Fredrik Solvang, The Armed Forces’ long-term plan | Fredrik Solvang fails to ask the most important question in the Debate

Never again April 9? The other day I tested some 20-year-olds on what April 9 was for. They had no idea, and suggested everything from Eidsvold to the Grand Prix, except for one, who cautiously suggested: “Was it when the Jews occupied Norway”?

So there we are now. A generation of young people who assume the wildest things about the last war. At the same time, the risk of a new occupation moves closer, or more likely, the risk of sabotage, terror and hybrid warfare.

On 5 April, the government presented the Norwegian Armed Forces’ long-term plan. It was well covered by Dagsrevyen, the 68 generation’s preferred news organ.

I eagerly awaited the Debate on the following Tuesday, April 9, to receive the critical input and discussion. I took it for granted that it would be about the defense! But no, the theme was “Asker, Norway’s new tax haven?”

Fredrik, how are you?

Not important enough for the Debate

NOK 526 million in less annual tax revenue in one of the country’s 357 municipalities? Wow, what a newsstand knocker! This was the first possible broadcast time after the government had proposed a roughly doubling of annual allocations to the Armed Forces: From NOK 71 billion in 2022 to NOK 166 billion (in 2024 kroner) in 2036.

NRK.no has covered well what this venture entails, but I thought the topic was big enough for NRK’s ​​biggest debate arena?

9 April, with the first Debate after the long-term plan was presented, was a Tuesday. On 11 April, the topic of the Debate was whether Ingvild Kjerkol could remain in office. On 16 April there were disgruntled farmers and on 18 April there were women who demanded a new rape law.

Now, a month after the Defense’s long-term plan was presented, I understand that this is never debated on Norway’s most important TV programme: The Debate.

Perhaps the editors think there is nothing to debate, that everyone agrees on this venture anyway?

It’s wrong.

Money doesn’t solve everything

Heavy defense experts warn against the belief that money solves everything. The drastic increase in personnel cannot possibly result in solid competence, when the turnover in critical positions, already today, is so high in the Armed Forces.

Competence in the procurement of complex large IT deliveries is razor thin. Just ask Berit Svendsen, who chaired the committee on the Armed Forces in a new technological age. Or asks Eldbjørg Løwer, who in Aftenposten recently called for an independent defense inspection. Or professor at the Norwegian Armed Forces College, Paal Sigurd Hilde, who explains how the Norwegian Armed Forces wastes tax money.

If you need more input on who can debate this, just call me Fredrik, I’ll be happy to spend a free morning doing research for the good cause.

You have to ask the question: How is a defense that has become experts at downsizing for the past three decades going to suddenly be able to handle wild growth in a sensible way?

The defense chief is an optimist, imagine that. He declares (like Eisenhower) that no pessimistic general has ever won a battle. He overlooks that good preparedness is pessimism in a system: To prepare for the worst, and to train for the worst.

Furthermore, platitudes in his posts in the Defense Forum, such as “We must continue to strengthen cooperation, inclusion and cooperation in the entire defense sector to ensure a comprehensive development of the Defence, are breeding”. What does “cooperation, inclusion and cooperation” mean in concrete terms?

The drastic increase in defense budgets could mean money out the window.

The mantra has become “Bigger coal at Krigsskolen”. What was the question?” And then everyone happily pats each other on the head, defense chiefs and politicians, because they were so tough to increase the budgets.

The armed forces must be externally supervised, as Eldbjørg Løwer suggests, and the armed forces must be measured on operational combat capability, not on the number of employees, the number of helicopters and frigates and the number of great new IT projects (which do not work because no one is able to operate them, and because the purchasers did not understand what they were buying anyway).

This is what we should have had a Debate about.

To lose sleep at night

The NRK program is usually public information at its best. Fredrik Solvang impresses by going into difficult topics and making them understandable. The editors impress just as much by finding good sources, putting together good panels and adding a dash of infotainment to the whole thing. But this spring they have disappointed greatly, by failing to take into account the enormous increase in planned defense budgets.

The only person in the press who quickly took a hard and correct angle was Trygve Hegnar. And I can only vote in favor: the IT companies, the maritime sector and the construction industry can laugh all the way to the bank when the defense’s purchasers are going to burn off 600 billion in one fell swoop.

By all means, I wish the construction industry all the best. But I wonder who will measure our operational combat capability, instead of measuring the number of brigades.

Combine the elderly’s sleepwalking acceptance of new billions with the youth’s lack of knowledge about our recent history: Like me, you should lose sleep at night.

Read more comments from Elin Ørjasæter

Putin is more important than tax engineering

In recent years, NRK has made hard attempts to reach viewers under the age of 30. Fredrik Solvang is one of the few who has really made it happen, through personal appeal and efforts in social media. NRK should therefore feel a special responsibility that his program covers the big and important issues.

When NRK itself is so uninterested in defence, the only thing left to do is to resign and stockpile a small stock of necessary medicines and ten jugs of water. The taxes must be paid at the same time as we fill the cellar with beans, diesel generators and canned goods.

The day after the Berlin Wall was opened, 9 November 1989, Dagbladet had on its front page “Let the children swear”, a statement from a well-known child psychologist at the time. It has become the image of a press that prioritizes mistakes.

Are you trying to climb the same podium of press fads, Fredrik?

Two years after Putin’s attack on Ukraine, Norway is doubling its defense budgets. And you create a fresh debate about the fact that Asker municipality has decided to investigate the municipal part of the property tax. Congratulations!