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Labour battalions have been a form of alternative service or unfree labour in various countries in lieu of or resembling regular military service. In some cases they were the result of some kind of discriminative segregation of the population, while in some others they have been a conscious choice.
In some countries labour battalions were created from part of population which for various reasons were not suitable for regular military service, often because this population was considered "undesirable" or "unreliable", e.g., political enemies, population of occupied territories or "lower races".
Examples include labour battalions in the late Ottoman Empire and early Turkish Republic both during World War I and during World War II, labour service in Hungary during World War II, as well as labour battalions in other territories held by Nazi Germany and its allies (see also "Hiwi".).
In some countries labour battalions are a form of civil conscription instead of military conscription for people who cannot join military service for various reasons, e.g., due to bad health or being conscientious objectors to any forms of violence, as long as they aren't considered unfit for other work.
In the British Army during the First World War, labour or pioneer battalions were initially formed in December 1914 from recruits with skilled trades or experience in manual labour, trained to fight as infantry but usually used to build trenches and carry out other manual labour. Early in 1916 these began to also include men not assessed as fit enough to fight to carry out a similar role and were sometimes also known as Infantry Works Battalions. Initially assigned to individual regiments, the existing Labour and Infantry Works battalions were grouped together in February 1917 to form the new Labour Corps. [1] [2]
Until the last days of the Soviet Union with obligatory military duty in the state, men deemed unfit to regular military duty but not unfit for other work, as well as many able-bodied ones, were assigned to construction battalions (стройбаты) of the Soviet Army . Similar armed forces branches existed in other Eastern European countries throughout the communist period between the end of World War II and the end of the 1980s. An interesting example are the Bulgarian Construction Troops (Строителни Войски), first established in 1920 to circumvent the limits on the size of the military imposed by the Treaty of Neuilly-Sur-Seine at the end of World War I. Over the years this branch became a blend of a corps of engineers and a means for some to fulfill the mandatory conscription in place during communism in the country.
An army, ground force or land force is an armed force that fights primarily on land. In the broadest sense, it is the land-based military branch, service branch or armed service of a nation or country. It may also include aviation assets by possessing an army aviation component. Within a national military force, the word army may also mean a field army.
The Latvian National Armed Forces, or NBS, are the armed forces of Latvia. Latvia's defense concept is based on a mobile professional rapid response force and reserve segment that can be called upon relatively fast for mobilization should the need arise. The National Armed Forces consists of Land Forces, Naval Forces, Air Force and National Guard. Its main tasks are to protect the territory of the State; participate in international military operations; and to prevent threats to national security.
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The New Army, often referred to as Kitchener's Army or, disparagingly, as Kitchener's Mob, was an (initially) all-volunteer portion of the British Army formed in the United Kingdom from 1914 onwards following the outbreak of hostilities in the First World War in late July 1914. It originated on the recommendation of Herbert Kitchener, then the Secretary of State for War to obtain 500,000 volunteers for the Army. Kitchener's original intention was that these men would be formed into units that would be ready to be put into action in mid-1916, but circumstances dictated the use of these troops before then. The first use in a major action of Kitchener's Army units came at the Battle of Loos.
The German Army is the land component of the armed forces of Germany. The present-day German Army was founded in 1955 as part of the newly formed West German Bundeswehr together with the Marine and the Luftwaffe. As of January 2022, the German Army had a strength of 62,766 soldiers.
The notion of the Labor army was introduced in Soviet Russia during the Russian Civil War in 1920. Initially the term was applied to regiments of Red Army transferred from military activity to labor activity, such as logging, coal mining, firewood stocking, etc.
The Canadian Expeditionary Force (CEF) was the expeditionary field force of Canada during the First World War. It was formed following Britain’s declaration of war on Germany on 15 August 1914, with an initial strength of one infantry division. The division subsequently fought at Ypres on the Western Front, with a newly raised second division reinforcing the committed units to form the Canadian Corps. The CEF and corps was eventually expanded to four infantry divisions, which were all committed to the fighting in France and Belgium along the Western Front. A fifth division was partially raised in 1917, but was broken up in 1918 and used as reinforcements following heavy casualties.
The Middlesex Regiment (Duke of Cambridge's Own) was a line infantry regiment of the British Army in existence from 1881 until 1966. The regiment was formed, as the Duke of Cambridge's Own (Middlesex Regiment), in 1881 as part of the Childers Reforms when the 57th (West Middlesex) and 77th (East Middlesex) Regiments of Foot were amalgamated with the county's militia and rifle volunteer units.
Self-inflicted wounds occur in various contexts in the military. Most self-inflicted wounds occur during wartime, for various reasons. Potential draftees may self-injure to have a health deferment to conscription. This was practiced as conscription abstinence by some Jewish conscripts in the Russian Empire. Deployed soldiers may injure themselves in order to be temporarily evacuated from the front lines for treatment, and possibly receive a medical discharge.
This article details the organization of the Imperial Japanese Army.
The Haldane Reforms were a series of far-ranging reforms of the British Army made from 1906 to 1912, and named after the Secretary of State for War, Richard Burdon Haldane. They were the first major reforms since the "Childers Reforms" of the early 1880s, and were made in the light of lessons newly learned in the Second Boer War.
The 156th Brigade was an infantry brigade formation of the British Army. The brigade saw active service in both the First and the Second World Wars with the 52nd (Lowland) Infantry Division.
The 197th Brigade was an infantry brigade formation of the British Army that saw distinguished active service in both the First and Second world wars.
The Labour Corps was a British Army unit formed in 1917 for manual and skilled labour on the Western Front and Salonika during the First World War. In previous centuries the British Army had fulfilled this role through the Royal Pioneer Corps (1762–1763), the Corps of Pioneers (1795–1800) and the Army Works Corps (1855-c.1856). Though it disbanded in 1921, it is often seen as the predecessor to the Royal Pioneer Corps of the Second World War.