Argument: Mandatory service often needed to have adequate forces

Support

Swedish brigadier general Bengt Axelsson responded to the phasing out of Sweden’s military in 2009: “I want to raise a warning finger. It’s not going to be possible to achieve the volume of soldiers people are now counting on having by relying on volunteers.”[1]

Henrik Trasberg, a 20-year-old law student who is at the moment serving in the 4th Single Infantry Battalion in Johvi as a driver, thinks that mandatory military service is necessary: “when a country is small and not so prosperous, then it is important to achieve our defense capacity as cheaply as possible. I am afraid that a professional army would be too expensive and, at the same time, not so efficient.”