"The Minister of Defense has inherited an organization that does not work"

[Saithan]

Kasper Junge Wester
-
January 5, 2022
4​

Retired Colonel Lars R. Møller does not believe that the extensive criticism of Minister of Defense Trine Bramsen is entirely fair. Many of the Ministry of Defence's blunders in 2021, according to him, are due to a miserable organization of the Ministry of Defense's area. Stock Photo: Ernstved

2021 was in many ways an annus horriblis in the area of the Ministry of Defense. As Minister, Trine Bramsen has been subjected to massive criticism, but according to the retired Colonel Lars R. Møller, it is not entirely fair. Many of the problems, according to him, stem from a hopeless organization of the area of the Ministry of Defense.​

The past year has developed dramatically in many ways in the area of the Ministry of Defense. Ballad about the defense chief's role as head of government, a tightly controlled and closed communication, a chaotic evacuation from Afghanistan, ongoing scandals in the FE, a billion shortfall in the defense budget and at the end of the year also a pirate confrontation in Guinea Bay that was not legally or politically prepared for.

While Minister of Defense Trine Bramsen (S) has played a leading role in several of the cases, it is far from everything that can be blamed on the Minister personally. This is the opinion of retired Colonel Lars R. Møller. The explanation for the Defense's challenges on the personnel and materiel side and the Ministry of Defence's financial challenges with the current defense agreement is based in a completely different place, he tells Frontlinjen on Radio 4:

"In my opinion, it is not the fault of Minister of Defense Trine Bramsen, but the organization she inherited. That organization is probably the most inappropriate organization one could have imagined. "

Lars Møller refers to the almost ten-year-old reorganization of the Ministry of Defense's organization, which with the implementation of the defense agreement for the period 2013-2018 on paper transformed the Armed Forces into one of a total of eight agencies under the ministry, and which deprived the Chief of Defense of a considerable part of his powers. A maneuver which both then and in the years since has given rise to fierce criticism, and which in 2021 indirectly gave rise to the discussion about whether the Chief of Defense can be called a head of board or not.

Knew it would develop into chaos​

The reason for the worst of the Armed Forces' current problems thus finds its explanation largely in the parting with past ways of doing things in the Armed Forces, says Lars R. Møller, who elaborates:

“It is not a good idea to distribute the responsibility to a whole lot of different actors when you really should have what is called overall responsibility. The Chief of Defense does not have that.

The problem for the government is that you can not push the chief of defense in front of you and say that it is his fault, because it is not. "

Nor is former Defense Minister Hans Engell, who today earns his living as a political commentator, enthusiastic about the Ministry of Defense's organization. He is in no doubt as to who is to blame for the embarrassing situation the Armed Forces finds itself in, and for many of the scandalous cases that have tormented it in recent years:

“So do previous governments and the parties that reached a settlement where the new form of organization was implemented. I remember that even then - when I was no longer in politics - I told the Conservatives and the Social Democrats that if you chose that model, you chose something that would develop into chaos at some point. It simply does not work. I completely agree with what Lars says, "says Hans Engell, who continues:

“What characterizes an effective defense organization is that the responsibility is completely unambiguous. The same is the command lines; who is in charge and who has the overall responsibility in relation to the implementation of a settlement? The Chief of Defense has it. It does not matter that large parts of the Armed Forces are not under the direct leadership of the Chief of Defense at all, but placed in some strange structures under the department. "

No one bothered to listen to the Defense Command​

A decade ago, Lars R. Møller himself was part of the steering group that worked to merge the Ministry of Defense and the Defense Command, and which ended up laying the foundations for the current organization, which he himself calls "terrible". No one at that time listened to the military advice.

"No one wanted to hear the Defense Command. The problem is in all its simplicity that in the old days - that is, before 2014 - it was the case that the department served the minister, and the Defense Command served soldiers, deployed units and everything else. Today it is the case that the whole ballad serves the Minister. There is no unequivocal responsibility for who takes care of units, construction, training and so on. That is why you have the situation you have today, "says Lars R. Møller.

The forthcoming conciliation negotiations are, in turn, a good opportunity to discuss a return to a more appropriate arrangement, Hans Engell adds.

“The department and the minister have come into some roles, which have been completely skewed in relation to the handling of cases. Like Lars, I also think that one can address some of the problems and crap that have been, to an organization that is not functioning properly. That in some areas it has not been obsessed with the right types is another matter. "

Politicians listen to the head of department​

However, neither Lars R. Møller, Hans Engell nor other observers inside and outside the Armed Forces should raise their noses after major upheavals of the military system. That is the opinion of Peter Viggo Jakobsen, who is an associate professor at the Defense Academy. Like Hans Engell, however, he acknowledges that a reorganization in theory could become part of the forthcoming negotiations in the conciliation circle:

"It should probably do so, because there have been a number of organizational problems with the creation of a rather unclear division of responsibilities between the many agencies in the Armed Forces. There is no longer the holistic understanding that once was. You could look at that. But I doubt that the politicians are willing to do that when it comes down to it, «assesses Peter Viggo Jakobsen and continues about the reason for his assessment:

»Because the politicians have limited insight and therefore also want to listen to some of the advice that comes from the Department of Defense's head of department. I actually think that the person in question (Morten Bæk, ed.) Is satisfied with the current organization. It is no secret that the organization we have today arose from a power struggle between the Defense Command and the ministry, which the ministry won. So I actually doubt that you will go through a major reorganization, "says the assessment from Peter Viggo Jakobsen.

You can listen to the entire discussion about the Armed Forces' organization and the rest of the flashback to the past year in the Radio 4 player above.

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