HISTORY OF THE WAR RESISTERS LEAGUE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 27
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 19, 2010
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: June 27, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
STAT
STAT
STAT
STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
Iq
Next 2 Page(s) In Document Denied
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
HISTORY
OF THE
WAR
RESISTERS
LEAGUE
The White House part of the simul-
taneous Moscow-Washington anti-
nuclear demonstration, organized by
WRL on September 4, 1978. Photo
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
Traditional pacifism-emphasis on individual
resistance to militarism, violence and war-
dates back to ancient times. But it is only
within the past sixty years, an era during which
War Resisters League emerged as a leading organ-
ization, that pacifists started searching for ways to
treat the complex political, social, economic, and
psychological causes of war. Radical pacifism, is
more than an effort to create a just and peaceful
society through nonviolent methods, it seeks
structural social change.
Members of the War Resisters League believe
that conflict between belligerent nations is but one
manifestation of violence. Economic exploitation,
sexism, racism, political repression, cultural alien-
ation and decay, colonialism, and imperialism
produce tensions equally warlike in effect, though
the violence is perpetrated more subtly.
The recent developments in feminist thinking has
brought to light a better understanding of the
connections between militarism and sexism. It is not
surprising that in a society which equates
masculinity with domination, wars should develop.
In addition, the spirit and style of feminism dffers a
striking alternative to the military psychology of
America which stresses competition and aggressive
(even violent) behavior.
Even where there seems to be "peace," the quiet
deaths from starvation, poverty and disease that
strike down peasants in Latin America, share-
croppers in Mississippi, unemployed miners in
Appalachia, and the babies in Harlem are as real
and deadly as the battlefield deaths from bullets and
bombs.
The War Resisters League is defined solely by its
members. It offers no dogmatic suppositions and
solutions for the past or future, other than a basic
dedication to nonviolence. It views pacifism as
radical, experimental, and necessary. It accepts as
its main task inventing processes of change that are
organic to the needs and ingenuity of growing
numbers of people. It sees itself in an innovative
rather than power-seeking role, as a catalyst for a
majority movement and not as an elite out to
impose its doctrine on the disinterested masses.
The Beginnings
The roots of the War Resisters League go back to
1915 when Jessie Wallace Hughan in cooperation
with Tracy D. Mygatt and John Haynes Holmes
founded the Anti-Enlistment League, which sought
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
to enroll war resisters to oppose American partici-
pation in World War I.
After the War and with the end of conscription,
the only existing peace groups were those that saw
peace coming through the League of Nations, the
Soviet Union, or as a result of individual "soul
saving." Based on the belief that wars would not
end until substantial numbers of people made clear
in advance their unconditional refusal to engage in
the next war, efforts were made to form an organ-
ization which would enroll war resisters of differing
political and religious beliefs, in particular, socialists
and anarchists who did not feel comfortable in a
religious organization.
In 1921, European conscientious objectors, with
the same concern, formed Paco (Esperanto for
"Peace"). Soon after the name was changed to
War Resisters' International. In 1922 a similar
organization was formed within the Fellowship of
Reconciliation by Jessie Wallace Hughan called the
Committee for Enrollment Against War, and it
adopted the WRI pledge. In 1923, Hughan and the
Enrollment Committee, along with representatives
of the Women's Peace Society and the Women's
Peace Union, established the War Resisters League
as an independent organization. Dr. Hughan saw
the WRL as more than an organization of men and
women who opposed war and its causes. She and
the other founders wanted to offer support to war
opponents who had no religious or other organiza-
tional ties.
In the early years, Hughan and her sister, Evelyn
West Hughan, furnished the greater part of the
League's modest budget (only $500 the first year).
Abraham Kaufman, as the first Executive
Secretary, helped to establish the League as a
widely respected national organization.
3
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
As popular opposition to war grew during the
thirties, so did League enrollments, from 1000 in
1928 to 13,000 (of whom 800 were regular
contributors) in 1938. The League initiated annual
No More War Parades in New York from 1931 to
1934, the first numbering 300 marchers and the
last 15,000. WRL, under the direction of Tracy
Mygatt and Frances Witherspoon, held annual
Armistice Day eve dedication services, which
featured public declarations by young men
renouncing war. At a Conference on Militant
Pacifism, organized by WRL in 1931, Hughan
urged radical pacifists to continue their efforts:
"This is the time for us to work fast, not when war
comes."
League members contributed to a growing body
of theory and knowledge concerned with resisting
wars and with finding constructive, dynamic alter-
natives to war. The growth and work of the
Gandhian movement in India added new insights
on nonviolence and its social organization which
Western pacifists welcomed.
Pacifists took the lead in warning against the rise
of fascism and also worked to do what they could to
rescue its victims. Indeed, the first public demon-
stration against German anti-semitism was held in
1933 under the leadership of Rabbi Stephen Wise
and the Rev. John Haynes Holmes, long a WRL
activist. The League also opposed Roosevelt's
immigration policies, which kept America's doors
locked to any possible refugees from Nazi
Germany.
When the 1940 Conscription Act was put into
effect the focus of the League shifted from enrolling
men and women against war to offering moral and
legal support to conscientious objectors.
World War II
With the onset of war, liberal peace groups col-
lapsed, but the War Resisters League and the
Fellowship of Reconciliation continued to grow.
From 1939 to 1946, the League with the help of
New York Friends and FOR people put out a lively
8-page newsprint monthly called The Conscien-
tious Objector, which became the voice of pacifists
during World War II.
The attitude of the Government and the general
public toward pacifists during the War was distinctly
tolerant, compared to the mob violence, raids on
peace organizations, and the very selective recog-
nition of conscience during the first World War.
4
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
WRL street corner forum in New York City in 1941. Photo by Harry
Patton/Swarthmore College Peace Collection.
Contributors to the League grew to 1800 by 1948
and the annual budget climbed to $20,000.
The WRL gave its strongest support to those
COs, whether in civilian camps or in prison, who
opposed not only the war but all regimentation
which went with it. Such support at this point was
crucial, for other pacifist groups in greater or lesser
degree accepted the forced labor system embodied
in Selective Service provisions for "alternative
service" in the camps. The League was unable to
cooperate with the Peace Churches in supporting
the camps in a program which many members felt
was assisting the government to administer con-
scription, and in 1943 finally withdrew even from a
consultative relationship, an action later to be
followed by other groups. At the same time it strove
to keep in touch with COs in the various camps.
In prison and in the Civilian Public Service
camps, the COs began to experiment with non-
violent tactics against racial segregation and other
injustices of the system. Some went on fasts and
work strikes and individually and collectively non-
cooperated with the authorities. These actions
created a community of militant pacifists, who,
when the war ended, would serve as the focus of a
newborn nonviolent movement.
During the war, the League continuously urged
the Allies to negotiate with the Germans for the
release of all concentration camp prisoners, even at
the cost of settling for something less than their
stated goal of "unconditional surrender." When it
became known that two million Jews had already
been killed, the League urged the State Depart-
ment to declare a ceasefire. Hughan argued that
German military defeats would only invite further
5
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
reprisals on the Jewish scapegoats and that an
Allied "victory will not save them, for [the] dead ...
cannot be liberated." Her prophecy turned out
tragically to be true.
Post World War II
The War produced three major changes in
radical pacifist thinking. First, the war against Hitler
was very difficult to resist so that our commitment
to peaceful change was forced to become that more
rational and political. Second, the bomb on
Hiroshima declared an unprecedented urgency: in
the past whole tribes and nations could be obliter-
ated, but life went on. Now, for the first time in the
human experience, all life could be destroyed. And
third, Gandhi emerged as a world figure with a
rational and politically acceptable approach to con-
flict. In the past, pacifists could always fall back on
the individual conscience; now we said, and had to
say, not only that we could be right, but that the
accepted way of engaging in conflict was definitely,
suicidally, wrong.
Groups like the WRL were radicalized as a result
of the influx of hundreds of militant war resisters
who had been imprisoned during the War. Many of
them had been radicalized by the Depression and
had been active in the labor struggles and in the
anti-fascist movement. The WRL was the obvious
place for the more militant COs to go because it had
given the most support to the absolutist position
during the war. Eventually, the militants had a
majority on the Executive Committee and League
policy came more and more under the control of
these resisters who viewed pacifism and non-
violence as the most radical and effective way of
creating meaningful change.
The League organized a number of street
demonstrations, often using theatrical props, to
protest nuclear bomb tests, to urge a general am-
nesty for all COs, and to oppose the proposed
universal conscription. In February of 1947, more
than 400 men burned their draft cards or sent them
to the White House, the first demonstration of its
kind.
However, the country had been severely mili-
tarized by the war experience and victory was too
fresh to make pacifism attractive. The rise of Cold
War ideology and its accompanying fears limited
the League's growth. Achievements were few, a
notable exception being the founding of the Pacifica
Foundation in 1949 by League members, which
6
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
led to the creation of listener-sponsored FM radio.
In 1948 the League, along with other peace
groups, set up the Central Committee for Con-
scientious Objectors to handle CO inquiries and
problems.
Civil Rights
The only area where activism seemed possible
was in civil rights. WRL members took part and
were jailed in "The Journey of Reconciliation," the
first freedom ride in the South, in 1947, to test a
Supreme Court prohibition on segregation in inter-
state travel.
A member of the WRL national staff was
assigned as early as 1956 to work closely with
Martin Luther King, Jr. In addition, staff time was
put into the March on Washington in 1963 and the
Poor People's campaign of 1968. In 1960, WRL
members joined with CORE, SNCC, and SCLC to
take part in the freedom rides, sit-ins, voter regis-
tration drives, and every other aspect of the
struggle, North and South.
Nuclear Testing
During the fifties, the main issue that concerned
pacifists was nuclear testing. The danger from
nuclear fall-out and the insanity of thinking civil
defense drills could provide a "defense" outraged
large numbers of people. In June 1955, the League
co-sponsored civil disobedience during a nation-
wide civil defense alert and 28 participants were
arrested for refusing to take shelter in New York's
City Hall Park. Civil disobedience against the civil
defense program and compulsory air raid drills
became an annual event. By 1960 a thousand
The first civil disobedience against the nationwide Civil Defense drill, New
York City, June 15, 1955.
7
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
participants gathered in the park, half of them
refusing to seek shelter when the air raid sirens
sounded. The next year the number was doubled,
as were the arrests, and that was the last time New
Yorkers were ever legally required to take shelter
during a defense drill.
In 1956 Liberation Magazine was started as a
project of WRL. Though it had an independent edi-
torial policy, the issues it dealt with-nuclear testing
and disarmament, civil rights, socialism, anarchism,
MARCH 1956
Liberation
What I Believe
Vinaba Shari
No Raal Peace Policy
PUbIn, Sa.kin
Guilt in Postwar Germany
John K. DIM-
s- tNN. S.YMp
KINNITH PATCNSN
The first issue of Liberation Magazine. March 1956.
and nonviolent direct action-closely paralleled the
League's own program. Liberation helped create
the ideological framework for a resurgent American
radicalism that would mark the 1960s.
League members were instrumental in the for-
mation of the Committee for Nonviolent Action, a
group which organized nonviolent direct action
campaigns. Beginning in 1958, it staged a series of
spectacular civil disobedience actions against
nuclear weapons that marked CNVA as the cutting
edge of a growing movement. Some of the actions
were: the sailing of the ketch Golden Rule into the
Pacific bomb test zone (1958); Omaha Action in
which pacifists nonviolently trespassed upon a
nuclear missile base (1959); Polaris Action, an on-
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
going project in New London, CT, to protest-
often by nonviolently disrupting official launch-
ings-missile-carrying submarines (1960); the San
Francisco to Moscow Walk for Peace which saw the
message of unilateral disarmament carried within
the Soviet Union for the first time (1960-61); and
the sailings of Everyman I and II into the nuclear
testing zone, and Everyman III to the Soviet Union
to demand cessation of nuclear testing (1962).
CNVA made nonviolence and civil disobedience
household words. After 1960 and the first student
sit-ins, nonviolence became an acceptable concept
as well as a workable method; it contributed to the
first major breakthrough in the black movement
since the abolition of slavery. In 1968, national
CNVA merged with WRL.
In the early sixties the League aided in setting up
the Student Peace Union and Acts for Peace.
Indochina
Vietnam began to intrude upon the public con-
sciousness in 1963. During the summer, WRL
protested the anti-Buddhist terrorism of the US-
supported Diem regime. In November 1964, the
WRL staff member David McReynolds speaking at the New York City rally
as part of the nationwide demonstrations against the Vietnam war,
December 19. 1964. Photo by Robert Joyce/National Guardian.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
League publicized its position on the war: "We are
for negotiation. We are for neutralization. But first
of all, and most of all, we are for the immediate
withdrawal of all US military forces and military aid.
Not all peace groups have taken this position, but it
is safe to predict that they will be forced by events to
follow WRL's lead in this regard."
The League co-sponsored the first nationwide
demonstration against the war in December 1964,
and throughout the war years helped organize
local and nationwide civil disobedience campaigns
and mobilizations against the war. But the major
thrust of the League's program was local organizing
and trying to open avenues of protest for the anti-
war movement at the grass roots. Between 1964
and 1973, the League's membership rose from
3000 to 15,000.' The new members brought with
them new attitudes and new lifestyles. And the
World War II resisters, who were so far ahead of
their time, took heart as history began to catch up
to them.
Especially influential in the new style of pacifism
was the NY Workshop in Nonviolence (a joint
WRL-CNVA project) and its publication WIN,
A publication of the NewYork
Workshop In Nonviolence
'These figures represent only the "active" membership.
From 1923 through the forties, membership was divided
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
which originated in New York in 1965. WIN
championed the new lifestyles and attempted to
synthesize the most constructive elements of the
counter-culture with the political insights of radical
pacifism. Since 1967, it has been a WRL project
(but independently structured) and has become the
most widely read bi-weekly publication in the peace
movement.
The League also promoted draft resistance, co-
sponsoring the first anti-Vietnam War draft card
burnings. While counseling conscientious objectors,
A. J. Muste presiding over draft card burning including WRL staff members
David McReynolds and Marc Edelman, November 6, 1965. Photo by Neil
Haworth.
WRL emphasized absolute resistance to the draft. It
gave special support-moral, organizational, and
financial-to the organized resistance movement.
Starting in 1967, noncooperation with Selective
Service led thousands of young men to return their
draft cards to the Government at the risk of felony
indictments.
The League also began to organize action cam-
paigns on its own. The nonviolence aspects of Stop
the Draft Week, which took place in New York and
the San Francisco Bay Area in late 1967, were
WRL actions and hundreds of people were arrested
for nonviolently blocking induction centers. And in
into two categories: those who had "enrolled" and that
portion of the enrolled who were "active" (i.e. regular
contributors). Beginning in the fifties, the League kept
track of and sent mailings only to those who were active.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
%'1
Blockade of New York City's Whitehall Street Induction Center,
December 5, 1967, at which 264 were arrested in this WRL-organized
action. Photo by Dan Hemenway.
May 1971, the League was the only national peace
organization to fully endorse the week-long May
Day demonstrations, assigning a staff member to
work full time with the May Day Tribe and to
produce the tactical manual.
Because of these activities and others, in May
1969 the WRL office was broken into, files were
strewn on the floor, and the addressograph was
smashed. The only thing stolen was the mailing list.
Though the perpetrators were never caught or
identified, subsequent information has made it all
1 Aiw....! 11 I
The WRL office, May 10, 1969. Photo by Maury Englander.
but certain that the Federal Bureau of Investigation
was responsible. The FBI has maintained an active
file on the League since 1939, has had informers at
WRL meetings, placed taps on League phones,
opened some mail, and has admitted breaking into
other New York City-based anti-war offices in
1969.
A.J. Muste once pointed out that "the two
decisive powers of the government with res*w"t to
ar_ the power to conscript and the powei to
tax." The paying of taxes amounts to tacit support
of war. So, in 1966, to supplement resistance to
the draft, the League and the Peacemakers began
to promote resistance to the Federal excise tax on
telephone service. WRL made tax resistance a
major part of its program to the extent that a new
staff member was added to deal with the mush-
rooming interest in nonpayment of not only the
telephone tax but the income tax as well. In 1969,
War Tax Resistance was formed to take over and
expand the program the League developed, en-
couraging local chapters to spring up around the
country. At the height of resistance to the Indo-
china War, it was estimated there were 200,000
telephone tax resisters and perhaps 20,000 income
tax resisters. Tax resistance continues to be relevant
and an imperative as long as so much of taxes go to
the military.
In 1972 the League sponsored a nationwide
boycott against ITT, a major war industry with
popular consumer products (e.g. "Wonder
Bread"). WRL initiated a simulated bombing and
blockade of ITT in Manhattan, which attracted
4000 people. Three years later it was learned that
About 4000 people demonstrate in a WRL-initiated demonstration to
protest ITT's involvement in Indochina war, May 10, 1972. Photo by
John Goodwin.
ITT received FBI files on WRL before the demon-
stration and five other times in the past.
WRL developed Campaign Freedom, a program
in which participants would "adopt" a South Viet-
namese political prisoner and lobby (by extensive
letter writing) on the prisoner's behalf. In 1973
WRL was one of the dozen or so founding organi-
zations of the United Campaign which developed a
program to continue opposing the Indochina War.
And, finally, WRL helped organize the May 1975
"Celebration" of the war's end in New York's
Sheep Meadow, Central Park-the site of the first
major draft-card burning in 1967.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
Amnesty for American draft and military
resisters, and other political prisoners was another
of the League's projects. WRL worked closely with
the National Council for Universal and Uncondi-
tional Amnesty to foster a climate in which amnesty
could become a reality. Like other WRL programs,
the amnesty project contained a range of activities,
extending from lobbying, letter-writing, and vigiling
to demonstrating with street theater and civil
disobedience.
Disarmament and the
Anti-Nuclear Movement
The ending of the Indochina War brought to a
close a decade of WRL program and activity which
was heavily dominated by Vietnam. Priority then
shifted to disarmament and related issues.
In 1975 the League initiated the Continental
Walk for Disarmament and Social Justice. A
member of the national staff was released to work
full time for over a year on the Walk, which began
in San Francisco January 1976 and ended 3800
miles later in Washington, D.C., that October. The
project, involving over 10,000 people, was com-
prised of 20 routes which fed into three main routes
that entered Washington. The decentralist nature of
The Continental Walk heading towards the Pentagon, October 18. 1976.
Photo by Larry Johnson.
the project was reflected in the network of
organizers around the country who set up demon-
strations linking their community issues with the
national and international issues of the Walk.
As the first major disarmament project since
before the beginning of the Vietnam War, the Walk
sought not only to raise the need to refocus on dis-
armament, but to establish the inseparable link with
economic and other social justice issues, strengthen
local organizing, and lessen the isolation felt by
many organizers around the country.
Following the Walk, League members played a
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
key role in the creation of a coalition which would
continue to push for the elimination of nuclear
weapons. In the Spring of 1977 the Mobilization for
Survival (MfS) was formed with four goals: zero
nuclear weapons, ban nuclear power, meet human
needs, and stop the arms race.
WRL contributed staff time to the first major
project of the Mobilization, the May 27, 1978 rally
of 15,000 at the United Nations at the beginning of
the UN Special Session on Disarmament. On June
12, 400 people were arrested as part of the WRL-
initiated Sit-in for Survival which tried to blockade
the US Mission to the UN.
WRL staff member Grace Hedemann being loaded on stretcher June 12.
1978. outside U. S Mission Photo by Paul Hosetros/New York Times
In an effort to dramatize the disarmament and
anti-nuclear issues, the League organized simultan-
eous civil disobedience actions in Moscow's Red
Square and on the White House front lawn. The
September 1978 actions resulted in world-wide
publicity. The seven Red Square demonstrators
were detained only briefly. However, the eleven
arrested at the White House were convicted after a
week-long trial and given a $100 fine and a 6-
month suspended sentence.
As the MfS was being organized, the anti-nuclear
movement was undergoing a rebirth and dramatic
growth. This time around there was a new element:
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
opposition was aimed primarily at nuclear power
plants and the associated radiation hazards. The
resurgence was in large part due to the dramatic
April 30, 1977, civil disobedience organized by the
Clamshell Alliance at the Seabrook, NH, nuclear
power plant. Many WRL staff and members were
among the 1415 arrested and jailed for two weeks
"New York City 339" affinity group (composed of WRL, WIN, and
Catholic Worker folks) just before the 1977 occupation. Photo by Ed
Hedemann.
in armories. The publicity of the occupation stimu-
lated the formation of anti-nuclear "alliances" all
over the country. Their formation in conjunction
with the March 1979 accident at the Three Mile
Island nuclear power plant near Harrisburg, PA,
created an effective movement which has put the
nuclear industry on the defensive.
WRL national staff and members contributed
significant time to the training, organizing,
participation, and development of materials for
many of the anti-nuclear occupations around the
country (such as the 1978 Seabrook rally, the 1979
Shoreham occupation with 660 arrests, the
blockade of the New York Stock Exchange where
1000 were arrested, and the 1980 Pentagon
blockade with 600 arrests). In these efforts the
League emphasis was on making clear the
inseparable connections between nuclear power
and nuclear weapons. One of the most successful
pieces of anti-nuclear materials created by WRL
was the "Nuclear America" map, displaying and
listing the more than 500 nuclear facilities in the
United States. WRL members also aided in the
training in nonviolence which inevitably preceeded
the occupations. Not since the civil rights
movement has so much emphasis been placed on
nonviolence.
16
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
Local Organizing
Since the late sixties, the League has seen a
need to encourage formation of WRL local groups.
The locals have the distinct advantage of bringing
the pacifist message and League program to people
around the country more effectively than mailings
from the national office. League members can join
together to study the application of nonviolence to
all issues, and to actively demonstrate against war
and its causes.
To aid local organizers, the national office has
created the WRL Organizer's Manual, a number of
action packets, the WRL Organizer's Bulletin,
among other materials. In addition, WRL has held
annual 2-week training programs for organizers,
since 1972. The League makes available literature,
films, and slide shows at a discount for local groups.
The network of some 15 local groups including 2
regional offices helps remove feelings of isolation
among pacifists in many areas of the country. Such
a network can also be called on from time to time to
react in unison to a given crisis situation.
International
Less well known, but of real importance, is the
League's international program which, through the
War Resisters' International, maintains contact with
sections in 18 countries and pacifists in 80 countries
throughout the world. WRL is directly represented
on the Council of WRI and helps coordinate non-
violent work across national boundaries. Each year
the League sends an American organizer to work
with the WRI staff. In addition, the WRL is a mem-
ber of the International Confederation for Disarma-
ment and Peace.
The League has had a special influence in the
nonviolent revolutionary movement in Africa, and
in 1953 raised funds to send a representative to
what is now Ghana to explore nonviolent possi-
bilities there. WRL was also involved in the estab-
lishment of the World Peace Brigade in 1961 and
created a training center for nonviolence in Dar-es-
Salaam, Tanzania.
In 1951, four League members participated in a
bicycle trip across Europe calling on soldiers of all
countries to lay down their weapons. Then in 1961
League members and staff participated in the
CNVA San Francisco to Moscow Walk for Peace.
And in 1968 the League sent two members to
participate in a WRI-sponsored protest in the
17
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
Bill Sutherland, Ralph DiGia, David Dellinger, and Art Emery in Vienna
during their attempt to bicycle from Paris to Moscow for disarmament,
October 15, 1951.
Warsaw Pact capitals against the Soviet invasion of
Czechoslovakia. In 1973 WRI sent delegates to
Moscow for an international peace conference,
who met with Soviet dissenters, were arrested in
the GUM department store for handing out a
Russian-language statement in support of dissent,
and read a statement at the conference-a state-
ment drafted by WRL staff and signed by leading
anti-war Americans-defending the universal right
of free expression. Finally in 1978, the WRL or-
ganized the simultaneous Moscow-Washington dis-
armament action, mentioned above.
Periodically, the League sends representatives to
international conferences such as the 1949 World
Pacifist Congress in India, and more recently, the
1974 Anti-Militarism Congress in Brussels and the
1976 International Women's Gathering in France,
and the WRI Triennial Conferences held all over
the world. In addition, WRL sent a contingent of 5
to participate in the 1977 Japanese anti-nuclear
weapons march, which was followed by
conferences in Hiroshima.
From time to time, the League has staged small
actions at foreign consulates or airline offices
opposing a nuclear test or in solidarity with
dissenters.
Today and Tomorrow
With the return of draft registration for all male
youth in 1980 (40 years after the first peacetime
draft), the War Resisters League has shifted its
energies into developing draft resistance materials,
organizing demonstrations to disrupt the registra-
tion process, and speaking on the draft. In
opposing the draft, the League makes clear its
18
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
opposition to the economic conscription of the All
"Volunteer" Army, as well.
The League is participating in the 1980 Survival
Summer project of the Mobilization for Survival: an
effort to do community grass roots educational
work on the nuclear, arms, and economic issues
which threaten human existence. In addition, the
WRL regional offices and local groups have
developed their own programs. For example,
WRL/West has initiated a project to convert the
nuclear weapons lab facilities at the University of
California at Berkeley. WRL Southeast has been
involved in organizing and coalition work against
the Klu Klux Klan in North Carolina. Both regional
offices maintain strong feminism and nonviolence
programs.
The educational component of the War Resisters
League is manifested in several ways. Since 1945,
the League has published WRL News on a
bimonthly basis. WRL maintains a literature
program of about 200 titles. The publication of the
WRL Peace Calendar (annual sales of 20,000),
with a different theme each year, is a major
event and an important fund raiser. The League
publishes other materials such as brochures,
booklets, analyses of current events, political
posters, WRL T-shirts, buttons, and organizing
packets. Each year a national conference or
several regional conferences are held. Annual
Fiftieth Anniversary Conference of the War Resisters League. August
1973. Photo by Grace Hedemann.
dinners are put together in New York and San
Francisco. The national office (and sometimes the
regional offices) offers a yearly 2-week training pro-
gram for organizers. Among other educational/
fund raising events, the WRL has organized a street
fair in Greenwich Village with the Washington
Square Church each fall since 1976.
19
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
The following task forces were set up to develop
ideas and program for the League: disarmament/
peace conversion, feminism, racism, classism,
prisons, and nuclear power. Among the programs
which have come out of these task forces was the
1974 Coalition on the Economic Crisis, the Prison
Newsletter, a feminism and nonviolence packet,
and the emphasis on and production of materials
for counter-recruitment.
In the past sixty years, but especially since World
War II, pacifist and nonviolence tactics have
emerged as a central force in the American radical
movement. But the nonviolent idea is still in its
early stage and pacifists still have much to learn
about its potential. As long as the threat of war
remains-and violent eruptions occur throughout
the world-the League will continue to work for the
abolition of war, using the direct action and edu-
cation techniques that were effective in the past.
Committed not only to war resistance, but also to
the nonviolent removal of all causes of war, the
League's outlook is particularly appropriate to the
nation's-and the world's-needs of today: radical
exploration and courageous change, disciplined by
a rigorous commitment to nonviolence. To feel
outrage and anger-only-is not enough; by them-
selves they frequently lead to actions which prove
little more than one's frustration and inability to
cope with political realities. What is needed, in
addition to indignation, is our sharpest under-
standing and our deepest insights. These qualities
are particularly exercised by the commitment to
nonviolence.
This leads us to deal with processes and institu-
tions rather than with human "enemies." This leads
us to a vision of a global community in which there
is action without hatred, revolution without guns,
justice without prisons.
The War Resisters League is continuing its work
to make the nonviolent way of life a political and
social reality.
20
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
The WRL contingent at the April 26, 1980, anti-nuclear rally in
Washington, D. C. Photo by Karl Bissinger.
21
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
Nineteen members of the New York City WRL arrested for blocking the
Armed Forces Day parade, i.,ay 12, 1979. Photo by Grace Hedemann.
War Resisters League
339 Lafayette Street
New York, N.Y. 10012
212-228-0450
The War Resisters League affirms that war is a
crime against humanity. We therefore are deter-
mined not to support any kind of war, inter-
national or civil, and to strive nonviolently for the
removal of all causes of war.
Statement of Purpose
signed
^ I support this statement and wish to enroll as
a member of the War Resisters League
^ Please send information on organizing for
WRL.
^ Enclosed is $ for the work of the
League.
Name
Address
City State Zip
Regional Offices:
WRL/West WRL/Southeast
85 Carl Street 604 West Chapel Hill St.
San Francisco, CA Durham, NC 27701
94117 27701
415-731-1220 919-682-6374
-------------------------------------
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
Scott Abbott
Nanci Bower
Dorie Bunting
Ann Davidon
Ruth Dear
Clark Field
Larry Gara
Diane Hampton
Peter Klotz-Chamberlain
tThe NC is composed of these
as well as the EC, and one
WRL local group.
Inuka Mwanguzi
Liz Rigali
Vic Schumacher
Joanne Sheehan
Bobby Slovak
Tim Sperry
Dorie Wilsnack
Beverly Woodward
members elected at large,
representative from each
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
Norma Becker, Edna Coleman
Chairwoman William Douthard
Bent Andresen Robert Ellsberg
Marls Cakars Kathy Engel
Susan Cakars Linnea Lacefield
Sybil Claiborne' Murray Rosenblith
Jerry Coffin Wendy Schwartz
Lynne Shatzkin Coffin Allan Solomonow
'Member of the Steering Committee
NATIONAL STAFF
Karl Bissinger Grace Hedemann
Ralph DiGia David McReynolds
Merriel Fish Susan Pines
Ed Hedemann Igal Roodenko
The WRL National Committee, March 9, 1980. Photo by Karl Bissinger.
23
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
how TO OVERTHROW
the government
(and other un-American activities)
by the
C.I.A.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
Want to learn how to overthrow the government? Need lessons in kidnapping
and murder? The CIA can help round out your education. We've culled some
of the juicier quotes from the CIA's recent "dirty tricks" manual designed
to aid the contras in overthrowing the government of Nicaragua.
The contras are a military force dominated by former Nicaraguan National
Guardsmen, the secret police of the Somoza dictatorship which was finally
deposed by the present government in 1979. The Somoza government, which
represented 14 families who owned most of the land in Nicaragua, was
infamous for its brutal domestic policies -- which were supported by the
U.S. government. The new Nicaraguan government includes social democrats,
Catholics, labor and farmworker organizations, and yes, some Marxists.
We in the War Resisters League do not believe there is any justification
for American dirty tricks, economic boycotts, or invasion threats. Seventy
percent of the American people have already said they don't want war in
Central America. Yet Congress has ignored our desires and funded a secret,
undeclared war against the Nicaraguan people. The Congress has now
approved "humanitarian" aid to the contra army -- aid which simply frees up
other funds to buy guns and bullets.
The quotes below are taken from the CIA manual Psychological Operations in
Guerrilla Warfare. Copies of the complete manual are available in Spanish
and English from the Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress,
Washington, D.C. 20540.
'Kidnap all officials or agents of the Sandinista government and replace
them in public places' with military or civilian persons of trust to our
movement."
"It is possible to neutralize carefully selected and planned targets, such
as court judges, municipal judges, police and State Security officials, CDS
chiefs, etc. For psychological purposes it is necessary to take extreme
precautions, and it is absolutely necessary to gather together the
population affected, so that they will be present, take part in the act,
and formulate accusations against the oppressor!'
"If, for example, it should be necessary for one of the advanced posts to
have to fire on a citizen . . . explain that if that citizen had managed to
escape, he would have alerted the enemy that is near the town or city, and
they would carry out acts of reprisal such as rapes, pillage, destruction,
captures, etc., in this way terrorizing the inhabitants of the place for
having given attention and hospitalities to the guerrillas of the town"
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
'Set up ambushes, in order to delay the reinforcements in all the possible
entry routes!'
'Cut all outside lines of communication: cables, radio, messengers!'
"If possible, professional criminals will be hired to carry out specific
selective jobs!'
"[Using] local and national history, make it clear that the Sandinista
regime is 'foreignizing,' 'repressive; and imperialistic; and that even
though there are some Nicaraguans within the government, point out that
they are 'puppets' of the power of the Soviets and Cubans, i.e., of foreign
power."
"When the enemy is equal in the number of its forces, there should be an
immediate retreat, and then the enemy should be ambushed or eliminated by
means of sharpshooters:'
"Specific tasks will be assigned to others, in order to create a 'martyr'
for the cause, taking the demonstrators to a confrontation with the
authorities, in order to bring about uprisings or shootings which will
cause the death of one or more persons, who would become the martyrs, a
situation that should be made use of immediately against the regime, in
order to create greater conflicts!'
"A guerrilla armed force always involves implicit terror because the
population, without saying it aloud, feels terror that the weapons may be
used against them. However, if the terror does not become explicit,
positive results can be expected
In a revolution, the individual lives under a constant threat of physical
damage. If the government police cannot put an end to the guerrilla
activities, the population will lose confidence in the government, which
has the inherent mission of guaranteeing the safety of citizens. However,
the guerrillas should be careful not to become an explicit terror, because
this would result in a loss of popular support!'
"Shock troops. These men should be equipped with weapons (knives, razors,
chains, clubs, bludgeons) and should march slightly behind the innocent and
gullible participant. They should carry their weapons hidden. They will
enter into action only as 'reinforcements,' if the guerrilla agitators are
attacked by the police. They will enter the scene quickly, violently and
by surprise, in order to distract the authorities, in this way making
possible the withdrawal or rapid escape of the inside commando."
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8
"The comandantes will remember that this type of operation such as the
Fifth Column which was used in the first part of the Second World War, and
that through infiltration and subversion tactics allowed the Germans to
penetrate the target countries before the invasions. They managed to enter
Poland, Belgium, Holland and France in a month and Norway in a week. The
effectiveness of this tactic has been clearly demonstrated in several wars
and can be used effectively by the Freedom Commandos!'
The activities enumerated above, endorsed and recommended by the CIA are in
direct violation of the following laws:
1. US Statutory Law. The Boland Amendment of 1984
specifically forbids the use of U.S. funds "for the
purpose of overthrowing the Nicaraguan Government."
2. US Constitution. Article VI, Section 2 states that we
are bound by all treaties that our Congress ratifies.
Further, these treaties have the force of law and are
to be respected and followed as absolutely as any law
that Congress enacts.
3. International Law. Congress has ratified more than ten
treaties and conventions which prohibit CIA terrorist
activities described above. For example, the
Organization of American States Charter prohibits in
Art. 18 and 19 intervention in the internal affairs of
another American national by any "coercive" military,
political or economic means; the Convention on
Terrorism prohibits the use of terrorist tactics by any
nation.
This leaflet was prepared and distributed by the War Resisters League
affinity group
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00806R000201180001-8