Landwehr ('Land-defence'), a military force in the German and Austrian empires, forming an army reserve, but not always retained under arms. Its members, although care is taken that they are sufficiently exercised, spend most of their time in civil pursuits during peace, and are called out for military service only in times of war or of commotion. (During the agrarian disturbances in Galicia in 1890 the Landwehr was employed for the first time against the peasant labour movement.)
The Prussian system of land-defence was called into existence in 1813, when the Landwehr was organised according to Scharnhorst's plan. At first it was designed solely as a land-defence, properly so called, and not, what is now the case, as an integral part of the regular army. Every German capable of bearing arms, after serving in the standing army for seven years, now has to enter the Landwehr, and remain in it for other five years. In exceptional cases the Landwehr may be filled up from the Landsturm, which is not reckoned part of the army, and is called out only in the event of invasion; in both Germany and Austria it embraces men up to the age of forty-two (in Austria, for retired officers, till sixty). For the period of service in the Austrian Landwehr, see ARMY, Vol. I. p. 436.