Photo-documentation:
>>> In 1924, the German anarchist and pacifist Ernst
Friedrich published one of the great anti-war classics, War Against War!.
Outraged by the slaughter of the Great War (now known as World War I), Friedrich
gathered pictures of battlefield butchery and mutilated soldiers. Juxtaposed
with propagandistic pictures of military "glory" and labeled with ironic,
sarcastic captions, these photographs showed, and continue to show, the reality
of war in all its sickening horror.
Despite its status as a classic of the genre, War
Against War! is almost impossible to find today. Forget about getting your
hands on the original edition. The best you can hope for is the 1987 edition
co-published by Journeyman Press (London) with Real Comet Press (Seattle).
At
some point, we may bring the entire book into digital form, but for now we offer
these lowlights. With Bush & Co. determined to send America's youth into Iraq at
the dawn of the 21st century, now seems like the perfect time to remind the
world of what war really is, courtesy of a man born in the 19th century.
Extract from 'War Against War'
Ernst Friedrich
To Human Beings in all lands!
I, who am falsely called "German" instead of just simply
"man". I call out to the icy regions of the North, I call out to Africa and to
America, to Asia and to Europe.
To all regions that have ears to hear I call out but two
words and these are
Man and Love
And even as the Australian weeps when he encounters pain,
and laughs and makes merry when joy and happiness are granted him, even so dost
thou weep, my brother Eskimo, and so, O African and O Chinese, weepest thou too
and so weep I.
And as we all, all human beings, equally feel joy and
pain, let us fight unitedly against the common monstrous enemy, War.
Picture: "Papa" before and after war
We shall unite in protesting against, in weeping over the
accursed mass murders for which we all bear equal guilt. But let us also raise
our eyes cheerfully to the red dawn of freedom and peace.
To the Fatherland of all Fatherlands, to the Fatherland of
human beings which stands above all!
In many books have many words been written for and against
this most diabolical, this meanest and lowest of all crimes of the State.
The bourgeois poet in his strength glorified this War in
verse and the proletarian writer wrote in glowing wrath against this mass
murder.
But all the treasury of words of all men of all lands
suffices not, in the present and in the future, to paint correctly this butchery
of human beings.
Here, however, in the present book, - partly by accident,
partly intentionally - a picture of War, objectively true and faithful to
nature, has been photographically recorded for all time.
The pictures in this book from page 53 to the end, show
records obtained by the inexorable, incorruptible photographic lens, of the
trenches and the mass graves, of "military lies", of the "field of honour", and
of other "idylls" of the "Great Epoch".
Picture: Young men before and after war
And not one single man of any country whatsoever can arise
and bear witness against these photographs, that they are untrue and that they
do not correspond to realities.
And no one comes and says: "0 how frightful that such
pictures should be shown!" But he says rather: "At last, at last the mask has
been torn away from this "field of honour", from this lie of an "heroic death",
and from all the other beautiful phrases, from all this international swindle
the mask has at last, yea, at last, been torn away!!"
This book is dedicated to all war profiteers and
parasites, to all war provokers, and is consecrated also to the "kings",
generals, presidents and ministers of all lands.
To the priests, however, who blessed the weapons in the
name of God, this book is dedicated as a War bible!
Show these pictures to all men who still can think!
PICTURE: After war: The Crown Prince
and the injured soldier
He who then still believes in this mass butchery, let him
be locked up in a madhouse, let us avoid him as we do the plague!
It may then be that the nationalists and war-provokers,
the kings and the generals, may wish to carry on war among themselves, on their
own account and at their own risk, and that they force no man to join them
against his will!
Such a war would indeed be welcomed by every pacifist and
every proletarian!
Then all the war enthusiasts would at last of their own
free will exterminate one another, and then we should have peace, eternal peace
on this earth!
But unfortunately these heroes are not to be had for such
a "war of liberation" (liberation from the war promoters and profiteers).
They lack the courage, these war-thinkers and war leaders,
to go themselves into the battle, and themselves to die a sweet "heroic death".
That is why they invented such beautiful phrases as
"Fatherland" and "Field of Honour" and spoke of "defence" and uttered other
lies.
And he who did not permit himself to be enthused to death
by military music and by lying legends of the "enemy" of "the invaded".
Him they forced against his will into the murderer's
uniform, him they ordered to murder and to rob for the interests of the
money-bags.
I know of one practical way of preventing war for all time
to come.
Many, many years ago the doctor, it is said, was fully
responsible with his own life and property for the life of his patients.
PICTURE: dead soldier
If the patient died at the hands of his doctor, the latter
died too. Such was the law.
And so let there be also a law for kings, presidents,
generals and, last but not least, newspaper writers: "Whoever forces men into
war or provokes them to mass murders, shall be responsible with all his property
and possessions and with his own life for the safety and the sufferings of the
soldiers.
The king who rallies people to his standard shall himself
bear the standard.
And if a soldier should be reduced to beggary, the king
shall go out begging with him.
If huts are burnt down in wars, so also shall palaces and
castles be set in flames.
And always, for each human life that is sacrificed at the
front, shall one king or one minister rest in peace on the "field of honour" for
the Fatherland.
PICTURE: injured soldier
And the newspaper writers that agitate for war, shall be
detained as hostages for the life of each single warrior!"
Such a law, however, will never come into being, and no
"disarmament" or "peace" conference will give heed to my proposal.
Therefore let us, who are fighters, join in the war
against war, let us examine the causes and the nature of war, so that, armed
with the weapon of knowledge and the sharp sword of the mind, we may emerge
victorious from the fight.
The Cause of war
Long ago, Plato who was born 427 years before the
Nazarene, Plato, that wise man, said: - "All wars arise for the possession of
wealth".
That is as true a word as ever was spoken. For to the
present day in all wars the object is to protect or to seize money and property
and power; and there will always be wars so long as Capital rules and oppresses
the people.
When international capital finds itself threatened by
mutual competition, and when the furnace-barons and factory owners begin to have
differences among themselves, then they rattle their sabres and spurs and they
call out:
"The Country is in danger!" (They mean by "country" always
the moneys-bags !)
PICTURE: injured soldier
And wonderfully enough the working slaves of all lands
abandon their plough and their anvil, they hasten to arms, and protect the life
and property of their masters with their own blood and life. What did I say?
"That this is strange?" No, it is quite natural - a natural monstrosity! For it
is not the state power and force alone that compels all "subjects" to protect
the throne and the money-bags, and to die for them.
Capital has not only economic power in its hands; it has,
equal measure and with equal power, subjected the proletariat also
intellectually.
This fact is easily overlooked and there still remains,
therefore, so much bourgeois ideology in the proletariat!
I, therefore, always say to my brothers, the proletarians,
I say to the class-war fighters: - "Free yourselves from bourgeois prejudices!
Fight against capitalism within yourselves! In your
thoughts and in your actions there still lurks unspeakably much of the
philistine and the soldier, and almost in every one there is hidden a drilled
subaltern, who wishes only to dominate and command, even if it be over his own
comrades and over his wife and children in his family!"
But I also say to those bourgeois pacifists, who seek to
fight against war by mere hand caresses and tea-cakes and piously up-turned
eyes: -
PICTURE: injured soldier
"Fight against Capitalism - and you fight against every
war!
The battle-field in the factories and the mines, the
hero's death in the infirmaries, the mass graves in the barracks, in short, the
war, the apparently eternal war, of the exploited against the exploiters!
Do - you not - realise - all - this?
The war against war signifies:
- The war of the
victimised against the profiteers!
- The war of the
deceived against the deceivers!
- The war of the
oppressed against the oppressors!
- The war of the
tortured against the torturers!
- The war of the
hungry against the wellsfed!
PICTURE: injured soldier
The Prevention of War
It is true that capital is the cause of every war.
But the guilt of war rests on our shoulders.
It is we proletarians that make the conduct of war
possible; it is for us likewise to prevent wars!
Refuse to serve!
Bring up your children so that they may later refuse to
render military and war service!
How very many lightly overlook the "fact that in one's own
home in the family, war is being spontaneously prepared!
And here lies the beginning of all evils, here lies the
beginning also of war!
The mother that sings soldier s' songs to the baby on her
lap, prepares for war, yes, she prepares for war!
The father that makes gifts of toy soldiers to his child
mobilises the child for the war idea!
The toy soldier is the Judas that you yourself bring into
the home, is the betrayal of human life! Remember always this one thing: -
The little helmet made of paper will one day be a steel
helmet on the head of a murderer! And if the child has once practised with his
air-gun, how natural it is that he should in later years shoot with a rifle!
The little sabre carved of wood will some day become the
battle-sword that pierces the body of a human being!
Ye parents that do not wish that your sons should murder
the dear sons of other parents, you should remember that the child whom you
present with a helmet and sabre and gun, plays his tender soul to death out of
his young body.
Those children, however, who are educated in love and
solidarity, and are brought up to respect unconditionally the inviolable
sanctity of human life, these children will most certainly be unfit for arms and
war-service.
We, opponents of military service must finally destroy the
halo and the humbug, and tear down the gaudy tinsel of the soldiery, and we must
speak out what then still remains to be said:
a
professional murderer paid by the state, who is trained in murder schools
(called barracks) privileged by the state, in the carrying out of the most
gruesome of crimes, the murder of human beings! That is what the children should
be told!
Then indeed will the young girl, destined by nature to
reproduce and protect life, be disgusted to flirt with the soldiers - her
natural enemies - "the pimps of death".
And the boy will later refuse to wear the uniform because
he knows: It is a murderer's cloak!
It is with such clearness and precision that you must
think and also act, if you wish to nip the evil in the bud! And, should war
nevertheless break out, then proceed consistently and unhesitatingly to
THE WAR AGAINST WAR!
Let the general strike be the first weapon! The men will
refuse service! True heroism lies not in murder, but in the refusal to commit
murder. Rather fill all prisons and workhouses and all the mad-houses of all
lands, than murder and die in the service of Capital!
The last and most dreadful war has not yet broken out
which cast gas and poison and flames on human beings and animals and houses.
It lies in our hands, in our power, to prevent, to hinder,
this most dreadful tragedy.
Let the great, inspiring example of consistent
conscientious objectors be our model.
They suffered death for their consistent "No!" rather than
themselves become murderers!
I WILL NOT!
Stronger than all violence, than the sabre and the rifle,
is our spirit, is our will! Repeat these three words: "I will not!" Give content
to these words and all wars in future will be impossible.
What then will all Capital of the whole world, what will
all the kings and presidents do, when the entire people in all lands arise with
the cry: WE WILL NOT!
AND YOU WOMEN! If your husbands should be too weak, then
carry out the work yourselves!! Prove that the bond of love with the husband is
stronger than an army order! Do not let your men go to the front! Do not
decorate their rifles with flowers! Cling to the necks of your husbands! Do not
let them go even when the order to depart calls! Tear up all the rails, throw
yourselves before the locomotives!
WOMEN! REALISE THIS IF YOUR HUSBANDS SHOULD BE TOO WEAK!
Mothers of all lands unite!
ERNST FRIEDRICH End of July, 1924
