More than 50,000 pupils across Germany are expected to boycott the classroom and take to the streets in a nationwide protest, with organisers saying the aim is to stop the government's rearmament policy from turning young people into 'cannon fodder'. Despite threats from teachers' associations and education ministries, which have warned that anyone demonstrating during school hours could face penalties or even expulsion, organisers predict participation on Friday will match or exceed the estimated 50,000 who attended each of the first two protests.
Youth movement gains momentum
'The government and industry are preparing for war and we, the young, are supposed to become the cannon fodder. Neither have we even been consulted,' said Hannes Kramer, the main spokesperson for the movement Schulstreik gegen Wehrpflicht (School Strike Against Conscription). The protest reflects growing unrest in homes and classrooms across Germany since Friedrich Merz's government introduced controversial changes to military service policy, arguing the country needs to boost its defences amid threats from Russia following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Military Service Modernisation Act
Under the new legislation, mandatory questionnaires are being sent to all 18-year-olds to assess their willingness and suitability for military service. From next year, compulsory medical tests will be introduced. The law also includes a clause that would theoretically require men aged 17 to 45 to obtain permission from the armed forces before traveling abroad for longer than three months. While the law stops short of conscription, Defence Minister Boris Pistorius has said that option remains on the table if the policy fails to attract enough recruits. Experts estimate the professional military needs to expand by about 80,000 members to 260,000, and reservists by 140,000 to 200,000, over the next decade.
Timing and symbolism
The third school boycott in five months has been deliberately scheduled to coincide with the anniversary of the end of the Second World War and the victory over Nazi Germany. Organisers warn that Germany's military buildup risks repeating history. 'VE Day on 8 May 1945 was the day that German fascism was defeated in Europe,' said Kramer, a 21-year-old educational science student at the University of Göttingen. 'We use this date to make clear the consequence of war and what the consequences of rampant militarisation can be.'
'Currently almost half of the federal budget is being spent on tanks, bombs and infrastructure to prepare the country for war,' Kramer added, noting that 'big German companies, arms factories as well as banks, stand to gain … we are very afraid that we have not learned the lessons from our history.'
Government defence spending
Unnerved by both Russia and the changed transatlantic relationship under US President Donald Trump, the German government plans to invest €779bn (£673bn) in defence by the end of the decade, roughly doubling spending compared to the previous five years. This would put Germany on track to exceed NATO's target of 3.5% of GDP by 2030. Chancellor Merz has framed the rearmament as essential for Germany's and Europe's long-term security, telling MPs in his first Bundestag speech that a properly funded military is 'what our friends and partners expect from us; more than that, they demand it.' His government's mantra has become: 'If you want peace, prepare for war.'
Protesters' concerns
Kramer argued that rearmament itself could propel Germany into conflict. 'Even though the situation is different and Germany is not now under a fascist regime, we feel the parallels in the rhetoric of German ambitions towards global influence and power through military might,' he said. 'Framing the current militarisation and the preparation for war as defence, as Merz does with his repeated claims that Germany as one of the biggest economies in the world needs to become a global power in this, is frightening, awful and very dangerous.'
At the last demonstration in March, pupils protested in about 150 towns and cities, carrying banners with slogans such as 'The rich want war, the youth want a future' and 'Dying is not on the timetable'. Others read 'Friedrich Merz to the front!', 'Our only war is the class war', and 'Education instead of army physicals'. Protesters repeatedly highlighted the contrast between Germany's multibillion-euro rearmament and its underfunded education system. In Koblenz, one person held a poster asking: 'Why should I fight for a country that is not even capable of fighting for us young people?'
Broader discontent
Kramer, a member of the Socialist German Workers Youth (SDAJ), said the movement grew from a collective feeling among pupils that 'their self-determination was being diminished'. The creeping knowledge that they might be forced into war is 'part of a series of crises that young people have faced in recent years, starting before the pandemic, that have shown them they are being ignored by politicians.' He added: 'Schools are falling apart; even in this, one of the richest countries in the world, there is a shortage of teachers; the worsening housing situation means many are forced to live with their parents; and young people's concerns about the climate have long been ignored.' While the government is not yet obliging anyone to sign up, Kramer believes it is only a matter of time: 'I believe in future it will be hard to refuse to serve.'
