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Themilitary history of Switzerland comprisescenturies of armed actions, and the role of theSwiss military inconflicts andpeacekeeping worldwide. Despite maintainingneutrality since its independence from theHoly Roman Empire in 1499,[1]Switzerland has been involved in military operations dating back to the hiring ofSwiss mercenaries by foreign nations, including thePapal States.
Formed with theFederal Charter of 1291, an alliance of three cantons was formed for mutual defense, chiefly against theHabsburgs. A succession of interventions by the Habsburgs led to the battles ofMorgarten (1315) andSempach (1386), resulting in independence for the confederacy. By 1353, the original three cantons had been joined by two additional cantons and threecity-states.
Late in the thirteenth century, soldiers drawn from the cantons of Switzerland gained a military reputation throughout Europe. This reputation was earned as a result of their defense against the AustrianHabsburg overlords and during campaigns in Italy. By the fifteenth century the Swiss had become particularly valued as soldiers-for-hire. Swiss soldiers were noted for their combat skill and ferocious attacks in thephalanx, or deep column formation usingpike andhalberd. They had a virtual monopoly on pike mercenary service up until 1490.
By 1490, German mercenaries had become proficient in Swiss military tactics and were available for hire at a lower cost. In 1515, the Swiss pledged themselves to neutrality, and they only continued to fight in the service of the Royal French army. They became bitter rivals with the German mercenaries and the two would often fight on the battlefields of Europe during the next few decades.
Following theBattle of Marignano in 1515, the Swiss style of massed-combat fighting went into steady decline, to be replaced by thearquebusiers, artillery and earthworks. During theBattle of Bicocca in 1522, the Swiss mercenaries met a bitter defeat with heavy casualties. Nonetheless, Swiss soldiers continued to serve as mercenaries during the next two centuries, adopting the musket to replace the pike.
The Swiss Guard has its origins in 1506 whenPope Julius II hired them as "bodyguards"; however the group of soldiers was large enough to be considered an army. This is appropriate, seeing as thePapal States took up one-third ofItaly at the time, requiring extensive protection. The pope enlisted them, seeing as he believed they were the best at the time. Currently, it is illegal for Swiss citizens to join another country's armed forces except as members of the Swiss Guard protecting theVatican.[2] Military service abroad of dual nationals is permitted under certain circumstances.
TheSwiss peasant war of 1653 was a popular revolt by the rural populations of several cantons. The rebellion was suppressed, but it led to a series of reforms. In 1656, tensions between Protestants and Catholics re-emerged and led to the outbreak of theFirst War of Villmergen. A new conflict in 1712 caused theSecond War of Villmergen, which overturned the balance of power to the Protestant cantons. The religious conflicts were renewed in 1847, resulting in theSonderbund War and leading to the formation ofSwitzerland as a federal state.
In 1798 the French armyoverran Switzerland and proclaimed theHelvetic Republic. Internal resistance and economic problems destabilized the state and additional French troops were deployed to restore order. Parts of Switzerland also became a battleground during theItalian and Swiss expedition.
During the 1814-15Congress of Vienna the neutrality of Switzerland was guaranteed by the signatories.
In thefederal treaty of 1815, the Tagsatzung prescribed cantonal troops to put a contingent of 2% of the population of each canton at the federation's disposition, amounting to a force of some 33,000 men. The cantonal armies were converted into the federal army (Bundesheer) with theconstitution of 1848. From this time, it was illegal for the individual cantons to declare war or to sign capitulations or peace agreements. Paragraph 13 explicitly prohibited the federation from sustaining astanding army, and the cantons were allowed a maximum standing force of 300 each (not including theLandjäger corps, a kind of police force). Paragraph 18 declared the obligation of every Swiss citizen to serve in the federal army if conscripted (Wehrpflicht), setting its size at 3% of the population plus areserve of one and one half that number, amounting to a total force of some 80,000.
The firstcomplete mobilization, under the command ofHans Herzog, was triggered by theFranco-Prussian War in 1871. In 1875, the army was called in to crush a strike of workers at theGotthard tunnel. Four workers were killed and 13 were severely wounded.
Paragraph 19 of the revised constitution of 1874 extended the definition of the federal army to every able-bodied citizen, swelling the size of the army at least in theory from below 150,000 to more than 700,000, with population growth during the 20th century rising further to some 1.5 million, one of the largest armed forceper capita.[citation needed]
DuringWorld War I, Switzerland remained a neutral state. InWorld War II, Germany made some plans for the invasion of Switzerland, most notablyOperation Tannenbaum, but these were never carried out. However Swiss air space was repeatedly violated, both by German and Allied aircraft.
A majormanoeuvre commanded in 1912 byUlrich Wille, a reputedGermanophile, convinced visiting European heads of state, in particularKaiser Wilhelm II, of the efficacy and determination of Swiss defences.[3] Wille subsequently was put in command of the second complete mobilization in 1914, and Switzerland escaped invasion in the course ofWorld War I.
Wille also ordered the suppression of theSwiss general strike (Landesstreik) of 1918 with military force. Three workers were killed, and a rather larger number of soldiers died of theSpanish flu during mobilization. In 1932, the army was called to suppress an anti-fascist demonstration in Geneva. The troops shot dead 13 demonstrators, wounding another 65. This incident long damaged the army's reputation, leading to persistent calls for its abolition among left-wing politicians. In both the 1918 and the 1932 incidents, the troops deployed were consciously selected from rural regions such as theBerner Oberland, fanning the enmity between the traditionally conservative rural population and the urban working class.
The third complete mobilization of the army took place duringWorld War II under the command ofHenri Guisan.
Switzerland's military strategy during World War II was essentially one of deterrence. The idea was to make clear to the Third Reich that an invasion would have a high cost. Simultaneously, economic concessions were made to Germany in the hope that the overall cost of a German invasion would be perceived as higher than the potential benefits. Despite this, it is clear that Hitler intended to invade eventually and that theAllied landing at Normandy as well as the difficulties faced ininvading Russia were pivotal in merelydelaying an invasion.[4]After Switzerland was surrounded by German and Italian forces ofOperation Tannenbaum, General Guisan revealed on 25 July 1940 at the so-calledRütli rapport, a meeting of theSwiss Armed Forces staff at the founding site of the Swiss confederation, that in case of attack the Swiss would only defend the high Alps including the important transalpine roads and rail links. As a last resort, the army would make these routes useless to the Axis by destroying key bridges and tunnels. This plan, known as theNational Redoubt, meant that the populated lowlands – including the economic centres of the country – would effectively be ceded to the Germans and to the Italians. The gold reserves of theSwiss National Bank in Zürich were moved farther away from the German border, to theGotthard Pass and to Bern.[5]
Many billions of Swiss francs have been invested in building the fortifications in the mountains, which are partly still used by the army. The most important buildings of theReduit were the fortifications ofSargans, St. Maurice (Valais) and theGotthard region. The caverns of those time were equipped with the needed infrastructure; besidecannons andhowitzers they consisted of dormitories, kitchens, field hospitals, rooms for the sick and bakeries; and they provided space enough to accommodate 100 to 600 soldiers for a timespan of up to several months. Because the tensions between the western countries and the USSR cooled down and bunkers became more or less obsolete because of newer weapon systems, a great number of the Reduit buildings were closed. Some of them have been reopened as museums and can be visited.
At the end of the 1950s, reflecting both the imagined threat of possible invasion by theSoviet Union and the realities ofnuclear warfare, Swissmilitary doctrine changed to mobile defense that included missions for the air force outside of its territory, in order to defeatstandoff attacks and nuclear threats, including the possibility of defensive employment of air-deliverednuclear weapons.[6] However the inability to field an air force of sufficient capability to carry out such missions led to a return of traditional "protection of own territory" doctrine.[7] Meanwhile, the Air Force also began to prepare ad hoc airbases in the mountains, with sections ofhighway strengthened to act as runways andhangars carved out of the mountains.
In the 1960s and 1970s, the armed forces were organised according to the "Armee 61" structure.
During theCold War, Swiss authoritiesconsidered the construction of a Swissnuclear bomb.[8] Leading nuclear physicists at theFederal Institute of Technology Zurich such asPaul Scherrer made this a realistic possibility. However, financial problems with the defense budget prevented the substantial funds from being allocated, and theNuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1968 was seen as a valid alternative. All remaining plans for building nuclear weapons were dropped by 1988.[9]
In 1989, the status of the army as a national icon was shaken by apopular initiative aiming at its dissolution (see:Group for a Switzerland without an Army) receiving 35.6% support. This triggered a series of reforms, and in 1995, the number of troops was reduced to 400,000 ("Armee 95"). Article 58.1 of the 1999 constitution repeats that the army is "in principle" organized as a militia, implicitly allowing a small number of professional soldiers. A second initiative aimed at the army's dissolution in late 2001 received a mere 21.9% support.[10] Nevertheless, the army was shrunk again in 2004, to 220,000 men ("Armee XXI"), including thereserves.
In 2003, for the first time since 1815, Switzerland deployed troops on foreign soil. The Swiss Armed Forces deployed 31 soldiers to Afghanistan. Swiss participation in theWar in Afghanistan ended in 2008 when 2 officers who had served with German forces returned home.[11]
On September 22, 2013, areferendum was held that aimed toabolish conscription in Switzerland.[12] However, the referendum failed with over 73% of the electorate voting against it, showing the strong support for conscription in Switzerland.
In 2016, theSwiss Federal Assembly voted to further reduce the army from 140,000 men to 100,000 men, reducing the time of basic training from 21 weeks to 18, but also to increase the military budget by 2.4 billionSwiss francs.[13] In 2022, the Assembly voted to increase spending by 1.4 billion Swiss francs by 2030, or at least 1% of the country's GDP.[14] The government planned to spend up to 50 billion Swiss francs on defense through the early 2030s.[15] In 2024, the Armed Forces was projected to face significant funding shortfalls.[16]
In 2019, Lieutenant ColonelChristine Hug became the first openly transgender officer in the Swiss Army.[17]
