“There are no political conditions” for returning from Mandatory Military Service, explains Minister of Defense

The Minister of National Defense admitted that “today there are no political conditions” to re-impose the Mandatory Military Service (SMO), suggesting that young people who opt for Armed forces have better conditions for entering university or public service.

At a conference dinner at the 13th edition of Universidade Europa, a PSD political training initiative, Nuno Melo also defended that military service could be an alternative for young people who commit petty crimes instead of being placed in institutions that, “mostly stop the cases, they only work as a school of crime for life”.

“How many of these young people who, instead of being institutionalized without any conditions, could carry out military service, have the opportunity to exercise training, authority, values, could not later be much better citizens and they simply were not given this opportunity?” he asked.

Both in his initial intervention and in answering questions from the “students” of this political training initiative, the Minister of Defense rejected the return of mandatory military service.

“We do not need a Mandatory Military Service, there are not even political conditions at the moment to impose an SMO. But there is a set of possibilities that go through situations already experienced in other countries, such as Sweden”, he said.

Nuno Melo exemplified that “one year of voluntary military experience” which, in the end, could give young people “more ease in entering a university” or in “integrating the public service in certain areas” could be “a way” for those who would like of military life end up signing a contract with the Armed Forces.

“We have to create conditions so that young people can have this option, which has to be attractive and we will try to do so”, he stated, appealing to the approximately 70 young people present at Universidade Europa to “try this experience”.

And he reinforced:

“Help show an entire country that the Armed Forces are not a thing of the past, but our identity. I assure you that many of you would like it.”

At a dinner with the theme “The EU of Defense and Security”, the minister also warned about what he considered to be an injustice in the treatment given to soldiers when fighting fires.

“The only difference is that while a firefighter fighting fires and other entities therefore has a supplement assigned to them – and well, because we are talking about highly dangerous functions – a soldier does exactly the same thing and does not receive more for That’s one of the things I want to change,” he said.

Nuno Melo reiterated the PSD/CDS Government’s commitment to “do justice” to former combatants and criticized the PS executives in matters of Defense.

“Each time the left has governed, the Armed Forces have kept pace”, he criticized, lamenting those who placed the investment made in submarines “on the side of jokes”.

The Minister of National Defense pointed to NATO as the first guarantee of global peace and promised that the country will “realistically” move towards its commitment to invest 2% of the Gross Domestic Product in Defense and reinforce investments in military university education and industry military.

Nuno Melo also recalled the role of Gouveia e Melo, former coordinator of the Vaccination Plan against COVID-19, now Chief of Staff of the Navy.

“With Covid, things went well because the person who was responsible had the capacity, but he also had the capacity because he is a soldier. Anyone who knows military culture knows that it is made up of planning, of goals that are set and met to the millimeter”, he said .

There was also the right to a message about Europeans

At the end of the dinner-conference, the leader of the CDS-PP also recalled that the European elections will be held within a month and a half and left an appeal to the young people taking part in this 13th edition of the Europa University: “We have to win and that goes through a lot of you”, he said.

The European elections will take place in Portugal on June 9th and PSD, CDS-PP and PPM will compete again on a joint list of the Democratic Alliance (AD) coalition.

With Lusa