20251022 Kriegsdienst verweigern!

22.10.2025 Kriegsdienst verweigern!

School without military lives on

From 2009 to 2015, Aktion Freiheit statt Angst e.V. was active in the Berlin initiative “School without the Military” organized by parents, students, and the Education and Science Union (GEW). We warned students with flyers when we learned that “career counselors” or “youth officers” from the German Armed Forces wanted to visit their classes. The following list shows some highlights.

Revive “School without the military”!

Now it seems urgent to revive this alliance, because the suspension of compulsory military service is coming to an end and as early as next year, all young people are to be registered again for possible military service. At the very least, young people should be informed about their rights before such a request lands on their doorstep.

Refuse before it's too late?

Where and how? This is explained by the BAFzA, the Federal Office for Family Affairs and Civil Society Matters
Arguments for conscientious objection can be found at the DFG/VK, the German Peace Society, United War Resisters
Legal assistance is available in emergencies from specialized law firms, such as Kanzlei SHB
... before it's too late? On Verfassungsblog.de, a professor of public law dispels fear that in the event of “defense,” i.e., war, the Basic Law and thus also the right to conscientious objection no longer apply. However, this will certainly not make refusal any easier in practice.
Where can you get involved? Not only can you find out more about the issue, you can also take action yourself for a more peaceful world at KriegsdienstBLOCKER.de and in the many groups of the peace movement (IPPNW, Friedensratschlag, Netzwerk Friedenskoordination, ICAN, trade union peace groups, FfF, Attac, etc.).

Those active in Freiheit statt Angst (Freedom Not Fear) will also be paying more attention to this issue in future, because politicians and the media want to push us towards “war readiness” instead of following the peace mandate of the German constitution.

PS. An example from this morning also prompted this article. The news on Inforadio.de reported that CDU member of parliament Kiesewetter, a member of the defense committee, had said that Russia had already laid claim to the Baltic states and Poland and demanded that these states leave NATO. No evidence was provided for this claim. This reminds us once again that this politician also claimed that Chancellor Scholz wanted to meet with President Putin a year ago – and why not? Negotiating is always better than shooting. However, SPD parliamentary group leader Rolf Mützenich and SPD secretary-general Matthias Miersch call this “pure fiction” and demand that the CDU politician retract this claim on X.
Stop war propaganda and fake news!

Update:

Here is the latest information for December 5. https://schulstreikgegenwehrpflicht.com/

More of our articles on “School without the military” https://www.a-fsa.de/cgi-bin/searchartl.pl?suche=Schule+Militär&sel=meta