{"id":319209,"date":"2026-08-10T12:00:25","date_gmt":"2026-08-10T11:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=319209"},"modified":"2026-08-07T22:50:56","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T21:50:56","slug":"on-war-defense-and-nonviolence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2026\/08\/on-war-defense-and-nonviolence\/","title":{"rendered":"On War, Defense, and Nonviolence"},"content":{"rendered":"

Foreword by Antonino Drago<\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

6 Aug 2026 – <\/em>For those unfamiliar with the events of the 1970s in France, the government declared its intention to expropriate the entire plateau for military use. The struggle began with a 15-day fast by Lanza del Vasto. The 118 peasant families of Larzac swore they would never cede their land to the military (Jos\u00e9 Bov\u00e9 is one of those families). After more than ten years of struggles by 100,000 people at a time and counterattacks (occupations and renovations of homes on already militarized land), the expropriation was defeated.<\/p>\n

After the glorious nonviolent revolutions of 1989, the possibility arose throughout Europe to reestablish the state, starting with defense. The question about alternative defense received two responses from non-violent activists: one from the Italian Campaign OSM-DPN, which insisted on calling for a structural change in the Italian Defense (and in 1998 succeeded in obtaining Law 230, which began to do so, also supported by various sentences of the Constitutional Court, in particular the sentence 219 of 2015), and another which stated the same sentence quoted by Castelbou at the beginning of article, supported by non-violent activists such as Michael Randle (a leading figure of English non-violence) and Jean-Marie Muller (a leading figure of French non-violence; to whom I responded in the preface to his book Vincere la guerra, principi e metodi dell’intervento civile<\/em> (EGA, 1999), a preface insistently requested of me by Nanni Salio).<\/p>\n

The CSDC (Civil Defense Studies Center) of Rome has been operating in Italy since 1984, proposing an agreement with the military to obtain recognition of a form of defense different from the military one (see the book edited by F. Tullio (ed.): Civil Defense and the White Helmets Project. Disarmed Civil Peacekeepers,”<\/em> F. Angeli, Rome, 2000, funded by the Military Center for Strategic Studies). The recent Italian debate on the “Another Defense is Possible” campaign concerns precisely the finalization of the text of that proposed law; whether it is for proposing a defense system independent of the military or in conjunction with it (“complementary”).<\/p>\n

Prof. Antonino Drago: University \u201cFederico II\u201d of Naples, Italy and a m<\/em>ember of the <\/em>TRANSCEND Network<\/em><\/a>. <\/em>Allied of Ark Community, he teaches at the <\/em>TRANSCEND Peace University-TPU<\/em><\/a>. Master degree in physics (University of Pisa 1961), a follower of the Community of the Ark of Gandhi\u2019s Italian disciple, Lanza del Vasto, a conscientious objector, a participant in the Italian campaigns for conscientious objection (1964-1972) and the campaign for refusing to pay taxes to finance military expenditure (1983-2000).<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

**************************<\/p>\n

(Nouvelles de l\u2019Arche, ann\u00e9e 74, n. 2, 2eme trimestre 2026)<\/p>\n

Thierry Castelbou has been involved with Ark Community for many years. After other community and activist experiences, in 1990 he joined Les Truels du Larzac, an Ark community site, later a collective farm, where he still lives. He contributes to the newspaper “Gardarem lo Larzac,” which he edited for 20 years.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“As long as we fail to create a framework and establish a sense of trust and security, military defense and deterrence will likely remain the standard solution.” This conclusion of an article published in the latest issue of Les Nouvelles<\/em> cannot help but raise questions, it seems to me, for those who have chosen to explore the paths of non-violence, and has inspired the following lines.<\/p>\n

It is not a matter of judging the author of the article, whom I do not know and who is presented as a Ukrainian pacifist. Like many pacifists in her country, she resigns herself to justifying armed defense, preferable to enslavement and oppression. We are not in Ukraine, and the risk of a comparable aggression in France remains unlikely for the time being. However, we cannot dismiss the possibility, and other forms of attacks on our freedoms are, moreover, entirely conceivable. My question is therefore not: what should the Ukrainians do or should they have done? But: what do we want to prepare for?<\/p>\n

The vivion of most pacifists faced with armed aggression is either to submit to the enemy in order to remain true to their rejection of war, or to renounce their convictions by resigning themselves to armed retaliation to defend their country. However, the option of non-violence involves opening a third way, yielding neither to violence nor to cowardice. It is tempting, and very common, to admit that faced with an unscrupulous aggressor, one should accept a military response despite any reservations one might have about violence. Ultimately, one always finds a justification for waging a defensive war. We can certainly understand such a justification when it comes, as in this case, from a Ukrainian, but it risks fostering a sense of fatalism within us: we would have no other solution than to also prepare for war. Indeed, the fact that Ukraine, for four years, has valiantly fought on the military front, paying a heavy price, without seeing the end of its struggle, should encourage us to prepare for something else and to reverse the logic of a military front against amilitary front. This implies completely rethinking our models, the objective no longer being to prevent invasion but to render that invasion ineffective. Several thinkers in the field of Non-violent Civil Defense (DNVC) have clarified this proposal for resistance, which aims not to physically repel the enemy but to discourage them (For an approach to Nonviolent Civil Defense, see issue 213 of the journal Alternatives non-violentes<\/em>).<\/p>\n

The author of the aforementioned article, as I understand her, aspires to a demilitarized world that guarantees the security of its people. In the meantime, the use of defensive warfare would remain necessary. In my view, this condemns us to remain trapped for a long time in this logic of inevitable armed defense. Certainly, we must support everything that contributes to a reduction of arms stockpiles and harmony between peoples, but it seems illusory to convince the USA, Russia, \u00a0China\u2014to name only the largest\u2014anytime soon to get rid of their armed forces and become guarantors of peace. If we wait for this state of peace and security worldwide, we undoubtedly have many generations of despairing people ahead of us. Rather than nurturing the illusion of a world where we no longer have to defend ourselves, we must invent another way to defend ourselves.<\/p>\n

Non-violence is not a utopia that will come about in a pacified world but a requirement to be implemented here and now. We can oppose the ongoing rearmament, this deadly logic of preparing for war, and try to propose a policy of non-violence. But above all, to work right now on implementing this DCNV without waiting for it to be officially adopted, to give us the means to resist without fueling the spiral of violence, and to hope not to be caught off guard in the event of an attack on what is ours.<\/p>\n

Two calls to action for members of the Ark.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Editorial Board of Nouvelles de l\u2019Arche<\/em><\/p>\n

Readers are invited to follow up on this article by Thierry Castelbou:<\/p>\n

1- to act immediately to implement this Nonviolent Civil Defense (NCD) policy without waiting for its official adoption.<\/em><\/p>\n

The Ark has an organization, the Nonviolent Action Circle, whose coordinator and Ark delegate is Agn\u00e8s Cayrel. Its mission is to provide training in nonviolent action and Nonviolent Civil Defense, the only form of defense available to every citizen.<\/p>\n

If you would like training, so as not to wait until we are cornered by the arrival of a war we naively hoped never to see, you can contact Agn\u00e8s at the Circle’s email address: cercle.actionnonviolente@etik.com<\/p>\n

2- to give us the means to resist without fueling the spiral of violence.<\/em><\/p>\n

There is another organization, independent of the “Community of the Ark, Nonviolence and Spirituality,” with which it maintains friendly relations: CANVA – Building and Raising Awareness with Active Nonviolence – whose coordinator is Alain Joffre and whose mission is action.<\/p>\n

Coming soon, from June 15th to 19th, the Eurosatory 2026 trade fair, a unifying platform for the French Army, will be held in Paris-Nord Villepinte. It is the largest international trade fair for defense (and attack) systems. For years, CANVA, along with other peace organizations, has maintained a vigilant presence outside the fair, displaying signs and distributing flyers. At the same time, a march has been taking place along the main avenues, distributing flyers to inform the public about the ineffectiveness of perpetual rearmament and the proven effectiveness of Nonviolent Civil Defense, as demonstrated by Gandhi. If volunteers wish to join this cause, it’s easy to organize. Contact CANVA or this Editorial Board for more information. Let’s go: everyone to Eurosatory!<\/p>\n

[Pro-Palestinian activists and public critics heavily contested the Eurosatory 2026<\/a> defense trade fair in Villepinte near Paris, staging road blockages and demonstrations against the event and the presence of military tech.]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The CSDC (Civil Defense Studies Center) of Rome has been operating in Italy since 1984, proposing an agreement with the military to obtain recognition of a form of defense different from the military one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":61862,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-319209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-transcend-members"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319209","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=319209"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319209\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":319210,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319209\/revisions\/319210"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/61862"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=319209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=319209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=319209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}