War resisters

David McReynolds, who died in New York at the age of 88 on 17 August, played a leading role in the US and international peace movement. He was one of the main organisers of the anti-Vietnam war mobilisation in the US, which not only contributed to the ending of that war but had a profound impact on US politics and society. He was also prominent in the anti-nuclear campaign both in the US and internationally, and, though not a gay…

Adam Hochschild, author of 'To End All Wars' helped us launch the Peace News WW1 project 'The World is My Country' in January 2014 at Friends House in London.

Adam‘s book 'To End All Wars: A Story of the Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914 – 1918' is the major inspiration for The World is My Country

Lion tamers and agents provacateurs

The only recent account of the First World War to foreground the war’s…

The First World War centenary (2014-2018) was accompanied by a tidal wave of events, exhibitions, TV series, books and commemorations. However, one key aspect of the War’s history received little attention: the history and stories of the people and organisations that opposed the conflict.

Moreover, this history – of police raids and clandestine printing presses, disobedient soldiers and feminist peace initiatives, Maori princesses and striking German munitions workers – appears…

Memorial for deserters by Nikolaus Kernbach in Stuttgart.
Photo: Ohne Rüstung Leben, Stuttgart

Most friends in the peace movement are familiar with the name of Franz Jägerstätter. There were other conscientious objectors who, like him, refused to fight Hitler’s war of aggression and paid the ultimate price. A few of these are pictured in Lars G Petersson’s book Deserters (2005), which mainly focuses on the 30,000 German soldiers who deserted while on active…

On 12 March, demonstrators protested at Menwith Hill US spy base in Yorkshire in support of US military whistle-blower Bradley Manning, currently on trial, and against the treatment of Guantánamo Bay detainees, many of whom are hunger-striking against deteriorating prison conditions.

At Menwith Hill, they attached a banner saying ‘The Shame of Guantánamo Bay’ to the fence while one demonstrator, dressed in a hooded orange jumpsuit resembling those that…

Manning, who was arrested after allegedly providing Wikileaks with classified US military information, has been confined for nearly 1,000 days awaiting trial for what could turn out to be a life sentence in military custody. He has been banned from providing evidence for all but a few of the motivations for his actions.

Lind also ruled that Manning could not put forward evidence to support his claim that the Wikileaks revelations had little or no impact on US national security.

WISE Up for Bradley Manning is a grassroots network in Wales, Ireland, Scotland and England (WISE) taking action for the young US military intelligence analyst who has been held by the US government for two years without trial.

Accused of blowing the whistle on US war crimes and revealing other truths the US would have preferred to keep buried, Bradley Manning has been tortured and denied his constitutional rights.

When US president Barack Obama, commander-in-chief of the…

WISE Up for Bradley Manning is a loose network of groups and individuals in Wales, Ireland, Scotland and England (WISE) taking action for Bradley Manning, the young US military intel. analyst with Welsh roots who has been held for almost two years without trial accused of blowing the whistle on war crimes and revealing other truths the US would have preferred to keep buried. Bradley Manning has been tortured and denied his…

Since the beginning of the second intifada in September 2000, conscientious objection in Israel has developed rapidly to an unprecedented scale. This is a counter trend to the general shift to the right within Israeli society. While the electoral “peace camp” lost considerably in the recent elections, the radical refusenik movement continues to grow.

Israel has a very rigid conscription system, which is also quite complicated. In theory, all men…

Good news for a change from Turkey: on 9 March, gay Turkish conscientious objector Mehmet Tarhan was unexpectedly released from the military prison in Sivas, following an order by the Military Court of Appeal in Ankara. The reasons for his release remain unclear, but one possibility is that, even if finally sentenced, Mehmet Tarhan would be unlikely to serve more time in prison than he already has (he was arrested on 6 April 2005, and has spent almost a year in prison).

Mehmet Tarhan…

In March 2003 an international conference on conscientious objection to military service, taking place in Seoul, attracted more than 400 participants over two days. The spectrum of participants was unusually broad: students, human rights lawyers, representatives from the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Seventh Day Adventist Church, and representatives from some smaller South Korean parties.

The “international” contingent was mainly limited to the resource people:conscientious objectors…

Andreas: When I became a total objector in Germany in the mid-80s, I saw my objection as an act of civil disobedience against militarism, or, more specifically, against the system of military slavery called conscription.

My refusal to serve was aimed towards abolishing conscription and I saw it as a small but important contribution to demilitarise peoples minds. And although I certainly acted out of conscience, I never perceived my conscientious objection as a human rights…

International Conscientious Objectors’ Day, 15 May, was marked by four events in Britain. At the CO Commemorative Stone in Tavistock Square, Bloomsbury, London, Norman Kember, post-WW2 CO and more recently a hostage in Iraq, spoke, before white carnations were laid to symbolise 70 named COs from countries around the world and over the past century.

Similar commemorations were held in Peace Gardens, Bath Row, Birmingham, on 11 May, and in the Peace Garden, St Peter’s Square,…

During his first days of imprisonment, Ossi received up to 100 letters a day. He felt that the prison walls were tumbling down. He was in a cell and still he was in contact with so many people nationally and internationally. “This motivated me very much. I tried to answer all letters and I was spending my whole day in the cell writing letters. Fortunately I knew from my lawyers and from replies that my letters had actually been dispatched”.

Many people write short postcards or…

Thirty-two people is a small number. A demonstration with thirty-two participants would hardly be worthy of the word. But since October 2000, thirty-two people were imprisoned or otherwise penalised in Israel for refusing to perform military duty on conscientious and political grounds.

Thirty-two may not be such a small figure after all. It is even rather large if we compare it to the figure for the preceding year - only three. It is also not that small because it actually represents…