The Minister continued: “The challenge in the coming years will be to coordinate the processes between procurement and infrastructure in such a way that the introduction of the systems into the troops functions smoothly. In any case, the staff are highly motivated and the number of new recruits to the cadre and the number of civilian staff is rising steadily. That is a very positive signal.”
Personnel: positive trend in admissions and reduction in voluntary departures
According to the press release, the positive trend of 2024 continued in the area of cadre candidates, with more than 1,200 young men and women starting their training to become non-commissioned officers or officers. In the area of civilian admissions, the available quota of posts was also fully utilized with 700 people. From the perspective of the Ministry of Defense, it is also pleasing that the number of voluntary departures in the area of personnel retention declined in 2025 compared to 2024.
Domestic operations
According to the report, an average of 505 soldiers were deployed as part of security police operations/migration in the observation period from January to November 2025, providing a total of 168,770 man-days. An average of 100 soldiers were deployed to guard critical infrastructure in Vienna – 33,402 man-days. In total, the Austrian Armed Forces provided 202,172 man-days and picked up 2,114 foreigners seeking help. Of particular note is the extension of the guarding of critical infrastructure in Vienna, currently with up to 100 soldiers, until the end of March 2026 for the time being. In addition, 3,076 man-days were spent on assistance missions/disaster relief, mainly in the fight against foot-and-mouth disease. combating foot-and-mouth disease.
Foreign assignments
There are currently almost 600 soldiers deployed abroad in 17 missions, 25 of whom are women. The largest contingents are in Kosovo with KFOR (157), in Bosnia and Herzegovina with EUFOR (194) and in Lebanon with UNIFIL (164). In addition, around 500 soldiers were made available for deployment as part of the EU Battle Group 2025 and, since the fall of 2025, around 200 personnel were made available as reinforcements for deployment in the Balkans. One special feature was the deployment of a contingent from the NBC Defense Center to Slovakia to combat foot-and-mouth disease with an average of 85 people.
Air Force
The air force flew over 13,500 flight hours. The airspace security operation for the World Economic Forum in Davos was the highlight of the flying missions. Among the assistance missions, the forest firefighting in the Eisenerz and Roßkopf area with 42 flight hours and the evacuation of 62 people in the Gschnitz/Tyrol area due to a mudslide are worth mentioning. As part of the modernization of the helicopter fleet the eleventh (of 36) AW169 Lion has now landed in Austria. The retraining of Allouette III operational pilots for the AW169 aircraft type has now been completed and the retraining of OH-58 military pilots has begun.
Procurements
The main procurements in 2025 were the twelve Leonardo M-346 fighter aircraft with an order volume of around 1.5 billion euros and 315 Magni-X combat drones. Other major projects included the initiation of the expansion of the vehicle fleet (80 Iveco group transport vehicles for 35 million euros), the combat suit (44 million euros), the reconnaissance and target designation radar (140 million euros) and a drone defense battery (200 million euros).
Military infrastructure
In the calendar year 2025, around 426 million euros were invested in infrastructure, maintenance, servicing, cleaning, energy purchases and rents. Around 700 projects and numerous small construction projects were realized. Around half of the projects are directly related to the “Mission Forward” and the “ÖBH2032+ development plan”. The second part relates to urgent repair measures, general renovations, official requirements and technical requirements, for example. Other budgets were used for areas such as self-sufficiency and accessibility. With the introduction of modern soldier radios, the implementation and further expansion of the Tactical Communication Network and the Battlefield Management System, technological progress has also reached the armed forces in this area.
Demining service
In 1,058 operations, the demining service recovered and defused around 28.5 tons of war material.
Cyber Defense
The department’s own AI services have been implemented and trained so that AI-supported work will also be possible for all users in the secure network of the Ministry of Defense in the future.
With the “LEO2VLEO” project (-> The Austrian Armed Forces launch their own satellites) will take communication and navigation to higher spheres. A project has been developed together with the Netherlands, which will be realized in 2026 with its own satellites in orbit. The newly developed capabilities will be tested, evaluated and further developed in close cooperation in the areas of information operations and cognitive counter warfare as part of international cooperation, especially with the National Guard Vermont and the DACH network.
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