This article makes a brief analysis of the sustainable development goals that are applicable in the military organization and identifies, through the literature-review method, the main ways in which the military organization was affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, focusing on the evolution of military spending. The ultimate goal is to establish how the pandemic has influenced the implementation of sustainable development goals in the military organization, in order to provide strategic management with recommendations to increase the resilience and sustainability of the military organization. The main conclusion of this research is that the pandemic did not have a significant impact in the short term, but in the medium and long term the situation may change, which calls for adaptation, cooperation, coordination and caution in the configuration of defence spending. As a secondary conclusion, it can be considered that the pandemic can have an accelerating effect on sustainable development policies, the military organization being called to benefit from the identified lessons and new opportunities, in order to increase the response capacity.

The US military presence in Afghanistan has been the subject of retrospective analyzes that facilitated the identification and learning of important lessons for future military actions. This article analyses, through the case study method, the way defense resources were managed from a sustainable development perspective, focusing on the durable effects of the main projects aimed at ensuring this country’s initial steps towards a sustainable development destination. As a result, this study points to the positive potential that the military instrument could have in a country’s efforts to achieve sustainable development goals, highlighting the way that unsustainable management practices can compromise or even nullify the progress in this area. Consequently, the main product of this research is a model of unsustainable use of defense resources that decision makers should know and avoid in the future, to obtain long-term beneficial results.

This article focused on offering a preliminary view on the most important areas in which gender equality perspective, one of the sustainable development goals, can contribute to the sustainability of human resource in the military organization and the possible effects. First, the article investigated, through a literature review approach, the conceptual dimensions of defense human resource sustainability, proposing a conceptual model which could be applied by military decision-makers to enhance the efficiency of human resource management and to contribute to the sustainability of military organization, in the context of sustainable development. Second, the article explored relevant documents, to identify the military approach to gendered issues, revealing some commonalities with the subsequent targets of the sustainable development goals and highlighting the emergence of a new military capability, represented by women’s empowerment. Finally, the proposed sustainability model and the military gender equality perspective represented a framework for identifying the contribution gender equality perspective could have to the sustainability of defense human resource. In this respect, recent statistics and the analysis of some specific on-line content offered valuable information on the practical benefits of the gender equality perspective. To conclude, this study highlights theneed that the military human resource management adapt its policies, to ensure a positive contribution of the gender perspective to the permanent and functional availability of its human resource

The military logistics is a key element in the military operations and activities, therefore it has to be adapted to the context in which combat and combat support troops evolve, to provide the full range of goods and services, in a sufficient and timely manner. This article explored, using the case study method, the extent to which the current and future procurement programs of the Romanian Army covered the broad range of logistic requirements generated by the actual economic and security context. Building on the large spectrum of logistics functional and related areas requirements, and also on the new strategic visions adopted this year by NATO and the EU, the article highlighted the fact that these strategic trends were in line with the sustainable development goals, on one hand, and also very demanding for the Romanian military logistics. The conducted study reveals a gap in the existing and planned procurement programs, which should be more logistics oriented, and also more focused on meeting the sustainability criteria determined by the context of sustainable development. Moreover, the research points to the need that the national defense industry be activated to include Romania into the military supply chain, to reduce dependencies from external support and enhance resilience.

This article presents the main types of modern leadership and the possibilities to use them in the context of sustainable development. Furthermore, the article highlights the important contribution that military leaders may play in implementing the sustainability of the military organization and the society of which it is part, through the combined use of appropriate leadership styles and of the most needed qualities that leaders should possess.