Book launch: War is a Crime against Humanity

The Story of The War Resisters' International

Book launch: 21 October, 6pm, Housmans Bookshop, 5 Caledonian Rd,
London N1 9DX

The War Resisters' International was formed in reaction to the
senseless slaughter of World War I with a mission not only to oppose
all war but also to strive to eradicate its causes. This ambitious
programme introduced a new and political dimension to the existing
moral and religious basis of pacifism. It attracted some of the best
pacifist thinkers and activists from around the world - George
Lansbury, Bertrand Russell, Bayard Rustin, Martin Niemoeller, Danilo
Dolci, and Mahatma Gandhi. The contributions of such figures and the
sacrifice and heroism of the thousands who refused to cooperate with
their government's war apparatus are chronicled for the first time in
this long awaited book.

This book starts with a survey of the historical roots of pacifism in
the presence of nonviolence within most world-religions. It goes on to
describe the spread of pacifism via European non-conformist religious
movements and its adoption by Tolstoi who was the first pacifist to
urge action not just against the symptoms of violence but against its
causes too: primary social and economic injustice. The major part of
the book deals with the history of the War Resisters' International
itself - including its formation and rapid spread; its response to
Italian action in Abyssinia and the Spanish Civil War; the many
challenges posed by World War II; the schism with Albert Einstein;
compulsory military service; the Cold War and the nuclear threat; the
anti-war movement in the 60s and 70s; and specific nonviolent direct
actions such as those in response to the Soviet invasion of
Czechoslovakia, the Bangladesh war and US draft resistance during the
Vietnam war.