Mandy Wagner once stood at the bakery in the morning to buy something for breakfast before going to work.
She wore the uniform of a corporal in the Bundeswehr.
An elderly gentleman came and pushed his way forward with the reason: "Soldiers have nothing to do anyway.
I have to go to work.” It was just a small thing, a queue, a snide remark at the baker's in a small town one morning, but there was so much disrespect for the German military in it that Wagner never forgot the moment.
And because she is the national chairman of the Association of Soldiers in the German Armed Forces, she registers such moods in society very precisely.
“The status of a soldier in society was more bad than good.
Many others perceive this as well.”
Justus Bender
Editor in the politics of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sunday newspaper.
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Some soldiers don't like to wear the uniform themselves.
For example on the train.
Today soldiers can ride the train for free if they are in uniform, this is supposed to increase their visibility and acceptance.
In the past, however, soldiers were often advised by comrades to drive in civilian clothes.
Because you were insulted and spat on at the train stations.
"It's like saying to a woman: Don't go out on the street after 10 p.m.," remembers Wagner.
The reservist Henning Kleene from Potsdam always feels like a "walking exhibit" on the train, so foreign a uniform has become to German passers-by.
However, Kleene is not sure whether he sometimes misinterprets neutral looks.
That people actually just look interested, not disparagingly.
"I believe that many soldiers almost expect
Sometimes the refusal of soldiers is quite open, for example in the case of public oaths.
They have to be protected by the police and military police because counter-demonstrators try to disrupt or even prevent the event.
The moment when soldiers do not swear allegiance to a leader, a general or a minister, but to the democratically constituted Federal Republic of Germany and its people, whose rights and freedoms they pledge to bravely defend, is seen by the demonstrators as a provocation.
They see it as martial pomp, as warmongering.
"Soldiers are murderers" was a popular slogan in the peace movement.
That was the mood in the country for a long time.
A lot has changed in recent years with the corona deployment of many soldiers and the increasing threat from Russia.
In surveys by the Center for Military History and Social Sciences, acceptance of the Bundeswehr has increased by seven percentage points since 2019.
83 percent of Germans today have a positive image of their army.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24 may have reinforced this sentiment.
The day not only marks a new era in European security policy, it also changed how people talk about war, violence and soldiers in everyday life.
Normally, it is easy to reject military force outright.
Many wars take place in moral gray areas.
Anyone who constantly calls for a ceasefire has good arguments on their side, and the skeptics in Afghanistan and Iraq were also armed with good arguments.
They had misconduct by soldiers, many dead civilians and fictitious reasons for war on their side.
In the case of Ukraine none of this works.
A dictatorship attacks a neighboring country to conquer its territory.
Anyone who wants to remain on moral ground must hope that this war will be won by the right side, by the defenders, also out of selfishness.
Such a victory would not only benefit Ukraine, but would also prevent Russia from committing similar crimes in the Baltic States for years to come.
Accept,