Initiation rituals

Germany's parliamentary commissioner for the armed forces, Reinhold Robbe, said he had received 54 written accounts of abuse and degrading treatment since he submitted a report about hazing in the military.

Several of the letters he received from soldiers corroborated previous allegations that mountain infantry troops at a camp in Bavaria had been forced to drink alcohol and eat raw pork liver until they threw up.

Robbe, a member of the Social Democratic party, demanded that the training curriculum be changed and said that the "dangerous, tasteless rituals must stop."

Fire dances and jukeboxes

The new letters also bring to light other forms of hazing. One former member of the Marines said that new sailors were often subjected to harsh rituals during their first nights at sea. He described the "fire dance," in which a man was forced to strip off his pants and have a lighted wick placed in his anus; another in which a floor polishing machine with rough bristles was held against a recruit's naked bottom until the skin turned red.

A volunteer soldier stationed in southern Germany between 1996 and 1998 told of soldiers being forced to play "Jukebox," during which they were shut into a locker, which was then stood upside down, and the occupant forced to sing certain songs.

Defense Minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg renewed his promise of a complete investigation. He did not rule out the possibility of disciplinary action for those involved, although he warned against making an across-the-board judgment.

"Every case must be pursued judiciously and emphatically," Guttenberg told fellow Christian Democrat politicians in Berlin on Tuesday.


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Editor: Andreas Illmer