Rearmament of the Swiss Army – Chief of Army Planning: “We are like a broad-spectrum antibiotic” – News

Instead of saving rounds, there is more money for the army. And a lot more money. In the future seven instead of five billion today. Upgrade is the motto. But does the army even need the money? Will the additional billions make Switzerland safer? The head of army planning provides information in an interview.

Benedict Roos

Chief of Army Planning


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Brigadier Roos is in charge of Army Planning on the Army Staff. He reports directly to the Chief of Army Staff and also acts as his deputy.

SRF News: The Ukraine war has led to a change of mood in Switzerland regarding the army. Politicians are prepared to gradually increase the army budget by 2030, from five to an estimated seven billion. Is this good news for you in difficult times?

Benedikt Roos: I would be far from saying that this is a stroke of luck for the army; But on the contrary. The fact that the army budget is now being increased is primarily a political decision. We now have the ability to bring forward things that we later wanted to procure and need to replace. But it’s not like we have a new wish list.

The left criticizes that parliament is increasing the budget in reserve without the army having a clear plan of what to do with it.

It still applies: The procurement of the new F-35 combat aircraft and the ground-based defense system has priority. So far we have had a clear plan for the ground forces within the framework of finances. If there’s more money now, we can speed things up a bit.

Next year we will conduct experiments with drone detection, i.e. detecting drones and defending against them.

We are, of course, closely monitoring the conflict. There are new tendencies, the whole problem with drones, for example, which shows that high efficiency can be achieved with relatively simple means. We also anticipated that. Next year we will conduct experiments with drone detection, i.e. detecting drones and defending against them.

What do you say to the accusation of doing a little bit of everything and not doing anything right?

We don’t get bogged down. I always say: We are like a broad-spectrum antibiotic that you can use. This is also shown by our militia system. We use all the skills from the militia – and that is our great strength.

Keyword ground troops: what can be obtained faster?

For example, mine throwers or mortars, as they are called today, is something where we have some catching up to do. We can get that faster. What is also important: on the modern battlefield, the systems are networked. This speeds up the whole process from recognizing a target to taking effect on some means.

We have some catching up to do when it comes to mortars and mortars. There is also a need to catch up when it comes to protected mobility.

There is also a need to catch up when it comes to protected mobility. I’m not talking about tanks, I’m talking about the possibility that we can move people from one place to another protected.

The security architecture in Europe is changing. The critics of the budget increase say that Switzerland must also work with its neighbors and first of all define its possible contribution.

Today it is impossible to say what the cooperation might look like. My credo is that we create the conditions for cooperation to be possible. But we don’t know what the security architecture will look like in the future.

The interview was conducted by Gion-Duri Vincenz.

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