German Army Motivation

The German Army (German: Deutsches Heer) is the land component of the armed forces of Germany. The present-day German Army was founded in 1955 as part of the newly formed West German Bundeswehr together with the Marine (German Navy) and the Luftwaffe (German Air Force). As of 10 November 2016, the German Army has a strength of 59,136 soldiers. After World War II Germany was split into two sovereign states and both formed their own militaries: on 12 November 1955 the first recruits began their service in the West German Heer, while on 1 March 1956 the East German Landstreitkräfte der NVA (Land Forces of the National People's Army) were founded. During the Cold War the West German Army was fully integrated into NATOs command structure, while the Landstreitkräfte were part of the Warsaw Pact. Following the German reunification in 1990 the Landstreitkräfte were partially integrated into the German Army. Since then the German Army has been employed in peacekeeping operations worldwide and since 2002 also in combat operations in Afghanistan as part of NATOs International Security Assistance Force.

While the modern German army prefers to distance itself from the World War II era, it still retains certain uniform accessories from that era and before. For example, the iconic Stahlhelm remains in service, as do the arabesque general collar tab designs. Cufftitle designs used by elite units during World War II now appear on both cuffs. The German Army also continues to use the MG3, a machine gun that looks much like the MG42 used during World War II. The East German military used uniforms that were very similar to the WWII era army uniforms. All corps have now been disbanded or transferred to a multinational level such as Multinational Corps North East. IV Corps was reorganized and on 31 March 2002 became an overseas deployment command, the Einsatzführungskommando der Bundeswehr, like the British Permanent Joint Headquarters. An army reorganisation in recent years has seen the disbandment of the 13th Mechanized Infantry Division headquarters, a merge of the Airmobile Operations Division and Special Operations Division headquarters, the disbandment of the 1st Airmobile Brigade, and reshuffling of units between divisions.[citation needed] No heavy brigades were disbanded, but the two remaining heavy divisions command three rather than two brigades.

On 21 September 2016 there were a total of 59,544 soldiers on active service in the German Army.[1] However the quite unique German military branch of the Joint Support Service consists to a significant degree of Heeresuniformträger (army uniform wearing personnel). This is also contributed to by the Joint Medical Service, which does have other solely-military-medical branch counterparts (such as in South Africa).

In accordance with EU working hour regulations, the regular work-week is 41 hours, although numerous exceptions exist for e.g. deployments in oversea missions, training exercises, emergencies, and similar military needs.[11]