Military globalisation and nonviolent resistance in Europe

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A two day international conference in Brussels, 23–24 March 2008

One day of action is not enough to make a difference. We need more and long-term international co-operation to have an impact on military intervention policy in general. Following the NATO Game Over-action we reflect on military globalisation and how to improve nonviolent resistance in a 2-day conference (23–24 March 2008) in Brussels organised by Bombspotting and War Resisters' International.

Five years ago the Iraq war increased public awareness of Europe’s role in military globalisation. In 2003 all over Europe nonviolent direct actions took place against the deployment of US and UK troops to Iraq. Meanwhile nuclear weapons and military bases are often met with strong resistance.

But until now these campaigns mostly remained on the local or national level. While they often had some local or national impact, the political decisions are today taken on an international level. To have an impact on these decisions cooperation across the borders is needed.

At this conference we bring together the local resistance against military bases and nonviolent direct action groups from several European countries to share knowledge on the military complex and to build partnerships and common strategies. We share our knowledge on military bases, movements and military deployments to create a common understanding of the military intervention machinery and the role of our local military base in this structure. We investigate how together we can put a spanner into the works: how can coordinated local and *international actions potentially raise our impact.

With both the NATO Game Over-action and the conference Bombspotting and War Resisters' International hope to strengthen the international resistance against military globalisation.

From 20 until 24 March basic accommodation is being organised, where you can stay with your own sleeping bag. Please register through the form on www.bombspotting.org/!

As part of the preparation of the conference we aim to map military bases and activities on the website mcmilitary.org. On this wiki participating groups are invited to share their knowledge and collect sources on military activities. This will be used to have a closer look into the practice of military interventions (bases, transport routes, infrastructure used) and will remain available as a public resource after the conference.

If you want to contribute, send a message to international@bombspotting.org