ABSTRACT
‘The military organization of the Confederation is perhaps the most original, the most ingenious, the most useful and the most beneficent of Swiss institutions,’ wrote M. Albert Bonnard, that remarkable publicist whose reccnt death was such a loss to Swiss journalism. The army, too, is democratic, constituting as it does under a system of compulsory service not a standing army but a militia force simply and solely for defensive purposes, the maintenance of neutrality and independence. In Switzerland every able-bodied man is liable to military service, but hitherto the term of service has been very short: the military law of 1906 instituted a period of training of 65 days for infantry recruits and rather more for other arms with a further course of 11 days a year for ten consecutive years. After I 2 years’ service with the colours, the soldier passes into the Landwehr. From 41 to 48 years of age, he serves in the Landsturm. The system of training is uniform and controlled by the Confederation; the administration is generally conducted by the cantons.
