Danish conscripts start 11-month service with operational duties

Some 1,600 young people began Denmark’s new 11-month conscription programme on Monday, with conscripts expected to take a greater role in real military operations, DR reports.

Among them is 20-year-old Joy Berg from Ryomgård, who waited outside the barracks in Aalborg to receive her new uniform.

“I have really been looking forward to it. Yesterday, I could feel that I was nervous,” Berg said.

The new conscription programme has been extended from four months to 11 months. It consists of five months of basic training followed by six months of operational service.

Berg said she was ready for the operational duties.

“I think it is exciting, but you have to think it through beforehand,” she said.

Jeppe Plenge Trautner, an external lecturer in European security and defence policy at Aalborg University, said the longer conscription period was an important part of Denmark’s military build-up.

“When you go from four months to 11 months, you go from training individual soldiers to training military units that can be deployed in war at short notice, also after they have been discharged,” he said.

“It is of course much more serious, so there are new expectations.”

Trautner welcomed the new programme but said it had been introduced against a troubling backdrop.

“It is of course sad that there is a risk of war in Northern Europe, which means that we now have to reintroduce conscription on a new length and at a new scale,” he said.

At the Aalborg barracks, Berg said she was looking forward to the next 11 months.

“I think you learn more, gain a better insight into the armed forces and form better friendships when you are here longer,” she said.

The uncertain times and possibility of being deployed did not frighten her.

“There is almost greater reassurance in being able to help defend the country than in not being here,” Berg said.

Asked whether she was ready to go to war for Denmark, she replied: “Yes, that is why you are here, but not if my mother asks.”

Some conscripts began the new programme in February. Conscription in the Royal Life Guards lasts 12 months, while everyone, regardless of gender, will automatically be called up for Armed Forces Day when they turn 18.