Demobilization Quotes

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Russian military rotted away. In one of the most dramatic campaigns in world history, from 1988-1994, Moscow's armed forces shrank from 5 million to 1 million personnel.

Today the guns are silent. A great tragedy has ended. A great victory has been won. The skies no longer rain with death - the seas bear only commerce - men everywhere walk upright in the sunlight. The entire world lies quietly at peace. The holy mission has been completed. And in reporting this to you, the people, I speak for the thousands of silent lips, forever stilled among the jungles and the beaches and in the deep waters of the Pacific which marked the way.

The American army between world wars after World War I had virtually disintegrated. It was a very small force, given largely to practicing cavalry charges on western outposts.

The concept of military readiness is well understood, but readiness for what happens after the fighting stops is just as important.

There is an inherent tension between the role of amnesties … and the goal of accountability .... Amnesties encourage ex-combatants to disarm and demobilize, advancing the goal of peace in the short term while doing the least possible harm to the goals of truth, justice, reparation and reform – transitional justice values that are contribute to durable peace in the long term. Some view amnesties as sources of impunity that compromise transitional justice by removing the possibility of criminal accountability. Amnesties covering the most serious crimes may also be seen as undermining victim's rights. In such instances, amnesties can damage public confidence in the rule of law.

Anyway, there were more after the war than before.

People don't stay mobilized.

The war was declared over - the end of major combat operations - in May 2003. Release procedures got under way immediately; reducing the population from 8,000 to just over 300, of course, requires fewer military police soldiers.

When we talk about the issue of child soldiers, it can be easy to focus just on ending recruitment and liberating those boys and girls who are currently being held in military camps. Obviously, both of these are incredibly important goals, but it's also essential that we not forget about former child soldiers once they are liberated.

A Colombia without coca and without conflict was an impossible dream just a few years or decades ago, and today I can tell you it is a real possibility. Just imagine it. We have already begun discussion of the last two substantive points: victims and the end of the conflict.

We’d continue to pay them. Using army allows us not to demobilize it immediately and put a lot of unemployed people on the street.

There was a military police brigade with over 3,400 soldiers getting ready to go home because their mission - prisoner-of-war operations - was finished.

We've had a difficult legacy of 40 years, and cleaning up is not going to be a one day job. But we are engaged in a systematic effort, we have not allowed formation of new militia groups, and we are reforming the local police systematically so that there won't be abuse.

It seems as if everybody in the country was getting impatient to get his or her particular soldier out of the Army and to upset the carefully arranged system of points for retirement which we had arranged with the approval of the Army itself.

When the insurgents shall have abandoned their armies and laid down their arms, the war will instantly cease; and all the war measures then existing, including those which affect slavery, will cease also.

We have had this happen in the past, right in Colombia: there were amnesties for everybody, guerrilla members were elected mayors, senators. Today there are senators who are - who were previously guerrillas.

The lunacy continues and has every chance of becoming a way of life unless we stop it soon. Men are getting so used to wars that the psychiatric wing of the RAMC are planning how to break the news to the men when the war is over.

Part of ending any war responsibly is to support those who fought it