Ploughshares into swords?

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The government’s ‘Strategic Defence Review’ was published last week, setting out an agenda for increases in nuclear weapons capacity, in the use of drones for warfare, in promotion of militarism to young people and wider society, and in arms production, amongst other points. All in the name of ‘war-fighting readiness’ and arguing that this provides a ‘defence dividend’. (link to BBC overview) If this is realised, it will require significant levels of funding and have implications for the lives of many, through use of these weapons and as a results of cuts to other areas of expenditure. At the bottom of this piece are links to a range of responses from Quakers and others who bring a different understandingof the nature of security.

A simple message that we shared on social media on the day of the announcement came in the form of a poster that NFPB printed last century, quoting former Quaker MP T. Edmund Harvey ‘If we go on turning ploughshares into swords how can we expect a harvest of peace?’. This has clearly struck a chord with many people, having been more widely shared and viewed than anything we have put on social media previously. The message today is just as simple; if we prepare for war, we are more likely to get war.

The challenge for Friends and others who share our alarm at the UK government’s current approach is to identify those things that we can do to plant and nurture in the interests of peace, as well as speaking out clearly on our concerns about this most recent defence review. An agenda and set of commitments has been set in motion and no quick response is going to suddenly convince the government to change direction. We do, however, have a responsibility to be prepared for the long haul in promoting alternatives and a radically different vision.  Let us then try what love will do. (William Penn)

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