Since today all three brigades of the Dutch Army are officially under German command

24 comments
  1. https://www.volkskrant.nl/nieuws-achtergrond/de-essentiele-omslag-die-we-nu-maken-ready-to-fight-tonight-zoals-de-amerikanen-zeggen~b85310df/

    We made this happen pretty fast. Last year in June the Dutch Defense Minister said the army of the Netherlands should completely merge with the German army. *”In the final picture it no longer matters who has a little Dutch flag or a little German flag on their sleeve”*, she said.

    A step towards a European army as a pillar of NATO. This is the future

  2. Good development in my opinion. For optics it might have been better if the 43th would have joined the 13th in the 10th Panzer Division so it would be majority-Dutch and thus commanded by a Dutch general. On the other hand this way every division has a Dutch component.

  3. It’s beautiful to see cooperation come into fruition in this, which will certainly enhance the common defense. What we’re seeing here is also an important step in putting into practice the basics of a common defence.

    However, I truly do not envy the people who have to learn how to say “Gemechaniseerde”.

  4. Great development! I am curious what will happen with the procurement of short and medium range air defense for both countries in the coming years. If we really want this combined army to operate as one, we should probably be looking at identical systems.

  5. To clarify; The Dutch government will still be responsible for the decision if the Dutch military will be deployed or not.

  6. Cool. Dutch and German army is merging, Nordic countries air forces are merging as well. We might not get ‘big EU army’ done in one go, but slowly as a result of series of regional mergers.

  7. Symbolically this is really great, but isn’t this also an enormous liability?

    Since WWII and the creation of the EU, we haven’t had any proper wars between EU states. But that’s just the span of about 80 years. Certainly we’re not concluding from that that we’re set for peace until the end of time, right?

    I’ve always thought that each country needs its own army, simply for the sake of being prepared for the worst.

  8. This is really goddamn cool. I’d be so happy if this process just kept going. Belgian/German/Dutch/Danish army; Polish/Czech/Slovakian army; Baltic army; Nordic Army… and eventually maybe these large groups start uniting and other nations, France/Spain etc, start joining together

  9. When thinking about communication in these units, I just think about Rudi Carell ” musst du een bisschen nuscheln, dann geht es”

  10. Well, let’s just hope that the Germans commanding the two militaries don’t use them to launch an attack against Germany.

    And I don’t say this as a joke- the current ministers are still having tough times breaking up neonazi terrorist cells in the Bundeswehr and the training and recruitment infrastructures. It was decades of neglect by the Union and it will take even longer to get Europe out of this mess.

  11. Had to take a second look that the Insignia of the 10. Panzer Division wasn’t the flag of Flanders. Damn they are similar.

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