Since there were so many Europeans deployed in various overseas missions/wars in the past 15-20 years, I’m wondering if in your country, are there any notable politicians in recent years with wartime experience?

22 comments

1. I am not sure. Usually in Spain politicians are profesional ones, if so they previously worked in law or in a university or something along those lines.

   In here it is not well looked at politicians who are related to the army, generally speaking. The reason is the huge presence the military had in political life for the past two centuries. With military coup d’etat after one another and pronouncements every once and again. I guess that has gotten into people.

2. A one of candidates for next year presidential election is a soldier. He his highest rank was a formal head of NATO.

3. Like most Finnish men, the majority of male politicians have completed conscription, which doesn’t involve any real combat or deployments. Beyond that, some have also participated in international peacekeeping operations. It’s a voluntary thing that reservists can apply to join.

4. Not in the last 20 years, but Wybren van Haga of all people was part of the special forces (KCT) of the Dutch army.

   Raymond Knops (CDA) served in Iraq. Gideon van Meijeren (FvD) has no war time experience as far as I know but was an IT employee in the army.

5. [A small number of politicians](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_military_veterans_in_British_politics) in the House of Commons and House of Lords have served and were also deployed. Just to name a few:

   Tory politician Desmond Swayne served for 34 years (Major) and was posted in Iraq,

   Bob Stewart (27 years, Colonel) was in Northern Ireland and Bosnia as commanding officer of his regiment.

   Labour politician Dan Jarvis (16 years, Major, PARA) was deployed to Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan.

   Johnny Mercer (11 years of service, Captain) did three tours of Afghanistan and was Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence People and Veterans.

   Current Secretary of State for Defence Ben Wallace was a captain in the Scots Guards and did some tours in NI.

   Sometimes flag officers are given a seat in the House of Lords after their retirement as crossbenchers. Usually former Chiefs of the Defence Staff or the chiefs of the three services, they obviously held higher commands and were deployed as commanding officers of their units before as well.

6. Soldiers with actual combat experience don’t tend to get into politics in Europe

7. Sadly, our PM right now. Something with which I don’t agree with and weirdly enough it has nothing to do with the Russian and Ukraine situation.

8. Nearly all Turkish men undergo mandatory military service, but I heavily doubt any of them were deployed in actual combat. We had Osman Pamukoğlu who is a retired army officer who personally got involved in combat, but he resigned from politics after his party flopped.

9. There’s one that was elected in 2018 to the Italian Chamber of Deputies, the first Senior Chief corporal-major to be elected in that position, and that currently helds.

10. It is unusual in France to see former soldiers in politics, even more active soldiers. Currently, only one *député* (National Assembly) is a soldier: [Laetitia Saint-Paul](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La%C3%ABtitia_Saint-Paul). The last time an active soldier was elected was in 1918.

    You have to know members of army can vote since 1945 only. It is due to the fear of a military coup (Napoléon Bonaparte after the Révolution and his nephew Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte in 1851).

    One of the principle of the French republic is that soldiers obey to civilians.

11. Even if there are any, which I doubt, they wouldn’t actively make it publicly known that they were in the army. It’s not something you use for clout here.

12. I would say I know German politics pretty well but right now I can’t think of anyone who was part of any mission.

    Military is not an issue with which you can win elections in Germany.

13. The last politician with the real war experience was Brezhnev.

14. The only politician with more military experience than conscription that I know is Jan Björklund he was first major in the defence, but didn’t take part in any peacekeeping abroad, then minister of school and now ambassador in Italy.

15. No soldiers tend to be civil servants for life in Austria. Very few enter the political sphere. You’ll find the odd former NCO running for our right wing party, but thats about it.

    What is much more common are former high ranking police officers going into politics. While the same civil servant concept applies to them, police officers have a much higher status in our rather pacifist society. Even though Austria only partakes in (UN) peace keeping missions, the military is something most of society steers away from, even though we still have mandatory military service for all males (so everybody knows to not trust in that institution).

16. “yeah i want somebody that signed up to kill people as the represtentant of my values , he surely is not corrupt , those overseas people had it coming…”

17. Arvydas Anušauskas is an incumbent Conservative minister of National Defence and a MP since 2008. He is also the first military officer to become a minister in contemporary Lithuania.

    Speaking of the topic – he served in Lithuanian military in 1990-1995, including the period of Soviet aggression in 1991. So he’s the closest to qualify there.

18. at present, one of the most famous is Zakhar Prilepin, he has experience of military operations in Chechnya, he did not fight in the DPR as they say, but was engaged in propaganda that he had his own “combat” battalion and all that sort of thing, he failed in the elections but twisted his votes

    in Russia, if you have experience in military operations, then with rare exceptions they will not be allowed into politics, the exceptions are when the “military past” helps candidates from United Russia get votes

19. Nope.

    Soldiers are not allowed to be a representative until 6 years after leaving (one of the fundamental principles of western democracy is that the military is subservient to a civilian government).

20. Probably, but they usually don’t tell you. It’s kind of “I did my duty and there’s nothing to boast about it”. And they’re probably very few anyway.

21. We have mandatory conscription so naturally most male politicians served in the army. However, because Switzerland didn’t participate in wars for ages I don’t think there are any with actual combat experience.

22. I don’t think Finland has taken part in any coalition wars in the middle east or Africa. But Finns are quite active as UN peacekeepers and Finnish peace keepers have a good reputation for doing it. But no i can’t name any Finn who has served in a war after WW2. Idk if you count our former president Martti Ahtisaari who was awarded the Nobel peace prize for his role in settling conflicts in Kosovo, Namibia and Indonesia to name a few