Quotes on the UN and Armaments
"Every gun, every warship, every tank and every military aircraft built is, in the
final analysis, a theft from those who are hungry and are not fed, from those who are
naked and are not clothed."
Dwight D Eisenhower, General Commander Allied Forces, World War 2 and
US President 1952-1960 (from Peace New's Nonviolent Action Issue 22 June 2001
"Our vision is of ..... a world where peace and human security, as envisioned in
the principles of the United Nations Charter, replace armaments, violent conflicts and
wars....
The UN and its member states have failed to fulfil their primary responsibility of
maintaining peace and preserving human life. "
"Disarmament is not the only way to peace. It must be accompanied by genuine human
security. It is imperative that NGOs be included in the dialogue for peace. The world
community, civil society, including younger and older people and their governments have
the resources and knowledge to move from a culture of violence to a culture of
peace."...
"The Forum urges: ... Governments... To initiate a world-wide freeze on armed forces
and a 25% cut in production and export of major weapons and small arms, ... as the
beginning of world-wide build-down of conventional forces."
We the Peoples Millennium Forum Declaration and Agenda for Action.
Strengthening the United Nations for the 21st Century - Declaration over 1,350
representatives of over 1,000 NGO from more than 100 countries. May 2000. (available from
UN Information Centre and UNA)
"For three years in a row now, the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva has not
engaged in any negotiations because its members have been unable to agree on disarmament
priorities. I cannot here review the entire arms control spectrum. I focus here on two
categories of weapons that are of special concern: small arms and light weapons, because
they currently kill most people in most wars; and nuclear weapons, because of their
continuing terrifying potential for mass destruction."...
"Let us resolve therefore:....To ensure that the Organisation (the UN) is given
necessary resources to carry out its mandates."
Kofi Annan - Secretary-General of the United Nations - We the Peoples:
the role of the United Nations in the twenty-first century.
"43. Demilitarise the Global Economy by reducing Military Budgets and
Shifting resources Toward Human Security Programs.
Peace in the 21st century demands a shift from the 20th century's
expenditures on the military to civilian programs that safeguard human security.
Disarmament will entail making drastic cuts in weapons, forces and military budgets.
Demilitarisation will require transforming the military economy to a peace economy by
allocating resources for programs that ensure the well being of the world's citizens -
that provide for the basic human rights of food, shelter, education, work, health,
security and peace. It will require global adherence to the United nations Charter and to
the development of non-military security structures and peace-making institutions.
As a first step toward disarmament and demilitarisation, the Hague Appeal for Peace
endorses the Women's Peace Petition, which calls for a 5% reduction a year for 5 years in
military spending and the reallocation of these substantial resources toward human
security programs and peace education.
The Hague Agenda for Peace and Justice for the 21st Century
- UN Ref: A/54/98 www.haguepeace.org
"We fear that, unless the principles of this Culture (of Peace) are increasingly
built into every activity undertaken by governments and others, the world will risk the
continuation of the appalling bloodshed and of the destruction which so dominated great
periods of the 20th century with its threat of termination of life throughout
the world."
"Members' determination at the United Nations to pursue the unfinished global
disarmament agenda remains sadly limited. The threatened development and/or spread of
weapons of mass destruction remain ver real."
"Small arms remain available in the Great Lakes Region of Central Africa, in Angola
and in many other countries and continue to fuel conflict, exacerbate human rights abuses,
undermine development programmes and peace processes and defy the effects of our and other
governments and of civil society to curb them. We believe that reductions in Military
budgets remain the cornerstones to achieving the international development and
environmental targets and greater human rights implementation"
"We remain deeply concerned at the UK's continuing reliance on the defence industry
and at the periodic provision of arms to a number of unsavoury regimes, where they may be
used against civilians or to abuse human rights or could undermine development, often with
the Export Credit Guarantee Department's (ECGD) support."
"We call upon Her Majesty's Government vigorously to seek a Fourth Special Session of
the UN General Assembly on Disarmament no later than 2003, which would seek to confirm a
creative, holistic and comprehensive UN disarmament agenda and action plan for the first
part of the 21st century. We believe that such Special Sessions should be held
on a regular basis in order to review progress and to set new targets."
"We urge Her Majesty's Government to campaign at the UN for structuring of effective
regional security guarantees to help to reduce individual countries' felt need for
arms."
"We believe that space should be kept free of weapons and of nuclear power and that
the excessive expense it would involve would be better served by sharing more fairly
the world's resources."
"... what must be engendered is far greater political will to bring those aspirations
to fruition."
Policy 2001. United Nations Association of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
(www.una-uk.org ). Policy Statement adopted at Annual
Conference April 2001.
| African
civil war Prime ministers Question time Wednesday 6 Feb 2002
Prime minister’s Question time Wednesday 6 Feb 2002
Mr. Alex Salmond (Banff and Buchan): Is the Prime Minister aware that on
the day of the Twin Towers disaster, there took place in this city an arms trade fair
sponsored by the Ministry of Defence? Among the customers at that fair for
state-of-the-art weaponry were both sides in the civil war in the Democratic Republic of
the Congo. Would it not be a useful start to the Prime Minister's mission to Africa if he
announced that henceforth this country will not sell arms to both sides in African civil
wars?
6 Feb 2002 : Column 862 The Prime Minister (Tony Blair): I do not know about the particular point that the hon. Gentleman makes, but I will investigate it and write to him. Our arms sales to Africa run at about 1 per cent. of total arms sales, so it is important to put that in context. There are also, incidentally, jobs and industry in this country to consider. Of course it is important to take care who we sell arms to, and we do. The desire of African nations is for the partnership for change in Africa—which covers a whole range of issues, including aid and trade, investment and governance—to be satisfactorily put together for the G8 summit in July, so that the developing and developed world can give Africa the chance that it needs. From: Parliament - UK web site: www.parliament.uk/ |
"But I also made it clear to [Vladimir Putin] that it's important to think beyond
the old days of when we had the concept that if we blew each other up, the world would be
safe."
George W. Bush, US President and Commander in Chief of the Armed
Forces, preaching on the US position on Health and safety (from CAAT news June-July 2000 /
Issue 166 - www.caat.org.uk )
This council believes development of ballistic missile defence risks increasing
international tensions and diverting huge resources, which could be better diverted to
tackle poverty, environmental degradation and human rights abuse which sow the seeds of
War"
Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council Resolution (from CND's Campaign
- June 2001 www.cnduk.org )
"Emphasizes: in this regard, the need for more effective coordination of
disarmament, demobilization and reintegration programmes, and reaffirms that
adequate and timely funding of these programmes is critical to the success of peace
processes".
UN Security Council resolution 1327 (2000) On implementation of the
Report of The Panel on UN Peace Operations 13 Nov 2000 S/RES/1327 (2000).
To the extent that money can solve conflicts and potential conflicts, not a huge amount
is required compared to what the world is prepared to spend on everything else, including
defence."
Gareth Evans, President of The International Crisis Group (www.intl-crisis-group.org ); Former Foreign
Minister of Australia. - Preventing and responding to deadly conflict in UN2000 The United
Nations Millennium Summit (available from UN Information Centre and UNA).
"In the Millennium Declaration [September 2000] ... governments from all over the
world pledged themselves to free their peoples from the scourge of war, from abject and
dehumanising poverty, and from the threat of living on a polluted planet with few natural
resources left ...[and] to promote democracy and the rule of law; to protect children and
other vulnerable people; and to meet the special needs of Africa. And they promised to
make the United Nations itself more effective, as an instrument for pursuing all those
aims. ....
The Charter was written in your name .... In the end, only you can ensure the Declaration
is more than fine words. It is up to you to see the pledges honoured, and so to make the
new century better than the old".
Message to the Peoples of the United Nations from Secretary-General Kofi Annan
24 October (United Nations Day), 2000.
"The world military sector is a vast repository of resources -- financial,
physical, human and technological. If only a fraction of these resources
could be diverted to meet the unmet socioeconomic needs of the developing world,
then not only would human welfare be dramatically enhanced, but also many
conflicts with their roots in economic deprivation would be averted. In order to realize
this 'peace dividend,' however, the over- militarized nations will have to undergo a major
restructuring of their forces and a reappraisal of their real military needs. They
must accept much more rapid reductions in military spending and make a political
commitment to investing what does not need to be retained for the disarmament and
decommissioning process itself in development programs to benefit the world's poorest
communities. "
Source: Disarmament: The Unfinished Disarmament Agenda, February, 1995. Written and edited
by the Special NGO Committee for Disarmament, Geneva, Switzerland.
"Disarmament is not an end in itself. The end is peace, and security is
one of its essential elements. The evolution of international relations reveals
today that disarmament is a necessary condition, if not the primary condition, for
security since, by a phenomenon of cooperation, it allows other elements of stability and
peace to develop. All are well aware that the type of security on which our planet has
depended for several decades - a balance of terror based on nuclear deterrence - is a
security with a far too high risk level. This awareness should encourage nations to enter
into a new phase in their relations, with all due urgency. This is precisely what you are
now devoting your attention to, in order to eliminate once and for all the spectre of a
nuclear war and of all armed conflict.
The progressive, balanced and controlled elimination of weapons of mass
destruction and the stabilization at the lowest possible level of the defensive weapon
systems of countries, is an objective that should obtain the necessary consensus
as a firs step toward increased security. "
MESSAGE OF JOHN PAUL II TO THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF UNO DISARMAMENT
EFFORTS CANNOT CONCERN ONLY SOME COUNTRIES OR BE CENTERED ONLY ON ONE TYPE OF WEAPON From
the Vatican, 31 May 1988 John Paul II
"Human security has emerged as a foreign policy paradigm with the potential to
serve as a powerful complement to more traditional security concepts in meeting the range
of new threats to people and, ultimately, to governments and multilateral organizations.
Human security is best seen as a shift in perspective, which takes people as the principal
point of reference in international affairs. The human security agenda seeks to
address a range of threats to the safety and security of people. It is
fundamentally about putting people first and enhancing our collective ability and capacity
to protect human rights, and to ensure the essential peace and stability which is a key
pre-requisite for sustainable human development. ...
Human security provides a valuable theoretical basis from which a variety of issues can be
dealt with. Its utility and focus may well prove different for a small island state than
it will for a large federal nation. For example, the influx of a small number of
illegal arms may pose a negligible threat to a large country, yet have much more serious
consequences in a smaller nation."
HUMAN SECURITY IN THE AMERICAS THIRTIETH REGULAR SESSION OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY
ORGANIZATION OF AMERICAN STATES June 4, 2000 Windsor, Canada OAS/SER.P AG/doc.3851/00
April 26, 2000 (Document presented by the Canadian Delegation)
"How will any form of equity be established unless more resources are aimed at developing people who are at the bottom of the economic ladder? Years after the end of the cold war, the world’s governments continue to spend more than $800 billion a year on arms and the arms trade is once again expanding. Though the bulk of military spending is on conventional arms, the possession of nuclear weapons by the powerful is driving militarism around the globe. Grotesque imbalances result:
"The Western nuclear powers are primarily responsible for keeping the relationship between disarmament and development off the political agenda.
There is a dynamic, triangular relationship between disarmament, development,
and security. The more disarmament and development are advanced, the more
security is enhanced and strengthened. But most nations haven’t yet made the mental
leap that security today requires the development of the human being, not the preparation
for war."
DEVELOPMENT AND EQUALITY by Douglas Roche A former Canadian Member of
Parliament and mbassador for Disarmament, Douglas Roche is author of The Ultimate Evil:
The Fight to Ban Nuclear Weapons and other books, and served for 6 years as GEA's
Chairperson
""Human security," defined by the Department of Foreign Affairs as "safety for people from both violent and non-violent threats," is now advanced as one of the fundamental objectives of Canadian foreign policy. Internationally, "human security" is increasingly recognized as the true measure of state security, and yet, in a world of some three dozen armed conflicts, in which civilian casualties far outnumber military casualties, many hundreds of millions of people today have no experience of safety or security. Entrenched economic, social, and political marginalization perpetrate a structural violence that threatens personal safety, well-being, and security and leads with alarming frequency to widespread overt violence. Lives are imperilled by both kinds of violence, a violence that is all too often perpetrated by the very services and institutions charged with the responsibility of protecting them.
Through the UN, other international agencies, and the efforts of certain national governments, the international community is gradually becoming more focussed on the imperative to provide protection to the world’s vulnerable people. The promotion of human security and peacebuilding has spawned a growing variety of concrete non-military governmental and non-governmental efforts to directly address the welfare and safety of people. The serious implementation of human security policies obviously still requires major and long-term peacebuilding efforts, aided by the significant infusion of new resources, but the acceptance of human security as a formal foreign policy objective is a major step forward.
Human security should also have major implications for defence policies and
practices. When diplomacy and peacebuilding, and other economic, social, and
political responses, fail and civilian populations are victimized by widespread violence
and humanitarian crises, military forces are increasingly called upon to come to their
rescue. But, without adapting and modifying military forces and their operations to
conform to human security standards and imperatives, the world will continue to bring
fundamentally inappropriate and counterproductive military responses to bear on
humanitarian and human security crises – Kosovo, Chechnya, and Sudan are among the
examples currently making headlines."
Defence and Human Security Ploughshares Monitor, December 1999 Defence and human security
By Ernie Regehr
"The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything except our thinking. Thus,
we are drifting toward catastrophe beyond conception. We shall require a substantially new
manner of thinking if mankind is to survive." -- Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
"This letter is an appeal to every secretary, technician, custodian,
scientist, engineer, and any other person whose participation supports the world war
machine. It is a wake-up call before tomorrow comes. Albert Einstein said:
"I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be
fought with sticks and stones." If there is any hope for the survival of humanity it
is cooperative survival. It is not competitive survival. A military-oriented world
economy must change soon to a people's needs-oriented world economy.I know
without any doubt in my heart that the people who work on nuclear weapons are as good as
people who work anywhere else. I have met some people with such beautiful souls that I
find it impossible to explain why they would work on weapons."
"We have a moral obligation and duty to think, speak, and act first as citizens for a
peaceful world, and next as scientists. The higher our education is, the higher our
responsibilities are for a humane world."
"Science without virtue is immoral science." - Plato.
"My fellow scientists and engineers, the national labs must change from labs of war
to labs of peace if there is to be a chance to avoid the extinction of all life on
earth.."
The Reasons for My Resignation from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. By Dr
Andreas Toupadakis, Ph.D., 2000 toupadakis@home.com
http://www.trivalleycares.org/toupadakis_open_letter.pdf
. http://www.globalcomment.com/articles/currentaffairs/andreas/resignation.htm
"New weapons systems do not bring security. They squander economic
resources; they subordinate research and development to military goals. Thinking
in military categories deforms intellectual and cultural life. "
"Heavily armed, the world will remain without peace. Disarmament gives peace
a chance. One fifth of today's military spending would suffice to ensure everyone
a sustained basic supply of food, drinking water, education and public health services.
We propose...
...disarmament, preservation and extension of international arms control treaties,
resurrection of the ABM treaty and the Convention on Biological Weapons and all other
conventions limiting weapons and weapons technologies; prohibition of arms exports, total
nuclear disarmament, complete renunciation of the military use of outer space and no new
missile systems. Lasting peaceful solutions to international conflicts must be found,
especially in the Near and Middle East.
Let peace be just."
The Dresden Appeal of the Party of Democratic Socialism, Germany, adopted
at the 2nd Session of the 7th PDS Congress on 7 October, 2001 From: http://www.spectrezine.org/war/pds.htm
They read good books, and
quote, but never learn
a language other than the
scream of rocket burn.
Our straighter talk is drowned
by ironclad:
elections, money, empire, oil
and Dad.
Poem attributed to Andrew Motion; the current poet laureate.
"With unfailing consistency, U.S. intervention has been on the side of the rich
and powerful of various nations at the expense of the poor and needy. Rather than
strengthening democracies, U.S. leaders have overthrown numerous democratically elected
governments or other populist regimes in dozens of countries... whenever these nations
give evidence of putting the interests of their people ahead of the interests of
multinational corporate interests. "
- Michael Parenti, political scientist and author
"Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded
because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies;
from these proceed debts and taxes. And armies, and debts, and taxes are the known
instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the
discretionary power of the Executive is extended. Its influence in dealing out offices,
honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added
to those of subduing the force of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism
may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out
of a state of war . . . and in the degeneracy of manners and morals, engendered by both.
No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
- James Madison, April 20, 1795
"Strike against all ordinances and laws and institutions that continue the
slaughter of peace and the butcheries of war. Strike against war, for without you no
battles can be fought. Strike against manufacturing shrapnel and gas bombs and all other
tools of murder. Strike against preparedness that means death and misery to millions of
human beings. Be not dumb, obedient slaves in an army of destruction. Be heroes in an army
of construction."
- Helen Keller
"I'm sick and tired of old men dreaming up wars in which young men do the
dying."
- George McGovern during his 1972 presidential campaign
"Those who make peaceful change impossible Make violent revolution
inevitable."
President John F. Kennedy
"Many of the wars in Africa are fought over natural resources. Ensuring they
are not destroyed is a way of ensuring there is no conflict. In managing our
resources… we plant the seeds of peace."
Nobel Peace Prize Winner-Wangarai Maaithai
"The path of peace is the path of guarantees for the rights of
peoples and the peoples' readiness to defend those rights."
Fidel Castro to UN Secretary-General U Thant over the Bay of Pigs
Crisis in 1962.
"It may make people realise that the UN needs to be well-equipped and funded.
If people diverted money from weapons and war, we have the technology and money
to be able to help if we decide to do that."
Tony Benn-On how the Boxing Day Tsunami opened many peoples eyes to the lack
of resources existing in the world.
"Adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments will be reduced
to the lowest points consistent with domestic safety"
Point 4 of President Woodrow Wilson's 'Peace Programme', which he
insisted, form the basis of the 1918 post-war Armistice.
"Peace is not a signed agreement between individuals-it is reconciliation
between peoples".
Yasser Arafat
"The cause of development and the cause of peace are one."
Louis Fréchette-UN Deputy Secretary-General
"True union is a union of harmony which causes all parties, however hostile
they may seem to be, to contribute to the general good of the society, as
dissonances in music contribute to the harmony of the whole. There may be union
in a state where we seem to see nothing but dissension, that is, a harmony which
produces happiness, which alone is true peace."
Montesquieu
'We should recall Article 26 of the Charter of the United Nations, which
envisages a an international system based on the "least diversion for
armaments of the worlds human and economic resources".'
Secretary-General Kofi Annan in the foreword to the 2004 Report of
the Group of Governmental Experts on the relationship between Disarmament and
Development.
Upon acknowledging Article 26,15 the delegates jointly contended that the arms race absorbed "too great a proportion of the world's human, financial, natural and technological resources",16 and that "The allocation of massive resources for armaments impedes the pursuit of development to its optimal level"17. In noting the ecological effects of war, they contended that "the production and stockpiling of armaments, particularly of nuclear and chemical weapons poses a significant threat to the environment",18 and that the use of resources for the military "provides little basis for future industrial civilian production"19 and that the high military spending of developing countries is a significant factor in deflecting investment away from their development activities.
Planned activities to follow the conference were to be the promotion of
multilateralism as a means of "providing the international framework for shaping
the relationship between disarmament, development and security",20 to "asses the
nature and volume of resources that may be released through arms limitation and
disarmament measures"21, and to request the Secretary-General to "foster and
co-ordinate the incorporation of disarmament and development perspective in the
activities of the United Nations system"22.
From Article 26 to an institutional link between disarmament and development. A
look at ARCs' future prospects by ARC UN/NGO Liaison Officer Fidel Asante.
Economic cost itself is seen as the prime index of military effort. Spending more money on defence becomes an end in itself. The relative security efforts of allies and enemies are measured by the proportion of gross domestic product devoted to the military, or the absolute level of military expenditure counted in some common currency. The calculations required depend on wildly and at present unavoidably imprecise comparisons of different countries’
Military establishments. Military security is counted in inputs (money)
rather than in outputs of ‘security’ or even of military goods or services. This
may be inevitable in an arms race where the quality of armies is determined by
metres of accuracy for missiles that have never been fired over their ultimate
paths, by the potential to destroy fourteen thousand or sixteen thousand cities.
But the competition to spend is likely to reduce further the economic efficiency
of expenditure for military security. And it supports the false and dangerous
objective of ‘inflicting costs’ on an enemy through an accelerated and
economically debilitating arms race.
Olaf Palmes' 1982 report ‘Common Security- A Programme for Disarmament’.
'Common Security' was a report from the Independent Commission on Disarmament
and Security Issues- 1982 Pan Books
"In the global context true security cannot be achieved by a mounting build
up of weapons-defence in the narrow sense-but only by providing basic conditions
for peaceful relations between nations, and solving not only the military but
also the non-military problems which threaten them."
From Willy Brandt's report 'North-South: A Programme for Survival'
" The developed nations of the world cannot remain secure islands of
prosperity in a seething sea of poverty. The storm is rising against the
privileged minority of the earth, from which there is no shelter in isolation
and armament. The storm will not abate until a just distribution of the fruits
of the earth enables men everywhere to live in dignity and human decency."
Martin Luther King jnr
"Global Security must be broadened from it's traditional focus on the
security of states to include the security of people and the planet."
From 'Our Global Neighbourhood' by The Commission on Global Governance.
www.cgg.ch/chapt3.htm
"It isn't enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it. And it isn't
enough to believe in it. One must work at it."
-Eleanor Roosevelt
"Its not the violence of the few that scares me it is the silence of the
many."
-Martin Luther King JR
"A comprehensive and integrated approach towards certain practical
disarmament measures often is a prerequisite to maintaining and consolidating
peace and security and thus provides a basis for effective post-conflict
peace-building"
From the 2001 First committee UN General Assembly Resolution UNGA 56/24E
(L.20)
"The network of support from organized groups for disarmament must also be
wide and deep - it should include both business and labour, groups that support
the rights of women and children, groups that seek a cleaner environment,
religious groups, and groups from the professional sector (law and medicine have
their own unique contributions to make). This network should include groups and
individuals everywhere who sincerely believe they have a stake in the success of
disarmament."
-Jayantha Dhanapala-from his 2001 speech at the 20th Anniversary of the
Lawyers' Committee on Nuclear Policy
"States must unite in defense of the principles of the Charter and
international law, while working to find ways to make the United Nations a more
effective instrument for producing collective responses to the threats of our
age."
Kofi Annan's message to the Third Forum for Debate Salamanca 2004 on "The
Role of the United Nations in the 21st Century and the Primacy of International
Law"
" If survival is the top priority-and I can think of nothing else on which we
could more easily agree among religions, ideologies and scientific
viewpoints-then the preservation of world peace is our most important objective,
dominating all others."
Willy Brandt -taken from his acceptance speech after winning the Third world
Prize in 1985
"Halt and eventually reverse a disturbing increase in global and military
expenditures, and to redirect such funds into much-needed development projects".
Kofi Annan on the need for Arms control agreements. January 2003
"There is a sense that the United States has become too arrogant, too
dominant, too self-centred, proud of our wealth, believing that w deserve to be
the richest and most powerful and influential nation in the world," "I think
they feel that we don’t really care about them, which is quite often true".
Jimmy Carter on the way the international community views the U.S. November
2002
" Convinced that reductions of military expenditure could be carried out
without affecting the military balance to the detriment of the national security
of any country".
UN Resolution 35/142B: "Reduction of military budgets": December 1980
" Peace is a product of Justice; it is not simply
the absence of violence. All violent conflicts represent earlier failures of
leadership, either by wrongdoing or default… Where the law of the jungle--the
survival of the fittest--reigns supreme; where might is Right; where the game of
money making includes arms trafficking and corruption: What is Justice…?"
Julius Nyerere on the relation between Peace and Justice: December 1996
" The reasonable conduct of politics is the only rational one
if the goal of intercourse among states is the survival of all, common
prosperity, and the sparing of the peoples blood"
Raymond Aron (sociologist)-from his book 'Peace and War', 1962 Pan Books.
"The struggle against the arms race, against the danger of a Third World War
which would annihilate everything (or almost everything), together with the
struggle against world hunger and underdevelopment remains the top priority.
However the struggle for freedom and equality of nations is not a contradiction
to that."
Willy Brandt (Nobel peace prize winner)-from his book 'World Armament &
World Hunger', 1985 Gollancz Books
"Today not only thousands but millions are saying "No" to war. Humanity is
aware of the fact that another great struggle would mean oblivion, and there are
enough people saying that instead of civilisation going out, the nation or
individual declaring war is going out instead."
Baird T Spalding (scientist)-from 'Mind magazine', 1935-1937
"It is very unlikely that disarmament will ever take place if it must wait
for the initiatives of governments and experts. It will only come about as the
expression of the political will of people in many parts of the world."
Olaf Palme (Ex-Swedish Premier)-from his book 'Common Security', 1982 Pan
Books
"There is a dynamic, triangular relationship between disarmament,
development, and security. The more disarmament and development are
advanced, the more security is enhanced and strengthened. But most nations
haven’t yet made the mental leap that security today requires the
development of the human being, not the preparation for war."
From 'DEVELOPMENT AND EQUALITY' by Douglas Roche A former
Canadian Member of Parliament and Ambassador for Disarmament.
"The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything except our thinking.
Thus, we are drifting toward catastrophe beyond conception. We shall require a
substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive."
By Albert Einstein (Scientist 1879-1955)
" Human security should also have major implications for defence
policies and practices. When diplomacy and peacebuilding, and other
economic, social, and political responses, fail and civilian populations are
victimized by widespread violence and humanitarian crises, military forces are
increasingly called upon to come to their rescue. But, without adapting and
modifying military forces and their operations to conform to human security
standards and imperatives, the world will continue to bring fundamentally
inappropriate and counterproductive military responses to bear on humanitarian
and human security crises – Kosovo, Chechnya, and Sudan are among the examples
currently making headlines."
By Ernie Regehr-Defence and Human Security Ploughshares
Monitor, December '1999 Defence and human security'
"A new understanding of defence and security policies is indispensable.
Public opinion must be better informed-of the burden and waste of the arms race,
of the damage it does to our economies, and the greater importance of other
measures which it deprives of resources. More arms do not make mankind safer,
only poorer."
From the report 'North-South : A Programme For Survival' By Willy Brandt-Ex
German Chancellor
"We have a moral obligation and duty to think, speak, and act first as
citizens for a peaceful world, and next as scientists. The higher our education
is, the higher our responsibilities are for a humane world."
Plato 5th-4th Century BC
"But I also made it clear to [Vladimir Putin] that it's important to think
beyond the old days of when we had the concept that if we blew each other up,
the world would be safe."
George W. Bush, US President and Commander in Chief of the
Armed Forces, preaching on the US position on Health and safety (from CAAT news
June-July 2000 / Issue 166 -
www.caat.org.uk )
"All states have the duty to promote the achievement of general and complete
disarmament under effective international control and to utilise the resources
released by effective disarmament measures for the economic and social
development of countries, allocating a substantial portion of such resources as
additional means for the development needs of developing countries"
Article 15 of of the Charter of the Economic Rights and Duties of States (UN
Economic and Social Council Charter)
"You know, I hope that at the meetings in the UN there is going to be a sense
of both distress and of coming together to say, Listen, guys, we know what to
do; if we really believe still what we believed in 2000, we have got to readjust
things.
We spend a thousand billion dollars a year on military expenditure--a thousand
billion dollars a year on military expenditure--and we spend maybe $50 to $60
billion a year on development. Anything more nonsensical, you cannot imagine.
And we spend $300 billion a year on protecting trade in one form or another,
either by subsidies or tariffs, which inhibits the growth of developing
countries.
Well, you have to be nuts to think that that's going to solve the problem. It's
not that we lack resources, it's that we lack commitment. And it is my hope that
before it's too late, people will understand that they have got to do
something."
Foom Press Briefing With James D. Wolfensohn, Washington, D.C., April 14,
2005 http://web.worldbank.org
http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/NEWS/0,,contentMDK:20449796~pagePK:34370~piPK:34424~theSitePK:4607,00.html
"The 25bn required to replace the trident nuclear capacity could be spent
on 120,000 newly-qualified nurses every year for the next ten years, Scrapping
student top-up fees for the next ten years, 60,000 newly-qualified teachers
every year for the next twenty years, 100,000 extra fire fighters every year
for the next ten years, protecting 900 million acres of rainforest, 100,000
extra community midwives every year for the next ten years and Meeting UN
Millennium Goals aid target of 0.7% of GNP every year for the next six years".
Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament web:
http://www.cnduk.org/pages/ntrep.pdf
"The progressive, balanced and controlled elimination of weapons of mass destruction and the stabilization at the lowest possible level of the defensive weapon systems of countries, is an objective that should obtain the necessary consensus as a firs step toward increased security." Pope John Paul II-From the Vatican, 31 May 1988
"Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of
the huge industrial and military machinery of defence with our peaceful
methods and goals so that security and liberty may prosper together."
President Eisenhower-January 1961
"More arms do not make mankind safer, only poorer."
Willy Brandt-Coordinator of the Brandt Commission
"The individual and social investment in weapons - that find their way into
the hands of children - must be redirected. The children of the world need
books, not guns, education, not war."
Michael Douglas – Actor and United
Nations Messenger of Peace
"The cause of development and the cause of peace are one."
Louis Fréchette-UN Deputy Secretary-General
"We live in an age of nuclear giants and ethical infants. In a world that has
achieved brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. We've solved the
mystery of the atom and forgotten the lessons of the Sermon on the Mount. We
know more about war than we know about peace; more about dying than we know
about living."
General Omar Bradley
"Wars are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows"
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
"A dream that I dream alone is only but a dream. But a dream that we dream
together is reality"
Raul Seixas - El Salvador music legend
All states have the duty to promote the achievement of general and complete
disarmament under effective international control and to utilise the resources
released by effective disarmament measures for the economic and social
development of countries, allocating a substantial portion of such resources as
additional means for the development needs of developing countries.
Article 15 of of the Charter of the Economic Rights and Duties of States (UN
Economic and Social Council Charter)
"There can be no Development without Security, and no Security without Development" Alan Doss, Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Liberia
"It’s estimated that there’s one gun for every ten people on the planet… And, as Oxfam sees in our work every day, the proliferation of guns and other weapons in society seriously undermines people’s ability to grow crops, earn a living or benefit from education. In these conditions, development doesn’t stand a chance." Oxfam-Amnesty International-IANSA Control Arms Campaign in the run-up to the UN Review Conference on Small Arms and Light Weapons, from 25 June (Inside Oxfam, Summer 2006)
"Globally, aid spending is between US$50 and US$60 billion. Globally, spending on defence is US$900 billion. If we spent $900 billion on aid, we would not need to spend more than $50 billion on defence." James D Wolfensohn, President of the World Bank, Financial Times 26 April 2004 (quoted in Quaker News Winter 2005)
"… a nuclear catastrophe in one of our great cities… As shock gave way to anger and despair, the leaders of every nation … would have to ask: How did it come to this? Is my conscience clear? Could I have done more to reduce the risk by strengthening the regime designed to do so?" Kofi Annan, UN Secretary-General, 2 May 2005 (quoted in Beyond Trident brochure from Acronym Institute, BASIC, Oxford Research Group & WMD Awareness Programme)
"The threats to peace and security in the twenty-first century include not just international war and conflict but civil violence, organized crime, terrorism and weapons of mass destruction. They also include poverty, deadly infectious disease and environmental degradation since these can have equally catastrophic consequences. All of these threats can cause death or lessen life chances on a large scale. All of them can undermine States as the basic unit of the international system.
"Depending on wealth, geography and power, we perceive different threats as the most pressing. But the truth is we cannot afford to choose. Collective security today depends on accepting that the threats which each region of the world perceives as most urgent are in fact equally so for all.
"In our globalized world, the threats we face are interconnected… On this interconnectedness of threats we must found a new security consensus… We need to ensure that States abide by security treaties… These are not theoretical issues, but issues of deadly urgency…" Kofi Annan, In Larger Freedom March 2005; para 78-83 passim
"Militarism must be recognized as an idolatry. The way in which it is looked at shows that it is more than a system and even an ideology." WCC Report of the Consultation on Militarism and Disarmament (1989)
"One of the most difficult and complex problems in political science and economics is to try to calculate the costs of modern war." Joseph C. Farah
"Of all the enemies of public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes ... known instruments for bringing the many under the control of the few ... No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare." James Madison, 1795
"You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war. " Albert Einstein
"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. The world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children... This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron." Dwight D. Eisenhower, Former U.S. President, April 16, 1953
"I never intend to adjust myself to economic conditions that will take necessities from the many to give luxuries to the few. I never intend to adjust myself to the madness of militarism..." MLK Jr. January 1968
" ...the excessive accumulation and illicit trade of small arms is threatening international peace and security, dashing hopes for social and economic development, and jeopardising prospects for democracy and human rights." UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan 2002
"We cannot have it both ways. We can’t be both the world’s leading champion of peace and the world’s leading supplier of arms." Jimmy Carter, former US President
"In 2002, arms deliveries to Asia, the Middle East, Latin America, and Africa constituted 66.7 per cent of the value of all arms deliveries worldwide, with a monetary value of nearly US$17bn; the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council accounted for 90 percent of those deliveries. Meanwhile, across these regions:
From Guns or Growth, Control Arms Campaign, June 2004
"To tackle the underlying roots of violence and conflict, we need a massive international effort to reduce poverty and injustice, and to promote development, democracy and human rights." Clare Short, UK International Development Secretary
"We will resist doctrines and systems of security, based on the use of, and deterrence by, all weapons of mass destruction, and military interventions and occupations." Statement by participant in the WCC World Convention on Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation
"Weapons transfers (including both sales and military aid/gifts) can be detrimental to developing nations’ economies. For instance, debt rose seriously in developing countries in the 1970s and 1980s because of rising interest rates on loans taken out to finance arms purchases in the 1970s.
Involvement in armed conflict has been a major source of dept in Ethiopia, Mozambique, Somalia, Sri Lanka, Sudan, El Salvador, and Uganda. In 1994, and estimated one fifth of the debt from the developing world was because of arms imports.
It is important to remember that the presence of weapons does not cause conflict. While it is not possible to know what would have happened if, when a particular conflict broke out, there had not been weapons (or as many weapons) available, ' ... the availability of weapons encourages some individuals and groups to resort to violence instead of relying on nonviolent means of resolving conflicts or achieving their goals.'"
World Military Expenditures. Coordination Office for the Decade to Overcome Violence, World Council of Churches, Geneva, Switzerland, 2005
(Generally italics and Bold added.)
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