The book calls for the immediate reorganisation of defence procurement. Armasuisse must be detached from the Federal Department of Defence (DDPS) by law and — following the model of the Swiss Federal Nuclear Safety Inspectorate ENSI — anchored as a public-law institution in the third circle of the federal administration: professionally independent of directives, politically accountable to Parliament. The Mirage affair of 1964, the troubled Panzer 68, the drone odyssey from Ranger through ADS 95 to ADS 15, the army command information system FIS Heer with a loss of around 700 million francs, the Gripen debacle of 2014 and the F-35 fixed-price affair of 2022 to 2025 all reveal the same structural pattern: a procurement agency that is organisationally subordinate to the customer can neither evaluate independently, nor ask critical questions, nor negotiate with suppliers on equal terms.
"Switzerland cannot defend itself autonomously." The sentence does not come from an opposition politician but from the former Chief of the Armed Forces. The defence minister says the same. The intelligence service writes it in its situation report: 15 flashpoints simultaneously — we have never faced such a density of threats.
Beni Gafner, parliamentary correspondent in Bern, and Beat Meier, entrepreneur and author, present with this book the sequel to Gafner's 2007 book "Armee am Abgrund" ("Army at the Abyss"). Its four theses of that time — force build-up as an illusion, systematic budget erosion, wishful thinking about the threat picture, a fair-weather construct — have come true point by point. And today the situation stands exactly where it was predicted back then.
The Thesis
Neutrality only has value if it can be defended. Whoever relies exclusively on alliances and supply contracts is the weakest link in a chain whose other links are stronger — the Patriot crisis of 2025 and the F-35 debacle of 2025 demonstrated this. Switzerland, on the contrary, holds an asset that NATO members do not have: it can buy freely on all markets. It can combine Chinese lasers, Taiwanese precision electronics, Japanese ammunition, Korean tanks, German air defence and Israeli sensor technology without breaking a single treaty. This single-criterion procurement principle — price, reliability, function — is the tangible strategic advantage of neutrality.
Who is this book for?
This book is addressed to voters. Not to specialists — they know the facts. Not to politicians — they decide on the basis of the political majorities the people give them. But to the citizens who vote at the ballot box on the army's spending framework, on the value-added tax increase of 0.8 percentage points being prepared for 2027, on the neutrality initiative running in parallel, and on the many smaller questions that together make the difference between a country that can protect itself and a country that cannot. The decision is not made in Bern. It is made in the municipalities. In the households. At the regulars' tables. In the parish councils, the clubs, the businesses, the families.
Structure
The book attempts to provide the foundations for this decision. It does so in seven parts. Part I describes the situation — the threats, the neighbours, Switzerland's own position. Part II formulates the strategic foundations — the role of neutrality, the mission, the principles. Part III describes the phased plan — from immediate measures to the technological future of the next ten years. Part IV addresses the intelligence service, cyber defence and early warning. Part V covers infrastructure and civil protection. Part VI deals with financing and the industrial base. Part VII brings the arc back to political implementation. Every chapter contains concrete demands. Every demand is backed by figures. Every figure comes from a documented source.