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Every thoughtful, well-meaning and conscientious human being
should assume, in time of peace,
the solemn and unconditional obligation
not to participate in any war, for any reason,
or to lend support of any kind, whether direct or indirect.
Albert Einstein to War Resisters' International, 1928Mankind's desire for peace can be realized
only by the creation of a world government.
Albert Einstein, January 1946Our world faces a crisis as yet unperceived
by those possessing the power
to make great decisions for good and evil.
The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything
save our modes of thinking,
and thus we drift toward unparalleled catastrophe.
Albert Einstein, May 1946What can we do in the prevailing situation
to bring about peaceful coexistence among all nations?
The first goal must be to do away with mutual fear and distrust.
Solemn renunciation of the policy of violence,
not only with respect to weapons of mass destruction,
is without doubt necessary.
Such renunciation, however, will be effective
only if a supranational judicial and executive agency
is established at the same time, with power to settle
questions of immediate concern to the security of nations.
Albert Einstein, February 1950Strengthening the United Nations requires admission of all nations,
irrespective of their internal organization;
for averting the danger of war
is the supreme and most immediate interest of all.
Albert Einstein, June 1953The highest insight man can attain is the yearning for peace,
for the union of his will with an infinite will,
his human will with God's will.
Albert SchweitzerThe peace of God is pulsating power, not quietude.
Albert Schweitzer, Sermon October 13, 1918The laying down of the commandment not to kill
and not to damage is one of the greatest events
in the spiritual history of mankind.
Albert Schweitzer, Indian Thought and Its DevelopmentOnly a humanity which is striving after ethical ends
can in full measure share in the blessings
brought by material progress
and become master of the dangers which accompany it.
Albert SchweitzerOnly such thinking as establishes the sway
of the mental attitude of reverence for life
can bring to mankind perpetual peace.
Albert Schweitzer, Civilization and EthicsThe renunciation of nuclear weapons is vital to peace.
Albert Schweitzer, Peace or Atomic War?
Albert Einstein, the renowned scientist whose theories of relativity
led to the development of atomic energy and weapons,
was a dedicated
pacifist and advocate of world government.
He was born March 14,
1879 in Ulm, Germany.
He grew up in Munich, where he attended
strict schools in which he performed poorly.
His mother insisted
he take violin lessons,
and his uncles introduced him to mathematics
and science.
At the age of five he wondered why a compass always
pointed north,
and at twelve he began a quest to understand the
mystery of the "huge world."
He continued to have difficulty
in school until he moved to Switzerland,
where in 1900 he graduated
in physics from the reputable Polytechnic Academy in Zurich.
He
gained Swiss citizenship and got a job in the patent office in
Bern examining inventions.
In 1905 Einstein began to publish important papers in theoretical
physics,
particularly on the special theory of relativity, which
synthesized the law of
the conservation of the mass with the law
of the conservation of energy
into an equivalence in terms of
the speed of light squared: E=mc2.
The three-dimensional coordinates
of space and the one of time
were also joined into the four-dimensional
continuum of space-time.
Einstein gained some recognition from
eminent physicists and
began teaching at universities in Switzerland
and Germany.
He moved his family to Berlin in April 1914
to accept
a position with the Prussian Academy.
His wife and two sons were
vacationing in Switzerland when the war broke out,
and the enforced
separation foreshadowed a later divorce.
Einstein hated the war
and criticized German militarism,
but he devoted himself to his
scientific work.
He published "The Foundation of the General
Theory of Relativity" in 1916.
Using the space-time continuum
concept, he postulated that gravity is not a force
as much as
a field shaped by bodies of mass.
His theory was proved correct
when he accurately predicted that even light from stars
would
bend when passing near the sun; this was measured
and verified
by Arthur Eddington during a total eclipse in 1919.
Einstein was now internationally acclaimed as perhaps
the greatest
scientist of the twentieth century.
In 1921 he was awarded the
Nobel Prize for Physics.
Einstein spent the rest of his scientific
career working on his unified field theory,
attempting to find
the mathematical relationship between
the electromagnetic field
and the gravitational field.
However, quantum theory and the uncertainty
principle thwarted his efforts
to find a formula which could predict
subatomic events.
Einstein clung to his belief that the universe
is comprehensible,
saying that God does not play dice with the
world.
As a world-famous celebrity, Einstein's statements
on peace
were given considerable publicity.
When the First World War began,
Einstein and two others signed a statement
by Georg Friedrich
Nicholai, the "Manifesto to Europeans," which challenged
the "Manifesto to the Civilized World," a blatant promotion
of German militarism
that had been signed by ninety-three prominent
Germans.
Nicholai's statement warned that every nation in the
war would pay a heavy price,
and he suggested a League of Europeans
to achieve unity.
During the war Einstein was a founder and supporter
of the New Fatherland League,
which sought to establish after
the war a supranational organization to prevent future wars.
He
gleefully smuggled pacifist literature to his friend Nicholai
in prison.
In 1915 he signed a declaration by this League
criticizing
annexationist policies of the Chancellor.
In a letter to the French
pacifist writer, Romain Rolland,
Einstein compared the "insanity
of nationalism" to the religious fanaticism
of three centuries
earlier which had caused so many useless wars.
In 1917 he wrote
again to Rolland, suggesting a military arbitration pact
involving
the United States, Britain, France and Russia,
which any democratic
nation could join.
Although Einstein was not religious in the traditional sense,
he was proud of being a Jew.
Within the war atmosphere that swept
up so many around him,
on February 24, 1918 he wrote to an academic,
I prefer to string along with my compatriot, Jesus Christ,
whose doctrines you and your kind consider to be obsolete.
Suffering is indeed more acceptable to me than resort to violence.1
Late in 1918 when Germany was undergoing revolution,
Einstein
gave a speech at the Reichstag, suggesting to the revolutionary
committees,
"Our common goal is democracy, the rule of the
people," but warning them,
Do not be lured by feelings of vengeance to the fateful view
that violence must be fought with violence,
that a dictatorship of the proletariat is temporarily needed
in order to hammer the concept of freedom
into the heads of our fellow countrymen.
Force breeds only bitterness, hatred and reaction.2
After the war Einstein favored the publication of the war crimes
committed
by the German High Command in Belgium and France to
communicate to Germans
how the others felt in order to "prevent
the emergence of a spirit of vengefulness."3
In 1922 he made
a trip to Paris to discuss with political figures methods of preventing
wars,
and after returning to Germany, he spoke again in the Reichstag
at a meeting
of the German Peace Federation, calling for goodwill
between peoples of different languages and cultures.
In a German
pacifist publication Einstein explained how war blocks international
cooperation and culture by destroying intellectual freedom, chaining
the energies
of the young to the engines of destruction, and causing
economic depression.
Einstein supported the League of Nations, but he resigned
from
the League Committee on Intellectual Cooperation in 1923
when
France did not agree to arbitration concerning Germany's war-reparations
payment.
He felt that the League was merely a tool of the dominant
nations.
In 1924 he was re-elected to that Committee and decided
to "let bygones be bygones"
and accept the position,
hoping that the League would
"live up to its great mission
of creating a world of peace."4
In 1928 Einstein began recommending that individuals refuse
military service and any participation in war activities.
During
this period Einstein's pacifism was absolute, and he believed
that any killing of a human being, even during war, is murder.
He saw how science and technology were changing warfare,
and he
believed that international conventions to limit the applications
of science did not solve the real problem, which was
how to end
war by establishing international justice.
In pleading for disarmament,
Einstein felt that its risks and sacrifices
were less than the
risks and sacrifices of war.
People ought to refuse to kill other
innocent people.
In a letter to a friend Einstein warned,
In a Europe which is systematically preparing for war,
both morally and materially,
an impotent League of Nations will not be able to command
even moral authority in the hour of nationalist madness.5
He suggested that a country could assume the risk of
not defending
itself as a sacrifice for human progress.
Surely it would not
suffer as much damage as Germany did in four years of war.
Otherwise
the preparations for war along with fear, distrust,
and selfish
ambitions would lead again to war.
He believed we could not wait
until the governing classes give up their sovereign power.
Public
personalities can influence people.
He asked how can decent and
self-respecting people wage war,
knowing that innocent people
will be killed?
Finally, the welfare of humanity must take precedence
over one's country.
Einstein believed that the production of armaments was damaging
not only economically but also spiritually.
In 1930 he signed
a manifesto for world disarmament sponsored by
the Women's International
League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF).
The same year Einstein warned
the Zionist movement that he would
not continue to support them
unless they made peace with the Arabs.
On December 14, 1930 Einstein
made his famous statement in New York
that if two percent of those
called for military service were to refuse to fight
and were to
urge peaceful means of settling international conflicts,
then
governments would become powerless
since they could not imprison
that many people.
He struggled against compulsory military service
and
urged international protection of conscientious objectors.
He concluded that peace, freedom for individuals, and security
for societies
depended on disarmament; otherwise, "slavery
of the individual
and the annihilation of civilization threaten
us."6
As part of his work for intellectual cooperation, Einstein
wrote an open letter
to Sigmund Freud in 1932, asking him to discuss
the causes and cures of war.
In his letter Einstein suggested
that an international legislative and judicial body
was needed
to solve conflicts and maintain security.
In his carefully reasoned
response Freud came to the same conclusion
that Einstein had intuitively
grasped.
Later that year Einstein supported the French Premier
Herriot's proposal
for "a police force which would be subject
to the authority of international organs."7
Early in 1933
Einstein warned that powerful industrial interests,
which produce
arms, were trying to sabotage efforts
to settle international
disputes peacefully.
When Hitler and the Nazi Party came to power in 1933,
Einstein
left Germany for good and settled at Princeton,
where he joined
the Institute for Advanced Study.
He saw that Germany was "secretly
arming at a great pace," and noticing
"the desire for
revenge among the educated," he predicted "the sacrifice
of a terrifying number of human lives and untold destruction."8
Being realistic about this danger, he ceased to be an absolute
pacifist;
although he still recommended a supranational organization
of force,
in its absence he felt that the democracies ought to
prepare to defend themselves.
He was criticized by some pacifists,
but Einstein felt that
it would be foolish to close one's eyes
to the Nazi menace.
He tried to communicate the dreadfulness of
Fascism
and the Nazis' fanatical drive toward war.
He encouraged
the United States to join the League of Nations
and to make it
an effective instrument of international security.
By 1935 he
estimated that war would come in two or three years.
He reiterated
the need for world government:
First, create the idea of supersovereignty:
men must be taught to think in world terms;
every country will have to surrender a portion
of its sovereignty through international cooperation.
If we want to avoid war,
we must try to make aggression impossible
through the creation of an international tribunal
having real authority.9
Second, Einstein believed we must understand the economic causes
of war,
the selfish desires that put profit before humanity.
In
1937 he declared that true pacifism works for international law,
while neutrality and isolation practiced by a great power contribute
to international anarchy and consequently to war.
Einstein's famous formula E=mc2 indicates that a very small
amount of matter
may be converted into a tremendous amount of
energy.
In July 1939 Leo Szilard told Einstein about the work
under way which showed
that through nuclear fission a chain reaction
might be started.
This was a shock to Einstein.
Four and a half
years earlier he had discounted the likelihood
of releasing energy
from a molecule, saying,
"It is something like shooting birds
in the dark in a country
where there are only a few birds."10
Now he immediately realized the danger if Germany were to get
uranium
from the Belgian Congo, and he agreed to contact
the Belgium
government through his friend, Queen Elizabeth.
Alexander Sachs, one of President Roosevelt's
unofficial advisors,
suggested to Einstein that he address a letter
directly to the President.
On August 2, 1939 Einstein wrote to
President Roosevelt explaining
how
nuclear chain reactions in a large mass of uranium could
generate
large amounts of power and radium-like elements.
In fact in the
immediate future a powerful enough bomb
could be built to destroy
an entire port.
He pointed out that the best uranium is found
in Canada, the former Czechoslovakia,
and especially the Belgian
Congo, and he had heard that Germany
had stopped the sale of uranium
from the Czechoslovakian mines.
He added that the son of the German
Under-Secretary of State was attached to
the Kaiser Wilhelm Institut
in Berlin, and they were
repeating some of the American work on
uranium.
The letter with a memorandum by Szilard actually was
not delivered
to the President by Sachs until October 11.
President Roosevelt immediately
appointed an Advisory Committee on Uranium.
Later Einstein considered
the writing of this letter the one great mistake of his life;
at the time he felt justified because of the danger
that the Germans
would make atom bombs.
This was the extent of Einstein's role
in nuclear energy;
he did not know an atomic bomb had been developed
by the United States
until he heard of the Hiroshima blast.
For the rest of his life Einstein emphasized the need for a
supranational organization
with the authority and power to maintain
international security.
With the unleashing of the atomic bomb
in 1945 his pleas became even more fervent.
As a knowledgeable
scientist he felt that it was his responsibility
to inform the
public of the enormity of the danger.
The United Nations was a
step in the right direction, but from the beginning
Einstein believed
that it was "a tragic illusion unless we are ready
to take
the further steps necessary to organize peace."11
There must
be effective world law with a federal constitution
and a permanent
world court to restrain the executive branch
of the world government
from going beyond peacekeeping.
National military power must be
abandoned in favor of the supranational authority.
Otherwise war
preparations inevitably lead to war, and in the atomic age
there
is the danger of pre-emptive war and the possibility of total
annihilation.
Einstein supported efforts to strengthen the
United
Nations and give it the powers it needs.
Survival, he felt, must
be the first priority, and survival depends on world government.
There is no defense against nuclear weapons.
Einstein evaluated
every nation's foreign policy by one criterion:
"Does it
lead us to a world of law and order
or does it lead us back toward
anarchy and death?"12
He said, "We need a great chain
reaction of awareness and communication."13
Einstein criticized as political exploitation the policy of
stockpiling
atomic bombs without promising not to initiate their
use.
In 1947 only the United States had atomic weapons.
However,
the cold war had already begun,
and the Soviet Union was developing
them also.
Both sides refused to consider supranational control,
and Einstein lamented
that the victors of the second world war
had degraded themselves
to the low ethics of their enemy and remained
at that level after the war.
In 1948 Einstein predicted that the
arms race would increase tension
between the United States and
the Soviet Union,
undermine the democratic spirit in America,
impose heavy and unnecessary
economic burdens because of the unproductive
work,
and generate that militaristic spirit which Toynbee said
is fatal to civilizations.
For Einstein, the problem of peace
and security was far more important
than the conflict between
socialism and capitalism.
Einstein worked with the Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientist
to educate people about the dangers of atomic war
and the necessity
of effective world government.
By 1949 the Soviet Union had atomic
weapons,
and the United States had begun working on the hydrogen
bomb.
Einstein's prophecy that the cold war would threaten democratic
principles
in the United States came to pass with the operations
of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).
He recommended
that intellectuals use Gandhi's method
of non-cooperation by refusing
to testify.
Einstein believed that Gandhi held the most enlightened
political views
and that his method of nonviolent revolution is
the only way
of bringing peace to the world on a supranational
basis.
With this method the small countries together
could become
a decisive factor in the world.
Nevertheless he felt that a responsible
statesman would not use
Gandhi's methods unilaterally until there
had been a period of transition.
In the last week of his life Einstein collaborated with Bertrand
Russell
on a manifesto that concluded with a resolution to be
presented
to a world convention of scientists which read:
In view of the fact that in any future world war
nuclear weapons will certainly be employed,
and that such weapons threaten
the continued existence of mankind,
we urge the governments of the world to realize,
and to acknowledge publicly,
that their purposes cannot be furthered by a world war,
and we urge them, consequently, to find peaceful means
for the settlement of all matters of dispute between them.14
When Einstein died on April 18, 1955, he left a
piece of writing
ending in an unfinished sentence.
These were his last words:
In essence, the conflict that exists today is
no more than an old-style struggle for power,
once again presented to mankind in semi-religious trappings.
The difference is that, this time, the development of atomic power
has imbued the struggle with a ghostly character;
for both parties know and admit that,
should the quarrel deteriorate into actual war, mankind is doomed.
Despite this knowledge, statesmen in responsible positions
on both sides continue to employ the well-known technique
of seeking to intimidate and demoralize the opponent
by marshaling superior military strength.
They do so even though such a policy
entails the risk of war and doom.
Not one statesman in a position of responsibility has dared
to pursue the only course that holds out any promise of peace,
the course of supranational security,
since for a statesman to follow such a course
would be tantamount to political suicide.
Political passions, once they have been fanned into flame,
exact their victims15
After Einstein's death, Albert Schweitzer wrote to Einstein's
niece that
he and the great physicist understood each other and
that they had the same ideals.
Schweitzer was born four years
before Einstein on January 14, 1875 in Alsace,
which at that time
was part of Germany but now is part of France.
His father was
a Lutheran pastor, and Albert studied and gained
doctorate degrees
in both philosophy and theology.
He was an accomplished organist,
and he wrote a comprehensive book
on Johann Sebastian Bach and
later edited Bach's complete works.
His theological books combined
his deep religious convictions
with a scholarly search for historical
truth.
Beyond the historical considerations he found the essence
of Jesus' teachings
to be love and preparing the heart for the
sovereignty of God.
He concluded Quest of the Historical Jesus
with Jesus' call for people to follow him.
He commands. And to those who obey Him,
whether they be wise or simple,
He will reveal Himself in the toils, the conflicts,
the sufferings which they shall pass through in His fellowship,
and, as an ineffable mystery,
they shall learn in their own experience Who He is.16
At the age of thirty Schweitzer decided to become a physician
so that he could dedicate himself to practical missionary work.
He resigned from his university teaching position and attended
medical school full-time.
His theological views were considered
controversial by the mission officials.
However, by making personal
contacts with each of them to assure them
he was going as a doctor
rather than a preacher,
he was granted the opportunity to serve
in French Equatorial Africa at Lambaréné.
His wife
trained as a nurse, and by 1913 they were prepared.
His farewell
sermon was on "The Peace of God,"
which comes when our
will is absorbed in the infinite.
This, he said, must be our active
search, and those who
experience God's peace can face any eventuality.
Sensing a coming war, he had their money converted into coins
before they left.
Schweitzer quickly gained the trust of the Africans in his
medical practice;
but when the World War began, Schweitzer, as
a German,
became a prisoner of the French authorities.
The native
Africans could not understand such a terrible war.
One old man,
hearing that as many as ten people had died, wondered why
they
did not negotiate a settlement since such great losses could not
be paid back.
According to their tribal customs they reimbursed
the opposing tribe for those they killed.
Also as cannibals they
felt that the Europeans must kill out of cruelty
if they have
no desire to eat the dead.
Schweitzer was a prisoner for three
years, although much of the time
he was allowed to continue his
work at the hospital.
He began working on his Philosophy of
Civilization, and while paddling down
the Ogowe River in the
midst of a herd of hippopotami
the concept "reverence for
life" suddenly occurred to him.
He was taken to France, and
while imprisoned at Saint Remy
he realized that he was in a room
that Van Gogh had painted.
At the end of the war Schweitzer's first sermon at St. Nicholai's
Church in Strasbourg
was again on peace and also on the future
of mankind.
He repeated that we must place our will in God's infinite
will and look for that,
not only in individual affairs but also
in the concerns of nations and mankind.
The will of God is a spiritual
intention toward perfection,
and people as a whole must be united
by spiritual goals.
In another sermon on December 1, 1918 he said,
Those millions who were made to kill,
forced to do it in self-defense or under military orders,
must impress the horror of what they had to endure
on all future generations
so that none will ever expose itself to such fate again.
Reverence for human suffering and human life,
for the smallest and most insignificant,
must be the inviolable law to rule the world from now on.17
The huge waste of life during the war terribly grieved Schweitzer,
and he was deeply depressed for several years.
The war, he believed,
was proof that religion
was not a real force in the spiritual
life of the age.
Looking back on his first visit to Africa,
he
considered his work there
not benevolence but rather atonement
for a tiny part of the guilt
the white race bears for all it has
done to the colored races.
Schweitzer hailed the League of Nations
but was afraid that it would fail; he remained apolitical.
In The Decay and the Restoration of Civilization
Schweitzer examined the problems of civilization and their solution through
ethics.
Nationalism has helped to bring about the decay of civilization
because of the spirit of barbarism.
Even the economic difficulties
can be solved
only "by an inner change of character."18
Revolutionary change is needed without revolutionary action.
When
the collective body dominates the individual's spiritual
and moral
worthiness, the constriction causes deterioration.
The individuals
must rise to a higher conception of their capabilities
and produce
new spiritual-ethical ideas.
A new public opinion must be created
to counteract the press,
which is under the influence of political
and financial forces.
This requires independent and strong personalities,
who are free of the prevalent conditions.
Nationalistic patriotism
must be replaced by the noble "patriotism
which aims at ends
that are worthy of the whole of mankind."19
This idealism
encourages people to focus on the values of civilization
even
amid the increasing absorption in material concerns.
Nothing less
than a reconstruction of the world-view
can bring about such changes.
The lack of a positive and life-affirming world-view is pathological
to societies as well as individuals, because there is no true
self-direction.
Schweitzer declared,
From the ethical comes ability to develop
the purposive state of mind
necessary to produce action on the world and society
and to cause the co-operation of all our achievements
to secure the spiritual and moral perfection of the individual
which is the final end of civilization.20
The second book in his Philosophy of Civilization, Civilization
and Ethics,
reviews the history of ethics and its relation
to civilization.
For Schweitzer ethics is the key to peace.
All those who in any way help forward our thought about ethics
are working for the coming of peace and prosperity in the world.
They are engaged in the higher politics,
and the higher national economics.21
His ethical philosophy is based on reverence for life and the
will-to-live,
which affirm both life and the world, and through
activity then produce values.
The thinking person feels the need
to revere every will-to-live
and experience that other life as
one's own.
Being good is preserving life, promoting life, and
raising life
to the highest value it is capable of developing.
Being evil is destroying life, injuring life, and
repressing life
that is capable of development.
This universal ethic widens to
include all that lives, and it seeks to relieve all suffering.
One joins in the mysterious infinite will of all Being which acts
for life
through the person, giving meaning to existence from
within outwards.
To attain peace the ethic of reverence for life
must be applied to the state
so that collective interests will
not overshadow the human feelings
of empathy and cause interpersonal
conflicts.
The illusions of national interests must be criticized
and replaced
by moral and spiritual values, by concern for humanity
as a whole.
Schweitzer advised people to put an end to the illusions
that
the modern state cherishes about itself.
He believed that things
would not get better until a majority took up a critical attitude.
The spirit of the state must become quite different.
Progress
will come when we demand that the state become more ethical.
He
suggested that we must look beyond peoples and states to humanity
as a whole.
He criticized the well intentioned Kant for believing
that rules for treaties could bring lasting peace.
Schweitzer
believed that only the mental attitude of
reverence for life could
bring peace to humanity.
In a world of violence Schweitzer still had faith that truth,
love,
peacefulness, meekness, and kindness could overcome all
violence.
When a sufficient number with purity of heart, strength
and perseverance
think and live out the thoughts of love, truth,
and peace, then the world will be theirs.
Violence produces its
own limitations, but kindness works
simply and effectively without
straining relations.
A question Schweitzer posed was whether the
spiritual will be strong
and create world history or be weak and
suffer world history.
He believed that we will either realize
the sovereignty of God or perish,
and the sovereignty of God begins
in our hearts.
Schweitzer returned to Africa in 1924 and spent
most of the
next four decades working there.
Occasionally he visited Europe,
and in 1934 he vowed never to enter Nazi Germany.
He was in Lambaréné
throughout World War II.
Hearing of V-E Day, he quoted Lao-zi's
teaching that the victors ought not to rejoice
in the murder of
war but rather mourn as at a funeral.
Following the war, Schweitzer
expressed concerns about the danger of nuclear war.
He said that
Africans could solve their own problems if the "civilized"
nations
of Europe and America did not blow up themselves and Africa
first.
In 1953 he was given the Nobel Peace prize; he used the
money
for a building at the Leper Village he had established in
Lambaréné.
In 1955 Schweitzer corresponded with Albert Einstein concerning
atomic weapons and the hazardous tests of atomic bombs.
He also
conferred with Bertrand Russell on the same problem.
In April
1954 Schweitzer had suggested that the protest
against the H-bomb
should be initiated by scientists.
Hoping for a statement by the renowned Schweitzer on the nuclear
weapons issue,
Norman Cousins traveled to Lambaréné
to
discuss the idea with the aging but vital doctor.
Schweitzer
said he was always reluctant to make public statements,
preferring
instead to make his life his argument.
However, because of the
overwhelming importance of the issue,
Schweitzer agreed to consider
it.
The result was a series of three radio broadcasts from Oslo,
Norway in 1958
and a letter to President Eisenhower.
In the first broadcast Schweitzer called for the renunciation
of nuclear tests.
He explained to the general public the harmful
medical effects of radiation
in the bones and blood and how this
continues for generations, causing birth defects.
He referred
to the declaration that was signed by 9,235 scientists
throughout
the world and given to the Secretary-General
of the United Nations
by Linus Pauling in January 1958.
This, he stated, refutes the
propaganda that
scientists do not agree on the dangers of radiation.
He criticized the concept of "a permissible amount of radiation."
He asked who permitted it, and if they had any right to permit
it.
He appealed especially to women to raise their voices
against
the nuclear tests that cause deformed babies.
He asked why international
law and the United Nations
have not done anything about this.
He cited the Soviet tests in Siberia and the American tests at
Bikini Atoll
that contaminated the Pacific Ocean and Japan.
Humanity
is imperiled by the tests.
"Mankind insists that they stop,
and has every right to do so."22
The second talk discussed the danger of an atomic war.
Schweitzer
recounted the first decade of the nuclear arms race and concluded
that
as a result of the arms buildup neither side could be victorious
in an atomic war.
Those who conduct an atomic war for freedom will die,
or end their lives miserably.
Instead of freedom they will find destruction.
Radioactive clouds resulting from a war between East and West
would imperil humanity everywhere.23
Missiles equipped with H-bombs have radically changed the situation.
The United States and the Soviet Union threaten each other from
a distance,
and there is the danger of their war occurring on
European soil.
The United States is arming countries, which may
use the weapons for defense
against the Soviet Union, which in
turn might defend itself.
These countries include Turkey and key
nations in the Middle East,
where both the US and USSR seek alliances
by giving financial and military aid.
Conflicts between these
smaller countries could endanger the peace of the world.
The technology
required and the short time intervals involved mean that war
could
originate from a mere incident or even an error.
He pointed out
that these quick decisions are being
"entrusted to an electronic
brain" which may become faulty.
He criticized America for
terrifying her opponent "to maintain peace"
and for attempting to pressure NATO countries into
acquiring weapons in
spite of adverse public opinion.
"The theory of peace through
terrifying an opponent by a greater armament
can now only heighten
the danger of war."24
He supported the recent proposal to
establish an atom-free zone in Europe
and re-affirmed the public
opinion in Europe "that under no circumstances
is Europe
to become a battlefield for an atomic war
between the Soviet Union
and the United States."25
In the third broadcast Schweitzer proposed negotiations at
the highest level
for complete nuclear disarmament with international
verification.
There is no justification for nuclear weapons or
tests
because they threaten the health and very existence of mankind.
He suggested that America withdraw its forces from Europe, for
the Europeans,
east and west, must learn to get along with each
other.
The Soviet Union should also agree to reduce her army and
agree not to attack Germany.
We must rid ourselves of the paralyzing
mistrust of our adversaries and
approach each other "in the
spirit that we are human beings, all of us."26
He saw two
choices: one is a mad atomic-arms race
with the danger of an unavoidable
atomic war;
the other is a mutual renunciation of nuclear weapons
in the hope
that we can manage to live in peace.
Because the first
is hopeless, we must risk the second.
Albert Schweitzer continued his medical work until he died
at the age of ninety.
Even in 1965, his last year, he was deeply
upset about the Vietnam War,
the tensions in the Middle East,
and relations
between the United States, Russia, and China.
He
died in Africa among the people he had served.
1. Einstein on Peace, p. 22.
2. Ibid., p. 25.
3. Ibid., p. 32.
4. Ibid., p. 68.
5. Ibid., p. 100.
6. Ibid., p. 164.
7. Ibid., p. 205.
8. Ibid., p. 224.
9. Ibid., p. 260.
10. Ibid., p. 290.
11. Ibid., p. 340.
12. Ibid., p. 385.
13. Ibid., p. 387.
14. Ibid., p. 635.
15. Ibid., p. 639-640.
16. The Quest for the Historical Jesus by Albert Schweitzer,
tr. W. Montgomery, p. 403.
17. Reverence for Life by Albert Schweitzer, p. 104.
18. The Philosophy of Civilization by Albert Schweitzer,
tr. C. T. Campion, p. 36.
19. Ibid., p. 47.
20. Ibid., p. 58.
21. Ibid., p. 104.
22. Peace or Atomic War? by Albert Schweitzer, p. 19.
23. Ibid., p. 27.
24. Ibid., p. 32.
25. Ibid., p. 32-33.
26. Ibid., p. 44.
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