Armed forces

On 9 April, Easter Monday, former SAS soldier Ben Griffin will officially launch Veterans for Peace in the UK. The group, founded in the US over 25 years ago, is committed to resisting war through nonviolent action.

Speaking at the event will be British and US veterans of the Second World War, the Malayan Emergency, Vietnam, Northern Ireland, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Ben Griffin said: ‘We live in a society that is constantly bombarded with one view of the wars that we…

Navy medic and conscientious objector Michael Lyons was released from Colchester military prison on 9 November. He had served a seven-month sentence for refusing to take part in rifle training in September 2010 because he disagreed with the war in Afghanistan, and was not prepared to shoot to kill. (PN 2537)

Supporters of Veterans for Peace, London Catholic Worker and Peace News raised over £1,000 to help Michael’s wife Lillian with the travel costs associated with visiting Michael in…

At the end of November, the Daily Telegraph learned that the British ministry of defence (MoD) had increased the number of soldiers due to be cut from the army from 7,000 to 16,500 by April 2015.

Up to a quarter of Britain's infantry battalions and almost half of its cavalry regiments could be disbanded.

Also in November, the national audit office (NAO) reported that financial incompetence by the MoD had led to delays in deploying new

Astute-class submarines, which in…

He has been on hunger strike since 23 August in protest at his conviction in March for violating article 184 of the Egyptian penal code, which criminalises any criticism of the military.

Maikel had published an article exposing the role of the military during and after the revolution, for which he was sentenced to three years in prison in a trial in front of a military court and without a lawyer. His appeal was scheduled for 4 October, but then adjourned because a file was missing.…

He had been convicted of “wilful disobedience” after he asked not to participate in the training as he had applied for conscientious objector status. He was given 7 months detention, stripped of his rank as leading medical assistant and dismissed from the service.

On 13 October three judges sitting at the court of appeal rejected the challenge to his conviction and also dismissed his appeal against his “manifestly excessive” sentence. Last December he applied for dismissal on the…

It is important for both Michael and myself to let you know how much we appreciate your support whilst my husband is locked up in military prison. Every message, letter and show of face means the world to us and is really helping us to get through this crazy time in our lives.

I am sure most of you know why Michael has been punished by the royal navy so I won’t waste your time regurgitating the details of his case, the intimidating court martials or the legality of his defence.…

Michael Lyons, a navy medic was jailed for seven months for refusing to be trained to use a rifle. He felt that he “wasn’t able to carry out the order on ethical and moral grounds”.

Michael joined the navy when he was 18 but later developed a moral objection to the war in Afghanistan. At his Conscientious Objector hearing he said “If you're at a patrol base or forward operating base, it's likely you'll have to use your weapon and will have to turn civilians away who are in need of…

In July ForcesWatch launched the Military Out of Schools campaign. Speakers Oskar Castro, a US activist in countering military recruitment, and Ben Griffin, ex-forces and the founder of fledgling Veterans for Peace UK, discussed how young people are militarised and what can be done about it.

US counter-recruitment has developed over the last 10 years to many thousands of individuals and hundreds of organisations. The terms “truth and recruitment” or “alternatives to the military” are…

Where’s the nearest army recruitment centre to you in Wales? Is there a company in your town selling combat raiding craft or “rugged use” military laptops? Is your local university teaming up with Rolls Royce to research the latest military technology? The Khaki Dragon project aims to bring together information on how the land, people, skills and knowledge within Wales contributes to war. The initial Khaki Dragon report Mapping Military Wales is soon to be available bilingually. It shows…

PN: OK, so tell us a bit about your background -- how and why you got into the military and about your personal journey.

AW: Well I joined the military right after I graduated from college, mainly because I wanted

“The RAF’s over-budget Typhoon fighter jets are being deployed in Libya on missions for which they are ill-equipped, because military chiefs are anxious to justify their high cost,” military sources revealed to The Times on 23 April.

The first combat attack by the Eurofighter Typhoon was carried out on 12 April, the day before a highly critical report on the £37bn* Typhoon programme by the public accounts committee (PAC) of the house of commons was due to be published. The…

In the latest British Army Review, a British officer in Afghanistan criticises the command structure there as a “bloated over-complex system that sucks the life out of operations”. The anonymous officer observes: “we’re not saying our commanders are fat, lazy child killers, far from it, but it has reached a point where their headquarters are”.

It may seem a strange preoccupation for a pacifist, but I am very concerned about the injustices suffered by members of the armed forces.

I sometimes despair about the ignorance of the civilian public, particularly the peace movement, about the situation faced by soldiers. Their contracts of employment resemble those of eighteenth-century apprentices.

On 5 March, there was a Stop the War Coalition “Free Joe Glenton” demonstration in Colchester. Some soldiers ran past…

The British Government is considering plans to redeploy British troops in Afghanistan from the more dangerous, northern areas of Helmand province to its quieter central districts, in an attempt to undermine growing anti-war sentiment here in the UK. 71% of Britons support a one-year withdrawal of all British forces (see PN 2516/17).

McChrystal’s thinking

The move is apparently the brainchild of the head of US/NATO forces in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal.
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Do you support the troops? Are you proud of them? It would be a brave – or perhaps foolhardy – person in public life who said no.

Indeed, in a recent speech to mark the end of military operations in Iraq, archbishop Rowan Williams – the dangerous radical who once got himself arrested at an CND protest – declared the need for all of us to “speak our thanks for those who have taught us through their sacrifice the sheer worth of justice and peace.” He was talking about British…