Children win wars, not generals. Europe and West-leaning Asia do not seem to know that simple truth. Israel does.
“Wanted: New Soldiers for Europe’s Shrinking Armies,” headlines the Financial Times.
The German government is worried: its army is small and decrepit. In Germany, the average age in 1990 was 36. Today it is 44, an increase of eight years in the space of a single generation. If the trend continues, in two generations more than half of Germans will be over 60. And today Germany must convince “Generation Z” to take the army seriously (judging by the levels of sympathy for Hamas, that will be difficult).
Spain has an army of old men: more than 34 percent of non-commissioned officers are aged 50 or older.
The inability of European countries to rebuild solid armies reflects the great taboo that grips the old continent: Europe is the demographic Titanic.
