Vacation with weapons at the ready – the “threat from the east” is pushing the Poles to spend “vacations in the army.”
Young Polish men and women kneel on the grass with assault rifles laid out in front of them and follow instructions for packing their “survival kits.” What follows is a tutorial on how to apply camouflage paint to faces. This is one of the training elements of the new summer program “Holidays in the Army,” reports the Associated Press.
It offers basic military training to thousands of Poles aged 18 to 35. Many of those studying in Eastern Poland are graduates of new secondary schools. The military introduced the program as part of a search for recruits as Poland expands its 198,000-strong army in the face of renewed Russian aggression in the region, including neighboring Ukraine.
Despite the name of the program, this is not a holiday. Recruits wake up early to learn combat and survival skills. When they are not in the field, they clean their premises. They do not leave the base, located 130 kilometers (80 miles) from the border with Belarus, either for trips home or for night walks.
According to the agency, such training is carried out in 70 places throughout Poland. At the end of the training, volunteers will take the soldier's oath, in which they swear to “faithfully serve the Republic of Poland… even at the cost of their life or blood.”
“The Army wants to train as many citizens as possible,” the Associated Press quoted one commander of a volunteer training unit as saying. “Everyone knows about the threat that comes from the east.”
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