Germany

Since December 2013 Germany has had its first female defense minister and she has walked right into a growing scandal over mismanagement and the growing inability of the German military to perform even the simplest tasks (like using military transports to fly people and supplies overseas). These problems, and their causes, long predate 2013. Decades of neglect and mismanagement will take more than a few months, or years, to set right but at least the Germans now admit they have a problem. Make that problems and they are occurring with greater frequency and severity. For example, earlier in 2014 there were numerous incidents where German military transports broke down because of lack of regular maintenance and the spare parts. Thus in August, when the German government pledged to send weapons to the Kurds who are fighting ISIL in northern Iraq there were embarrassing delays because of German military transports that were not reliable enough to get the deliveries done as promised. Germany wisely declined to send warplanes or troops. One of the reasons for that reluctance became obvious when a Defense Ministry readiness report was leaked. This made it clear why even getting weapons, or anything else, to the Kurds would be difficult. The report showed that only 8 percent of 109 Eurofighters (similar to the U.S. F-15), 11 percent of 67 CH-53 transport helicopters, and 10 percent of 33 NH90 helicopters were fully operational (not sidelined for upgrades, repairs or other problems.) However 38 percent of 56 C-160 twin turboprop transports were available. This made it possible to fly some weapons into northern Iraq, but not much else. Yet even some of those “ready” C-160s ran into problems along the way and had to land for repairs, or to wait for spare parts the air force often found it did not have handy. Normally a combat ready military has at least half, and more normally over 70 percent of its warplanes and transports ready to go. While this situation shocked many, those who have followed European military trends since the 1980s were not surprised... Faking military preparedness is a hard habit for Europeans to break. That’s because, from 1945 to 1991, the United States was available whenever Europeans needed some real military muscle. So confident were the Europeans, that they often heaped abuse and scorn on the U.S. and the American military, certain that the Americans would still show up if Europe ever faced a threat. source: http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htlead/articles/20141013.aspx