Staff Members of Research Centre Visit Bucharest

The CSWG offers military historians and military scientists a permanent international forum and relations. The annual conferences are usually co-organized by two military scientific institutions. This year, the 17th annual CSWG conference was co-organized by the Institute for Political Studies of Defense and Military History (Romania) and the Institute of Military History and War Studies (Danish Royal Defense College). More than 40 participants attended the program from 24 countries. Hungary was represented by Col. Dr. János Besenyő, Head of the General Staff Scientific Research Centre (GS SRC) of the HDF Military Augmentation, Preparation and Training Command; Dr. Péter Álmos Kiss, senior researcher at the GS SRC; and Dr. Mihály Krámli, a researcher from the MoD Institute and Museum of Military History.

The conference was opened by Mircea Dusa, State Secretary for Defence Policy and Planning at the Ministry of National Defence, Romania and Rear Admiral Nils Wang, Commandant of the Royal Danish Defence College. The lectures focused on analyzing the past lessons learned in the use of military forces in domestic affairs (in several cases during the interwar period). Some lectures, however, dealt with current issues and future developments of the use of military forces in domestic affairs. In his lecture – which also raised a number of practical problems – Dr. Péter Álmos Kiss talked about the importance of continuous analysis in connection with internal security operations. He emphasized that this topic is very novel and unique, because as yet, democratic states have neither experience nor doctrinal guidelines nor specific training programs in this field.

After the conference, as part of a daylong program, the participants visited the 21st Mountain Battalion near Predeal. During the visit, the guests were introduced to the history and equipment of the battalion and were given an insight into the mountaineering and mountain rescue capabilities of the battalion.

On the whole, the conference created an excellent opportunity not only for the presentation of ongoing scientific activities in the Hungarian Defence Forces in an international environment, but also for learning about dominant trends in military science and the views on future warfare, as well as for preparing future agreements of cooperation.

Photo: Col. Dr. János Besenyő, Dr. Péter Álmos Kiss