after medical examinations".

Defence studies expert Maja Garb says the decision to abolish conscription "was political, while long-term experiences also showed the generations of conscripts were getting smaller".

Soon after Slovenia gained independence in 1991, there were many conscripts, because those who did not serve during independence processes did so after independence.

The numbers later decreased due to demographics, the option of conscientious objection or civilian service, and poorer health of young men.

Also, Slovenia began NATO integration, having more and more tasks for which a professional army is better suited, says Garb from the Ljubljana Faculty of Social Sciences.

Closer to NATO with professional army

Transition to a professional army facilitated faster development, making the army more interoperable with other members of NATO, which Slovenia joined in 2004.

Among the first NATO integration tasks was adjusting military education and training to the alliance' models, which did not go entirely without challenges.

Lipič says it was impossible to expect that officers and NCOs who had trained only conscripts would start training professional soldiers overnight.

The NCO-private relationship also became more impersonal, based on the Western model, which Lipič says was not suited to the mentality of Slovenian soldiers.

However, Garb says a professional army means a well trained, responsible and ethical army, and professional standards do not apply only to officers but also NCOs and privates.

Professional army probably not much cheaper than conscription-based

Garb says it is difficult to say which type of recruitment is cheaper for the country, but she assumes a professional army is more expensive.

However, since a conscription army also has its professional composition, its cost would not be significantly lower, but such an army would not be able to fulfil all its tasks with the same quality.

"The Slovenian Armed Forces can certainly be said to be doing its job well, despite its many problems," she says.

A shortage of soldiers is its biggest problem, and Garb says it is not improving despite the many measures taken.

Another issue is, according to her, an identity crisis. "Is it a combat, humanitarian, expeditionary, defence, national army or subject to foreign interests?"

Legislation clearly shows that we must have an army with multiple identities, but one should not forget that the army's No.1 task is to defend the country, she says.

With professional army, politicians know less about military

Going from a conscription to professional army also leads to disintegration of social control over it, says Lipič, adding that families used to have sons in the army and thus direct contact with it.

"There is considerably less of this social oversight now, we've been left with institutional civilian oversight via the parliamentary Defence Committee," he says.

Garb agrees, adding that with a professional army people are less interested in military affairs and much less aware of its role of providing defence and security.

She finds it even more problematic that when a country has a professional army politicians no longer have military experience and consequently take poor decisions [regarding the army].