Data on the Number of Members of the Croatian Armed Forces Publicly Available in the 2024 Annual Defense Report, Prepared by the Ministry of Defense and Personally Signed by the Minister of Defense
First, the Minister of Defense criticized the President of the Republic for revealing “classified information” when the President publicly discussed the number of members of the Croatian Armed Forces. Then, just yesterday, the Ministry of Defense took it a step further, claiming that disclosing the number of Croatian Armed Forces personnel constitutes “treason.” In other words, the Ministry of Defense has accused the President of “treason.” This accusation is being made unofficially, likely through employees whose security clearance certificates have been revoked.
The Office of the President of the Republic has therefore decided to formally notify the Ministry of Defense that the data on the number of members of the Croatian Armed Forces are publicly available in the 2024 Annual Defense Report, which was prepared by the Ministry of Defense and signed by the Minister of Defense.
If the Minister of Defense and his officials are unaware of what is written in the Annual Defense Report – which is clearly the case – we suggest they refer to pages 23 and 24, section 1.4.1. To help them locate the “classified data,” the Minister of Defense wrote in the publicly available report: “As of 31 December 2024, the personnel of the Ministry of Defense, which includes the Croatian Army, numbered 15,558: 13,814 active military personnel, of whom 1,989 were women, and 1,744 civil servants and employees, of whom 899 were women.”
If the Ministry of Defense still does not know where their Annual Defense Report is located, it can be found on the official website of the Croatian Parliament at the following link: https://www.sabor.hr/hr/sjednice-sabora/godisnje-izvjesce-o-obrani-za-2024-godinu-podnositeljica-vlada-republike-hrvatske
Additionally, they can find all previous Annual Defense Reports, which are also public. These reports not only state the current number of Croatian Armed Forces personnel but also indicate how many personnel we should have, as shown in the 2017 Annual Defense Report.
In short, after the Ministry of Defense compiled and the Minister of Defense signed the Annual Defense Report, which includes the data on the number of Croatian Armed Forces members, the same document was adopted by the Government of the Republic of Croatia during its session on 2 May 2025, and later discussed and approved by the Croatian Parliament on 6 June 2025. Therefore, the Annual Defense Report is a public document, and the information on the number of Croatian Armed Forces personnel it contains is not “classified” or secret, as claimed by the Minister of Defense.
As for the unofficial accusations of “treason,” we are waiting for the brave whistle-blowers from the Ministry of Defense to come forward publicly – presumably after they receive arguments and evidence from their strategic partners in the Middle East, who, interestingly, seem unconcerned about discussing military secrets in front of foreigners without security clearance.