by Eva Isaksson

When the First World War broke out, Einstein had just settled down in Berlin at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute. He was already a well-known physicist despite his young age. Born in Germany, Einstein had studied in Switzerland and preferred its freer intellectual atmosphere to the extent that he had taken Swiss citizenship at the age of 16. There is no evidence of his interest in social affairs before the war. He was a loner who avoided authority, and valued intellectual freedom quite highly.

There had been a strong rise in international cooperation in science since the late 19th century. International scientific meetings flourished, and there was for some time an atmosphere of fruitful international exchange of scientific ideas. The creation of Nobel prizes reflected an international appreciation of scientific achievements. At the same time, peace movement was building its international structures. The International Peace Bureau was formed in 1891 to coordinate international peace gatherings. Its approach was grounded in bourgeois liberalism, seeking the peaceful arbitration of international conflicts. The well-known IPB activist and vice-president Bertha Suttner influenced Alfred Nobel to start a Nobel peace prize, thus making a link between scientific work and peace activism. However, the scientists’ awareness of the reasons for war, and their own role in it, were not well developed in 1914. When the war started, its decisive difference from all the previous wars was not immediately evident. It was the first total war, in which mass weapons created by technological innovations killed civilians as well as armies.

The majority of professors at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute lacked the cosmopolitan perspective that Einstein had. United by their nationalist sentiments, they enthusiastically supported the German war effort, either at the front or as military research experts.  A sign of these spirits was the  “Manifesto to the civilized world”, published in the autumn 1914, and also called “Manifesto 93”, as it was signed by 93 scientists.  Einstein reacted adversely to this strongly nationalist manifesto. Together with a well-known pacifist, professor of physiology Georg Friedrich Nicolai, he drew up the “Manifesto to the Europeans”, which states: "The struggle raging today can scarcely yield a ”victor”; all nations that participate in it will, in all likelihood, pay an exceedingly high price.”1  This manifesto was signed only two others and it was never published, but in any case it was the first anti-war manifesto signed by Einstein.

The new anti-war movement began to regard social conditions as a cause of war. Its supporters were working in difficult circumstances and separated from each other. Open war resistance often led to imprisonment. In 1914 Einstein joined a small antiwar group, the Bund Neues Vaterland. Its membership was prominent – lawyers, aristocrats, even bankers.  The group was forbidden in 1916 but continued its activities underground, to be revitalized after the war. Its main goal was to create an supranational organization which would make future wars impossible. This was to be a solution to the problem of war and peace, which Einstein would support for the rest of this life.

In September 1915, Einstein met Romain Rolland in Switzerland.  Rolland, a well-known peace activist, describes this meeting in his diary:   "… Einstein is incredibly outspoken in his opinion about Germany, where he lives and which is his second fatherland (or his first). No other German acts and speaks with a similar degree of freedom. Another man might have suffered from a sense of isolation during that terrible last year, but not he. He laughs. He has found it possible, during the war, to write his most important scientific work. I ask him whether he voices his ideas to his German friends and whether he discusses them with them. He says no. He limits himself to putting questions to them, in the Socratic manner, in order to challenge their complacency. People don’t like that very much, he adds. ‘Greedy’ seems to Einstein the word that best characterizes the Germans. Their power drive, their admiration of, and belief in, force, their firm determination to conquer and annex territories are everywhere apparent.   … The socialists are the one relatively independent element. … The Bund Neues Vaterland makes rather slow progress and does not enjoy wide support. … Einstein does not expect that Germany will be reformed under its own power. … He hopes for an allied victory, which would destroy the power of Prussia and its dynasty. "2

The war ended just as Einstein had hoped – in an allied victory. The spirits among those who believed that the peace would now solve the burning questions facing mankind were quite high. After the war, Einstein stood sympathetic towards the Social Democratic Party, which he never joined, however. He did not like its faltering attitude towards the war, and the failure of its politics during the Weimar republic alienated Einstein from party politics. He sympathized with socialists, but had no formal ties to them. After the bending of light during the eclipse of 1919 had been detected, Einstein had become world famous, and his opinions gained weight. He did not hesitate to use this to further the cause of peace. His name began to appear in appeals for a variety of causes. 

The Weimar republic proved a disappointment for those hoping for peace and democracy. Einstein was a Jew and a socialist, and as such a good target for reactionary forces. There were numerous attempts to discredit both his scientific achievements and his political opinions. His scientific colleagues were also critical of his views. When Einstein refused to accept some of the fundamental assumptions of the new quantum mechanics, some scientists remarked that he was putting so much effort into his activism that he was not able to follow the progress of modern science.
 
The League of Nations was founded in 1920, and at first seemed to represent the goals that Einstein had expected from a world government. The League was, however, formed by the victors, and the former central powers, such as Germany, were not treated equally. The International Peace Bureau supported the League, however demanding its reform. In the 1920s, the peace movement was quite strong, and also split into more and less radical groups. At that time, Einstein sympathized with the radical peace activists, only to grow more conservative in his views a decade later.

The League of Nations called in 1922 some well-known scientists and scholars, Einstein among them, to form the Committee on Intellectual Cooperation. Einstein was full of doubts already from the start. Would he be representing Germany in a body run by those representing the victorious side? Was the League of Nations really doing work that was worth supporting? Einstein began to express increasing doubts about these matters. The World Disarmament Conference, which was in preparation from 1926, but which was held as late as 1932, was the last straw for Einstein. He felt that the conference was still only considering possibilities for limiting armaments when Germany was already leaving those talks on the eve of Hitler’s rise to power. Einstein withdrew from the committee in 1932 with a public statement criticizing the League of Nations, stating: “One does not make wars less likely to occur by formulating rules to warfare.”

Einstein was still a radical pacifist in the 1920s: "My pacifism is an instinctive feeling that possesses me; the thought of murdering another human being is abhorrent to me. My attitude is not the result of an intellectual theory but is caused by a deep antipathy to every kind of cruelty and hatred. …”3 From this starting point, Einstein was ready to condemn every form of military service no matter what he might think of the causes of any particular war. He did not, however, give any visible public support to militant pacifist movements before 1928. 

In 1930, touring the U.S., Einstein made a well-known speech that represents the culmination of his pacifist ideas.  He made this so-called '2 per cent' speech on December 14 1930 in a meeting arranged by the New History Society. In this speech, made without notes, he argued that even if only two per cent of those assigned to perform military service should announce their refusal to fight, as well as urge means other than war of settling international disputes, governments would be powerless, they would not dare send such a large number of people to jail. In Einstein’s opinion, conscious objectors should be permitted to do “some strenuous or even dangerous work, in the interest of their own country and mankind as a whole.”4

This speech was met with enthusiasm by pacifists, and Einstein quickly became an international hero in the eyes of the peace movement. There were however also critical comments, such as the remark made by Romain Rolland: "Einstein seems to overlook the fact that the technique of war has changed since 1914, and is still changing. The tendency has been to employ small armies of technicians who know how to run air squadrons armed with gas and bacteriological torpedoes and other weapons of mass destruction. In such circumstances it becomes a matter of complete indifference to governments whether two or ten per cent of the population refuses military service. Governments would not even need to throw war resisters into jail. Soldiers and non-combatants alike would be subjected to the deadly rain...."5

Another disputed point was which kind of work could be considered non-military. In the long run, any work could be considered to benefit the war effort. In 1929, Einstein signed a letter drafted by the War Resisters International to free the Finnish conscientious objector Arndt Pekurinen, who had been jailed for his refusal to accept any form of military service. When the Finnish Minister of Defence replied that the conscription law allowed the employment of conscientious objectors for non-military work, Einstein sent a congratulatory letter, which received wide publicity in Finland. Upon receiving clarifying information from Finnish peace activists, Einstein again wrote a letter to the Finnish minister: "Morality and fairness make it necessary that those who object to military service be employed only in work that has no close connection with military purposes."6 The publicity that Einstein’s letters added to this case may have speeded up the new Finnish conscription law of 1931.

In 1932, before the breach with the League of Nations, the Committee on Intellectual Cooperation had invited Einstein to send an open letter to Sigmund Freud. Their exchange was published as a booklet ”Warum War?” (Why war?) in 1933. Only 2000 copies were printed, and after Hitler’s rise into power the distribution of this booklet was prohibited.

In his letter Einstein asked whether there is any way of delivering mankind from the threat of war. How is it possible that a small clique can bend the will of majority who stand to lose and suffer by a state of war, to the service of their ambitions? How do they succeed so well in rousing men to such wild enthusiasm, even to sacrifice their lives? Einstein asks: “Is it possible to control man’s mental evolution so as to make him proof against the psychosis of hate and destructiveness?”7. Freud’s reply was quite pessimistic. According to him, conflicts between men are resolved with violence, and cultural evolution has just tried to suppress brute force by transferring power to a larger combination founded on the community of sentiments linking up its members. A central controlling body, like the League of Nations, would only succeed in a peacekeeping task if it has force at its disposal.

At the time of Hitler’s rise to power in winter 1933 Einstein was in the U.S. and decided not to return to Germany. In March he stated:  "As long as I have any choice in the matter, I shall live only in a country where civil liberty, tolerance and equality of all citizens before the law prevail. Civil liberty implies freedom to express one's political convictions, in speech and in writing; tolerance implies respect for the convictions of others whatever they may be. These conditions do not exist in Germany at the present time."8

The events in Germany affected Einstein’s views on antiwar measures. He decided that Germany’s threat to world peace was so great that passive resistance was not enough. Einstein spent his last months in Europe in Belgium. He was approached by Alfred Nahon, a Belgian lawyer asking him to support two conscientious objectors. Einstein refused, and also published his reasons for doing so in an open letter, which caused a stir among pacifists. Einstein writes: "Were I a Belgian, I should not, in the present circumstances, refuse military service; rather, I should enter such service cheerfully in the belief that I would thereby be helping to save European civilization."9 Already prior to this Einstein’s support to World Government had caused resentment. Pacifists could not accept his reasoning that the World Government should have military resources. "Other times, other means, although the final goal remains unchanged," says Einstein in his 1934 article "Re-examination of pacifism".

Pacifists had reason to feel that Einstein had betrayed them, as his name had helped to attract credibility to the peace movement. Thousands of conscientious objectors had gained strength from this vocal support. Reactions could be quite bitter. Romain Rolland writes in his diary: "Such weakness of spirit is indeed unimaginable in a great scientist, who should weigh and express his statements carefully before putting them in circulation. It is even more incredible coming from the author of the Theory of Relativity. Had it never occurred to him that circumstances might develop, circumstances such as those that prevail today, which would make it dangerous to practice conscientious objection which he espoused? It is a joke, a kind of intellectual game, to advocate the idea at a time when no risks are involved; on the other band, one has assumed a particularly serious responsibility for having indoctrinated blind and confident youth without sufficient consideration of all implications. It is quite clear to me that Einstein, a genius in his scientific field, is weak, indecisive and inconsistent outside it. .1 have sensed this more than once. … One can imagine the homicidal fury of the Hitlerites when they learned that a German had sounded the call to arms to other nations against Germany. Nothing could have been more fatal to the cause of the Jews in Germany. Einstein did not anticipate this. I am afraid that he may now find it quite difficult to justify himself. His constant about-faces, hesitations and contradictions are worse than the inexorable tenacity of a declared enemy...."10 Faced with such accusations, Einstein did not defend himself, but made instead a desperate question: "Can it be that the world does not see that Hitler is dragging us into war?"11

In 1934 Einstein left for the U.S. and never returned to Europe. He settled down in Princeton at the Advanced Study Institute. Einstein was not however willing to fully concentrate on scientific work, and continued his political activities.

World War II was an overwhelming challenge to peace activists. Einstein met this challenge with the perhaps biggest miscalculation in his career, the letter to President Roosevelt which Einstein composed together with Leo Szilard, and which was dated August 2, 1939. His apprehension towards Hitler’s Germany was so great that Einstein felt he must warn the U.S. government about the possibility about uranium deposits in Belgian Congo falling in German hands. At that time, Einstein and many others felt they had reason to fear that German was developing an atom bomb. Roosevelt took these warnings seriously, and the Briggs committee was started. Not satisfied with the slowness with which this committee seemed to work, Einstein wrote another letter to the President in March 1940, repeating his warnings.

After these two letters, Einstein had no further connection with the atomic bomb project. It was probable that he was well aware about the progress of its development, however. Szilard contacted Einstein once again in early 1945, expressing his worries about the use of bomb, and how it would affect the post-war situation.  Einstein wrote his third letter to the U.S. President, dated March 25, 1945. "The terms of secrecy under which Dr. Szilard is working at present do not permit him to give me information about his work; however, I understand that he now is greatly concerned about the lack of adequate contact between scientists who are doing this work and those members of your Cabinet who are responsible for formulating policy.”12 Roosevelt died before Leo Szilard presented this problem to him. His successor, president Truman, was not affected by Einstein’s letter in any way. The U.S. made a successful atom bomb test in July, and by the time the bomb was to be deployed against Japan there was already a considerable number of scientists opposed to its use. An appeal initiated by Szilard and signed by sixty scientists, condemning the military use of the atomic bomb, was unsuccessful, and the U.S. dropped the bomb on Hiroshima on August 6 and another bomb on Nagasaki on August 9.

"My participation in the production of the atomic bomb consisted of one single act," wrote Einstein later. "I signed a letter to President Roosevelt, in which I emphasized the necessity of conducting large-scale experimentation with regard to the feasibility of producing an atom bomb. I was well aware of the dreadful danger which would threaten mankind were the experiments to prove successful. Yet I felt impelled to take the step because it seemed probable that the Germans might be working on the same problem with every prospect of success. I saw no alternative but to act as I did, although I have always been a convinced pacifist."13  It is certain that the atomic bomb would have been developed without Einstein’s intervention. It remains an open question whether the bomb would have been finished before the end of the second World War, and how the possible delay would have affected the post/war world situation.

"I do not consider myself the father of the release of atomic energy, " said Einstein in his first public talk about the atomic bomb, given to Raymond Swing, and published in Atlantic Monthly in November 1945, under the title "Atomic War or Peace". "My part in it was quite indirect. I did not, in fact, foresee that it would be released in my time. I only believed that it was theoretically possible. It became practical through the accidental discovery of chain reaction, and this was not something I could have predicted."14

This was the beginning of a long series of writings that Einstein composed against the bomb and against the arms race. His own solution to the problem of war was now world government, which he saw as an organization like the United Nations and which would have both political and military power. This new world government was urgently needed, so that total destruction could still be avoided.  Einstein joined organizations like Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientists. His name attracted funds and publicity, although his views were often more radical than most of his fellow scientists. He was particularly vocal about the necessity of involving the Soviet Union in the international community. To begin with, it should receive observer status in the new world government. Einstein thought that the Soviet Union was feeling threatened by the growing military power in the west, and that it should become involved in the peace process on a more equal basis. Einstein’s views received heated criticism from Soviet scientists, who composed an open letter on “Dr. Einstein’s mistaken notions”, in which they said: “By the irony of fate, Einstein has virtually become a supporter of the schemes and ambitions of the bitterest foes of peace and international co-operation.” This exchange reflects the rift between peace activism in the west and in the east. Many peace activists in the west were also split about the issue of world government, among them the International Peace Bureau, which consequently underwent a quiet phase in these difficult post-war times. In the east, peace activism was channelled to the World Peace Council, which was partial to the Soviet Union and funded by it.

The Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientists was still supportive of world government in April 1948 when it published a declaration supporting it, but had given up the urgency of achieving it in the near future. Einstein never gave up the idea of a world government. When a pacifist asked him in 1952 about his real stand regarding pure pacifism, Einstein replied: "I am indeed a pacifist, but not a pacifist at any price. My views are virtually identical with those of Gandhi. But I would, individually and collectively, resist violently any attempt to kill me or to take away from me, or my people, the basic means of subsistence. …I was, therefore, of the conviction that it was justified and necessary to fight Hitler. For his was such an extreme attempt to destroy people. … Furthermore, I am of the conviction that realization of the goal of pacifism is possible only through supranational organization. To stand unconditionally for this cause is, in my opinion, the criterion of true pacifism."15

In the divided post-war atmosphere, Einstein became a solitary thinker. During the Cold War years, he was often under attack. Reactionary circles resented his critical views about the U.S. foreign and domestic politics and his negative approach towards anti-communism. Einstein took a strong stand against the Committee on Un-American Activities. In a letter published in New York Times in June 1953 he stated: "Every intellectual who is called before one of the committees ought to refuse to testify, i.e. he must be prepared for jail and economic ruin, in short, for the sacrifice of his personal welfare in the interest of the cultural welfare of his country.”16 Einstein’s statement gave many reactionary politicians a reason to accuse him of incitement to civil disobedience. Einstein said in 1964:  "The Communist menace is being used here by reactionary politicians as a pretext to mask their attack on civil rights.”17

In 1950, the United States made a decision to start the development of the hydrogen bomb. When Einstein was asked for a statement, he said: "I do not believe your proposal that the United States refrain from experimenting with the production of hydrogen bombs touches the core of the problem. The fact of the matter is that the people who possess the real power in this country have no intention of ending the cold war."18 Einstein would most likely have expressed similar views about the world situation of early 2000s, and have called for a stronger United Nations to further world peace in a world where the United States has shown no willingness to give up its dominant role in world politics in favour of a more balanced world order. In a commencement address in Swarthmore College in 1938, Einstein gave a clear expression of his views about a socially moral individual: “Were he to receive from his fellowmen a much greater return in goods and services than most other men ever receive? Were his country, because it feels itself for the time being militarily secure, to stand aloof from the aspiration to create a super-national system of security and justice? Could he look on passively, or perhaps even with indifference, when elsewhere in the world innocent people are being brutally persecuted, deprived of their rights or even massacred? To ask these questions is to answer them!”19

The Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientists became inactive in the late 1940s. The world situation had not proved benign to world government. During the cold war years, there seemed to be practically no means to avoid nuclear catastrophe. In February 1955 Bertrand Russell sent Einstein a letter that opened new perspectives in anti-war activism. "Do you think it would be possible to get, say, six men of the very highest scientific repute, headed by yourself, to make a very solemn statement about the imperative necessity of avoiding war?" Russell stressed: "Everything must be said from the point of view of mankind, not of this or that group."20

Einstein replied quickly and full of enthusiasm, making suggestions about possible signatories. After a short and rapid exchange of letters, a final version was drafted which Russell sent Einstein on April 5, 1955. Einstein wrote back on April 11, approving the list of other signatories and expressing his consent to sign the appeal. These were the last documents that Einstein signed before his death. Russell heard about Einstein’s passing on his way from Rome to Paris. Upon his arrival, he received Einstein’s last letter and the declaration signed by him.

The declaration, which was published later that year, was signed by eleven scientists, of which nine were Nobel laureates. "We are speaking on this occasion, not as members of this or that nation, continent or creed, but as human beings, members of the species man, whose continued existence is in doubt," the declaration states. It had to be understood that the nature of war had changed, so that no one would gain but instead, all participants would face destruction. "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 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."

The declaration was published right before two major international conferences, and received much attention. It was the first anti-war declaration signed by this number of leading scientists, many of which represented differing political views. The difference with the situation at the outbreak of the World War I was huge. Not only had the military technology taken a leap forwards, but also the anti-war consciousness of scientists had come a long way forward.

An immediate continuation of the Russell‑Einstein manifesto was the first Pugwash conference of scientists that met in Canada in 1957, and which started the series of Pugwash conferences. It has involved a large number of scientists from many countries and disciplines. What makes the Pugwash movement special is that it was started by the scientists out of their own initiative. Like Einstein, they have understood that peace will benefit all. Scientists have a special role in the peace movement because they are able to predict not only the consequences of scientific inventions, but also possibilities of their application.

<Leaders
Harold Evans>