GLOBAL ACTION TO

GLOBAL ACTION TO PREVENT WAR

A COALITION-BUILDING EFFORT TO STOP WAR, GENOCIDE,

AND INTERNAL ARMED CONFLICT

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GlobalAction Steering Committee

c/o Institute for Defense and Disarmament Studies

675 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02139

U. S. A.

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GLOBAL ACTION TO PREVENT WAR

A COALITION-BUILDING EFFORT TO STOP WAR, GENOCIDE,

AND INTERNAL ARMED CONFLICT

War is as pervasive as the wish for peace is universal. Confronted with a world that cannot be changed, reasonable people adapt and accommodate. The turning points of history and progress in human civilization have come from those who set out to change the world.

A group of unreasonable people have formed "Global Action to Prevent War: An International Coalition to Stop Armed Conflict and Genocide" (GlobalAction). The causes of war are many and complex. Our call to end it is single-minded and simple.

The past century was the most lethal in human history. Over 200 million people were killed in 250 wars and genocidal onslaughts, more than in the past two thousand years. More than six million people have died in war since the end of the Cold War: so much for the peace dividend. The river of human blood is still flowing, scarring survivors with crippling wounds and deep personal loss, sweeping away the painstaking work of generations of human hands and minds.

Cynics insist that war is an inherent part of human society. To end war would be to end history. Maybe. But crime and poverty, too, have always been part of human history. Any political leader who admitted to giving up on the fight to end crime or poverty would quickly be returned to private life by voters. Paradoxically, in the case of war, those who seek to abolish it are the ones to be considered soft in the head.

The world’s societies and governments already have the knowledge and resources to stop the killing. GlobalAction provides the missing link for the sustained, systematic, worldwide application of these resources and knowledge. We believe that killing fields can be turned into playing fields and rice fields.

GlobalAction is a comprehensive project for reducing and eliminating armed conflict. It envisages four phases of change, each lasting 5—10 years, with a wide array of measures to prevent war and genocide.

Specifically, the program:

Increases international capacity for early warning and early action, such as mediation, to prevent the escalation of disputes into armed violence;
Works against arms races and offensive military strategies that breed mistrust and war;
Guards against genocide; and
Builds commitment to the rule of law and the peaceful resolution of conflicts.

GlobalAction is a coalition-building platform for peoples and governments everywhere. Some components of the program, such as cuts in conventional and nuclear arms or multilateral action against aggression and genocide, concern mainly governments and civil society, working in combination. Other components, such as those dealing with nonviolent conflict resolution and peace education, can be implemented separately by individuals and state and local communities as well as by national governments.

GlobalAction is a work in progress. The current phase is one of strengthening and disseminating basic concepts and recruiting coalition members. Concerned individuals around the world are invited to make suggestions and report activities to the GlobalAction website < www.globalactionpw.org >. GlobalAction working groups are promoting priority components of the GlobalAction program. The goal of this process is to support and supplement the many efforts for peace already under way by adding important elements and uniting all components in a common, integrated program. The sense of common action, in turn, will reinforce the existing projects and facilitate coordinated efforts.

The ambitious goals of the GlobalAction program cannot be achieved quickly. Building support for the program will take several years, and launching the first phase will take some years more. But sustained, coordinated efforts can end the killing fields, and has the potential to mobilize and focus such efforts.

 THE CHALLENGE…

The world is failing to prevent new outbreaks of armed conflict, at great cost. The statistics are dismaying. According to some estimates, up to 35 million people–90% of them civilians–have been killed in 170 wars since the end of World War II. Nearly thirty wars are now under way, most of them inside national boundaries. In addition to the tragic loss of life and limb, and mourning that often lasts for many lifetimes, these conflicts breed international terrorism and they have huge economic costs–war’s damage to productive economic activity is immense. Together, the world’s governments spend over $1 million a minute–over $1 billion per day–on the military.

According to one traditional view, war is a built-in defect of the human species. If this were the case, humanity would have to suffer the appalling consequences of this defect—now augmented by biological, chemical, nuclear, and space weapons—for all time to come.

However, this view is fundamentally incorrect. The capability for individuals to use physical violence against each other is innate. But war—organized armed violence—is learned behavior, learned from instructors, on the training ground, in the guerrilla camp, and in the staff college, and learned from social values that are used to justify many forms of war. The answer to learned behavior is to change the pattern of learning, to modify the social values that lead to violence, and to make resort to war more difficult through improved prevention and disarmament.

 … AND THE OPPORTUNITY

Today we have a rare opportunity to mobilize government and public support for a

comprehensive approach to war prevention. For the first time in centuries, there is neither war nor imminent threat of war between major powers. Working relationships among the world’s top military powers, while not always cordial, have opened a window of opportunity for cooperation to strengthen UN and regional conflict resolution and peacekeeping capabilities and to reduce global arms deployment, production, and trade. The increase in the number of practicing democracies is another favorable factor: History indicates that practicing democracies are less likely to go to war with one another.

In our view, some degree of conflict, in the sense of opposing objectives and interests, is endemic in human society. Sometimes it has positive results. GlobalAction does not believe it is possible or even desirable to eradicate this type of conflict. GlobalAction seeks to prevent its development into armed conflict. As regards organized armed conflict, we do not fully understand the process by which problems like poverty, injustice, group antagonisms, and inequitable distribution of scarce resources are transmuted into armed conflict. Often these causes exist and armed conflict ensues; often they exist and there is no conflict. The process is not automatic. Other factors are involved before there is conflict. Both the International Steering Committee and the US Steering Committee of GlobalAction have established special working groups to promote linkage and cooperation with groups and programs that deal with basic causes of conflict.

Step-by-step, GlobalAction would establish a comprehensive world security system comprising a well-financed UN with its own readiness forces, pro-active in conflict prevention, and a fully developed network of universal-membership regional security institutions, each with its own conflict prevention and peacekeeping capability. This would be paralleled by cuts in nuclear and conventional (non-nuclear) armed forces and a binding commitment not to send armed forces beyond national borders except under the auspices of the UN or regional security organizations.

Conflict Prevention

Innovative concepts for conflict avoidance, distilled from the bitter experiences of the past century, offer powerful new tools to help prevent war. These include:

Confidence-building measures;
Transparency and information exchange;
Mutual constraints on force deployments and activities;
Negotiated reductions in armed forces; and
Restrictions on arms holdings, production and trade.

New Measures for Peacekeeping

Pre-conflict early warning and action, including diplomatic intervention, mediation, judicial processes, and preventive deployment of armed forces; and
Post-conflict peacekeeping and peace-building.

Disarmament

Programs to reduce military spending are underway in many countries. Disarmament must cover both nuclear and conventional arms, and multilateral institutions for peacemaking must be strengthened before countries can be expected to radically cut their standing armed forces.

For nuclear arms, the concept of separate programs has had some success because the many issues into which nuclear arms control has been divided–testing ban, bilateral reductions, nonproliferation, ending production of fissile material, and disposing of fissile material–are all supported by strong public rejection of nuclear weapons. For conventional forces, in contrast, the disaggregation of disarmament into separate projects has fragmented interest, dividing support among many worthwhile measures such as limits on arms transfers or cuts in military spending. Peacekeeping has been completely separated from efforts to reduce conflict through arms control.

Instead of striving for peace in fragments, it is time to bring together these diverse approaches in a unified program to prevent war. Such an approach will supplement and strengthen existing peacemaking and arms control programs by building a broader coalition of interested publics and government officials to support them.

The GlobalAction Program Will Help to Prevent All Types of Wars

For internal conflicts, it proposes a broad array of conflict prevention measures to be applied by the UN, regional security organizations, and international courts.

For conflicts between neighboring states, it proposes force reductions, defensively-oriented changes in force structure, and confidence-building measures and constraints on force activities tailored to each conflict.

To reduce the risk of war among the major powers, it proposes that they cooperate in preventing smaller wars and make step-by-step cuts in their conventional and nuclear forces, ultimately eliminating their capacity to attack each other with any chance of success.

At the same time, by increasing respect for human dignity and saving billions of dollars for productive uses, GlobalAction will reduce structural violence. It will strengthen efforts to meet basic human needs, build tolerance, and protect the environment; and it will foster the democratic institutions that must ultimately replace armed force in achieving justice and meeting human needs.

 THE GLOBAL ACTION PROGRAM: A PHASED PROCESS OF CHANGE 

To succeed in mobilizing broad support, a program of action to prevent deadly conflict should meet several requirements:

It should be careful not to increase some risks of war inadvertently while reducing others;
It should strengthen commitment to nonviolent conflict resolution;
It should offer substantial economic benefits; and
It should include means of overcoming domestic resistance to change rooted in inertia, ignorance, and vested interests.

The GlobalAction program seeks to meet these criteria. Militarily, it proposes gradual step-by-step changes, designed to avoid creating new situations of uncertainty in which the risk of war might rise. Morally, it underscores commitment to the rule of law and to peaceful dispute resolution in three ways: it radically enhances institutions for war prevention; it limits accepted uses of force to deterring and defending against aggression, genocide, and other forms of organized violence; step-by-step it replaces national armed forces, which can be used in arbitrary, self-interested ways, with UN and regional forces for use in a nonpartisan way.

Economically, this program should bring major savings both to the populations of areas that might be struck by armed conflict and to donors of emergency relief and reconstruction aid. In addition, by cutting the world’s largest conventional armed forces and major weapon systems–which take 95% of world military spending–the program should release enormous resources for non-military uses. After an initial period of transition and conversion, these savings could be directed to nationally-adapted combinations of tax cuts, domestic programs for health and education, international debt relief, development aid, and to special relief programs for war-torn countries.

With respect to potential internal obstacles to change–employment in defense-dependent communities, profits in arms industries, jobs for veterans, the careers of senior military officers, and so on–a gradual process of change will facilitate a smooth transition to non-military employment and production. It will mobilize local as well as national support by ending local boom-and-bust cycles of funding for arms production, strengthening economic growth, and releasing a large part of government spending for other needs.

GlobalAction sets out a comprehensive approach to war prevention, with a plan to reduce the frequency and devastation of war and the scale of preparations for war throughout the world. We expect that once implemented, GlobalAction will achieve these goals–but also that achieving broad agreement from world governments to proceed with the program could be slow and difficult, especially at the outset. That is why the GlobalAction program provides for a long effort, which will be sustained by a very broad coalition of organizations, individuals, and interested governments until the program wins the support of the governments of many countries, especially the United States and other heavily armed countries.

Coalition-building among Organizations and Individuals

Supporters of GlobalAction are still disseminating the GlobalAction concept and acting to build a broad coalition. Those who are already committed should ask interested individuals, groups, and organizations to discuss the GlobalAction program in detail and give it the widest possible distribution–to friends, relatives, colleagues, religious and political leaders, and others.

GlobalAction 's first goal, to be achieved in the next two—three years, is to establish an international coalition of groups and individuals who are sufficiently committed and influential to make GlobalAction known worldwide as a serious long-term enterprise with increasing visibility and momentum and to begin to promote the set of priority goals described at the beginning of this paper.

By 2005, we hope to establish name recognition and understanding of GlobalAction roughly equivalent to what exists today for the leading environmental and human rights organizations. Once many committed people throughout the world conclude that GlobalAction offers a practical and effective program to make armed conflict rare, this effort will tap into the universal desire for peace and support for GlobalAction will spread much more rapidly.

High Priority Near Term Goals

A key form of action in the first stage is to establish working groups that actively promote specific components of the GlobalAction program–or, if effective networks for specific components already exist, to promote and support their efforts.

In May 2000, in a meeting at Rutgers University Law School, GlobalAction established an international steering committee of over thirty people from all over the world (names and addresses are in Annex 1). Members of GlobalAction’s USA Steering Committee Executive Committee are listed in Annex 2. The International Steering Committee established 14 working groups (names and chairs in Annex 3). Working groups bring together GlobalAction supporters to promote and advance individual components or aspects of the GlobalAction program. They are the action element of the project.

Developing Support among Governments

Key government officials in several countries have already expressed serious interest in and support for the GlobalAction program. GlobalAction needs supporters who are willing and able to help circulate the program in the higher ranks of government in every country, soliciting favorable endorsement by working level officials. In addition, other near term goals include finding one or more friendly governments to introduce the GlobalAction program into the agenda of the UN General Assembly; and persuading various government leaders to make positive public mention of GlobalAction at suitable times, for example in speeches to the UN General Assembly.

Within ten years, if not sooner, it should be possible to gain widespread governmental acceptance in different parts of the world of the GlobalAction program. What is needed now to move the GlobalAction program forward is the formation of a broad, powerful coalition composed of concerned individuals from many different sectors, including private voluntary humanitarian and economic development organizations, peace, disarmament and religious groups, businesses, political parties, environmental organizations, and supportive government officials. Such a coalition can bring pressure to bear on governments to acknowledge the need for a comprehensive approach like that offered by the GlobalAction program, and to start by taking the modest steps proposed for the first phase of the program.

 THE PROGRAM 

GlobalAction is an integrated program for conflict reduction that derives much of its strength from its package approach. Concerted action from civil society and world governments will be needed to gain its acceptance. A treaty structure will provide a framework for this systematic cooperation over a period of years. However, this does not mean that all program components have to enter into effect simultaneously, nor that all of them must be treaty-based. Instead, many components of the GlobalAction program can be put into effect separately and soon, allowing participants in different places to focus on the issues that are most important to them.

The GlobalAction program proposes three initial phases of change, each of which lasts 5–10 years and which, taken together, lay the foundation for a fourth phase that establishes a permanent global security system. Working Groups have been formed to promote each objective.

PHASE I. STRENGTHENING GLOBAL AND REGIONAL MEANS OF WAR PREVENTION AND CONFIDENCE BUILDING 
I.1 - Strengthening the UN’s Conflict Prevention Capabilities

To prevent and end internal wars, genocide, and other large-scale armed violence, a range of steps to strengthen global and regional capabilities for conflict prevention are urgently needed and feasible. GlobalAction envisages regional peacekeeping brigades, strengthened regional machinery for mediation and reconciliation, and regional human rights and judicial machinery. Since many of the procedures and institutions proposed for Phase I already exist in some form, GlobalAction will not be starting from zero, but building on positive recent developments. For the most part, the steps proposed here do not require amendment of the UN Charter, an extremely difficult process. Once these Phase I steps are achieved, more far-reaching steps requiring Charter amendment can be considered.

The UN Secretary-General, Security Council and member states should jointly develop a program to strengthen the mediation and peacekeeping capabilities of existing universal-membership regional security organizations: the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the Organization of American States (OAS), the Organization of African Unity (OAU), and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). They should at the same time systematically promote the creation of comparable new universal-membership security organizations in the Middle East, South Asia, and Northeast Asia.

Transform NATO from a military alliance into a universal-membership regional organization by opening its membership to Russia, Ukraine and the Baltic States as well as to remaining candidates for membership and by committing itself to cooperation with the OSCE.

Establish a permanent Center for Nonviolent Conflict Prevention and Resolution at the UN, staffed by highly qualified volunteer personnel from the world’s religions, NGOs, academic institutions, business and professional communities, backed by a professional mediation corps in the UN and in each of the regional security organizations. Today, the Secretary-General has neither permanent professional personnel nor adequate funds to fulfill this function properly. When he wants to send out a conflict preventing mediation mission to head off building tension, he has to identify and borrow personnel from member states. A small corps of professionals trained in conflict prevention and resolution, selected from many cultures and skilled in grassroots work, as well as experienced experts on conflict resolution from the Center, would provide an immediate conflict-avoidance resource. A small group of mediation professionals could also be assigned to the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague, permitting it to undertake a more pro-active conflict prevention role.

To strengthen capabilities for rapid action to prevent the escalation of internal conflicts, the UN should, on a trial ten-year basis, establish a standing force of 2,000-5,000 volunteer civilian police officers trained for preventive peacekeeping, disaster relief and humanitarian aid missions. Its establishment on an experimental basis would be cheaper and encounter less political resistance than standing military forces. It could carry out many pre-conflict and post-conflict peacekeeping tasks without raising the same issues of national sovereignty with host countries as peacekeeping units from armed forces.

The General Assembly should establish a permanent Conflict Prevention Committee of its own. This committee would be a less formal, more flexible conflict prevention group than the Security Council. It would not be subject to the veto and could set its own agenda by majority vote. It would work with and supplement the work of the Security Council and also reach out to civil society actors.

Initiate or expand domestic programs for training in the nonviolent resolution of disputes in all schools and for dispute-resolution mediation and arbitration services in all communities to the public media.

Pay UN dues in full at the beginning of each calendar year. It is absurd to complain about the ineffectiveness of the United Nations while withholding the minimum funds necessary for it to do its job.

I.2 - The Security Council

A deliberate, publicized decision by the UN Security Council to undertake a pro-active conflict prevention role is a necessity for effective conflict avoidance. The Council should make the commitments in planning, organization, professional staffing, and financing needed to carry it out with determination.

Follow up with carefully targeted measures, including the possibility of full negative publicity, the use of emissaries to national leaders, carefully selected economic sanctions, preventive deployment of a peacekeeping force if the governments concerned were prepared to agree, or, as a last extreme measure, deployment of peace enforcement forces without government agreement.

I.3 — International Legal Instruments

Promote the World Court’s role in dispute settlement. Move toward an international norm of submitting disputes to the Court, and, ultimately, to obligatory submission. An effective global security system would require that the declared commitment by states to the peaceful settlement of disputes should ultimately find concrete expression in compulsory adjudication and arbitration procedures. Include in all newly concluded treaties provision for compulsory referral of unresolved disputes to the International Court of Justice.

Promote worldwide ratification of the treaty establishing the International Criminal Court making government officials individually accountable for abusive human rights treatment of their citizens when local courts fail to act.

Bring into force the UN General Assembly convention on international cooperation to prevent terrorism.

1.4 — Peacekeeping

Service in peacekeeping and mediation corps should be recognized as an alternative to military conscription or other national service.

Create rapid response peacekeeping brigades in Africa, the Americas, the Middle East, and Asia, matching the multinational Standby High Readiness Brigade (SHIRBRIG) that now exists in Europe, and make these brigades available for UN and regional peacekeeping and defense missions. A coalition of like-minded UN member states should complete a study and take the initial steps to recruit, train and finance a 10,000-person volunteer standing UN peacekeeping force, to be placed at the disposal of the Security Council, to serve for a ten-year trial period.

Establish several mobile headquarters units at the UN to permit the rapid deployment of new peacekeeping operations.

Create a $500 million contingency fund to permit such operations to begin without delay when needed.

I.6 - Human Rights and Humanitarian Intervention

UN member states should move step by step toward agreed standards for humanitarian intervention based on the following premises: governments are entrusted with stewardship of the welfare of their people, especially their human rights; governments are accountable to their people and to the international community for their conduct of this stewardship; if this stewardship is abused or neglected in an extreme way, the international community should be prepared to intervene in some form. The form of intervention should be decided on a case by case basis by the Security Council. There is a wide spectrum of possibilities, only one of which involves armed force. The Secretary General, UN member states and international courts should continue to insist that, except for defense of national territory against aggression, only the UN Security Council has the mandate to authorize the use of armed force.

The General Assembly should adopt a resolution, if possible unanimously, committing all member governments to admit immediately and facilitate the visits of official human rights monitors responding to complaints of violation of human rights. The resolution would have provision for referring cases of non-compliance to the Security Council.

The General Assembly should begin negotiations to establish an international code of minority rights for ethnic, cultural and religious minorities in treaty form, giving standing before international courts to individuals and groups representing minorities as well as to governments.

I.6 — Sanctions

"Smart" economic sanctions and incentives can be effective means of enforcing international law and upholding international norms of human rights, disarmament and democracy. If sanctions are to be imposed, however, they should be multilateral, ideally under the authority of the UN Security Council. They should be structured to avoid adverse humanitarian impacts on vulnerable populations within the target regime. They should be targeted against specific decision-making elites. Targeted financial sanctions, travel sanctions, specific commodity boycotts, and arms embargoes are recommended forms of targeted sanctions. Sanctions and incentives work best as elements of an overall bargaining strategy designed to achieve the negotiated resolution of conflict.

I.7 — Disarmament

Initiate a worldwide freeze on armed forces and a 25% cut in production and trade of major weapons and small arms. To support these measures, governments should begin by publishing the data on the components of their armed forces currently requested for the UN Conventional Arms Register, the proposed small arms register, the UN report on military spending, and the CFE and OSCE exchanges of military information.

Nuclear Disarmament. Freeze deployed nuclear weapons to existing levels, de-alert nuclear forces globally, reduce U.S. and Russian strategic and tactical nuclear warheads to total holdings of 1,500, exchange complete data on their nuclear arsenals, and commence multilateral negotiations among all nuclear weapon states, including India, Pakistan and Israel, for the reduction and elimination of their nuclear weapons.

Ban arms sales to private groups or individuals; to those engaged in armed conflict unless the Security Council determines that one side is the victim of aggression; to nations with bad human rights records, as determined by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights; and to governments that spend more on their armed forces than on health or education.

Apply a carefully-designed set of confidence-building measures, including constraints on force activities, in bilateral relationships that have the potential to lead to war.

Establish a coordinating committee to oversee implementation, verification and elimination of armaments reduced under the GlobalAction program, patterned on similar committees in START I and II, the CFE Treaty, and the Chemical Weapons Convention. The responsibilities of this committee will increase in later phases.

I.8 - Greater Accountability for the UN

As the UN and its regional counterparts play a greater role in war prevention, it will be essential to take steps to assure widespread confidence in the impartiality of their decision-making.

Abstain from using the veto. Agreements to expand membership and to amend the Charter to eliminate the veto are not likely in the short term. However, informal voluntary agreement among the five permanent members of the Security Council to use the veto sparingly might be achieved. During the last decade, all permanent members of the Council have either voted yes or abstained in many votes on several crisis areas. The P5 governments may be motivated to restrict their use of the veto by their desire to fend off constant pressures for Charter amendment, by their desire to maintain the effectiveness of the Council in peacemaking, and by a desire to maintain their own international prestige as members of a functioning Council.

Use the "uniting for peace" procedure if action by the Security Council remains blocked.

The President of the General Assembly should have an observer seat on the Security Council, allowing him to report Assembly views to the Council and vice versa.

Democratization of the UN. The UN is essentially an organization of governments staffed by government officials. A desirable step would be the creation of a Parliamentary Assembly, with its membership selected through an election process, to advise the General Assembly.

Institutionalize increased dialogue, consultation, and cooperation on peace and security between NGOs and the UN and regional security organizations. Civil society NGOs have programs in several areas of peace and security, including mediation, arbitration, and the unarmed intervention of peace brigades. Such activities, which have been growing rapidly, are likely to be increasingly useful in future as NGOs become more experienced and innovative.

PHASE II–DEEP CUTS

Phase II will continue to strengthen the means available to the international community for preventing and ending internal war and genocide. For example, governments will commit themselves to obligatory arbitration or submission of disputes to international courts, and the global network of universal-membership regional security organizations will be fully developed. The main focus of Phase II, however, will be on reducing the risks of major regional or global war. An educational campaign launched by GlobalAction will promote timely decisions to use conflict-prevention measures by educating national leaders at all levels (elected officials, military officers, and civil servants) and society at large on the need to identify potential conflicts at an early stage and take early action to prevent them from becoming far more costly and bloody armed conflicts.

The key goal in Phase II is an international treaty providing for substantial global and regional cuts in key elements of military power–force structure, military personnel, and spending–and in the holdings, production, and trade of major weapon systems combat aircraft, armed helicopters, tanks, armored personnel carriers, heavy artillery, missiles, and naval ships over 825 tonnes) and small arms.

The conventional arms reduction treaty will make proportionately larger cuts in the forces and weapon holdings and production of countries with larger armed forces. Countries with aggregate inventories of major weapons numbering over 10,000 to reduce their forces by one-third, those with inventories totaling 1,000—10,000 to cut by one-quarter, and those with inventories under 1,000 to reduce by 15%.

These global cuts will be supplemented by additional confidence-building arms reductions and defensive-oriented restructuring in areas plagued by long-standing regional conflicts. With shrinking conventional forces worldwide, decreased regional tensions, and fewer internal armed conflicts, there would be greatly reduced demand for production and trade of new weapons to replace aging holdings.

A further 50% reduction in the worldwide production and trade in major weapon systems and small arms, and in the size of arms industries, would accompany the global and regional cuts in standing armed forces outlined above.

China, Britain, and France should join the United States and Russia in negotiating reduction of their nuclear weapons arsenal to a level of 200 warheads each, with provision for monitored destruction of reduced warheads. Delivery systems would also be reduced and limited. As cuts proceed, India, Pakistan, and Israel should be brought into the system of monitoring and limitation.

UN member states will also finally implement their obligations under Articles 43 and 45 of the UN Charter to make available to the Security Council pre-designated, trained and equipped ground, air, and naval personnel, as well as ships and planes.

The individually-recruited all-volunteer peacekeeping force, hitherto experimental, will be established on a permanent basis; and the national peacekeeping forces at the disposal of the UN and regional security organizations will begin the process of gradual transition from national contingents to the growing all-volunteer force. Little by little, reliance on national military contingents for UN peacekeeping will be phased out except for very large operations.

Participants will also implement their obligation under Article 47 to establish a functioning Military Staff Committee to provide strategic direction of these forces on orders from the Security Council, and they will also establish regional Military Staff Committees to work with regional security organizations.

To prevent paralysis by veto, the Secretary-General should be authorized to deploy, for up to 30 days, military or police forces of limited size for conflict prevention (but not for Chapter VII armed intervention).

The UN should be permitted to raise money for conflict prevention and peacekeeping through sale of bonds and postage stamps in member states (peace stamps), to permit wide public participation and continued voluntary contributions by member states.

Efforts will continue during Phase II to strengthen institutions for war prevention and conflict resolution, and to prevent the outbreak of civil wars, violent ethnic conflicts, and genocide. The entire program up to this point will support a gradual shift in Phases III and IV from national to multilateral means of non-military or, if necessary, military intervention to preserve or restore peace.

PHASE III–TRIAL BAN ON UNILATERAL MILITARY INTERVENTION

By the beginning of Phase III, the UN and its regional security counterparts (which will have substantially strengthened their peacekeeping capabilities and experience in Phases I and II) should be willing and able to take responsibility for keeping the peace. In other words, they should be prepared to take steps, authorized by the Secretary-General or the Security Council (or a regional counterpart), to launch rapid multilateral non-military intervention or, as a last resort, military action aimed at preventing or ending outbreaks of war, genocide, and other forms of deadly conflict.

Participating countries, including the major powers, will test the effectiveness of the expanded global security system by making a provisional commitment not to deploy their armed forces beyond national borders except as part of a multilateral deployment under UN, or UN-authorized regional, auspices.

Since Phase II cuts will reduce national forces by no more than a third (compared with today's levels), adequate forces for unilateral national military action (to replace inadequate multilateral action) will still exist. At any time during Phase III, if participating nations conclude that their security is endangered by a failure of the UN- and regionally-based global security system, they will have the right to withdraw from this agreement. Withdrawal from the non-intervention agreement will not vitiate the commitments made in previous phases.

Negotiations to take place on another round of cuts in conventional forces and military spending to be implemented in Phase IV, when there is full confidence in the effectiveness of the global security system. A successful Phase III trial–a decade with no withdrawals and no unilateral military actions by nations with large armed forces–will be a prerequisite for proceeding with Phase IV.

By the time the Phase III Treaty is agreed, nuclear disarmament should have reached a point at which the small remaining stocks of nuclear warheads and delivery systems in all countries can be immobilized by being placed in internationally-monitored storage on the territory of the owner state. This will be the last step before the complete abolition of nuclear weapons. At the same time, the non-proliferation regime would be tightened and a worldwide treaty would limit missiles of all kinds and long-range bomber and attack aircraft.

PHASE IV–PERMANENT TRANSFER OF RESPONSIBILITY FOR GLOBAL SECURITY FROM NATIONAL TO INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTIONS

Following the trial run in Phase III, the Phase IV agreement, a treaty of indefinite duration will complete the transfer of the responsibility and capability for action to deal with international aggression, internal armed conflict, and genocide from individual nations to a global security system operated by a reformed UN and regional security organizations.

This transfer will permit and require further deep cuts in national forces, comparable to those made in Phase II (one-third, one-quarter, and 15%, respectively, for countries with very large, large, and small armed forces). Force-projection capabilities–air, naval, and logistical forces that permit military action far from national borders–will be dropped from national arsenals, in whole or in part.

While this process continues, and as UN and regional security organizations complete their transition from earmarked national contingents to fully-trained, well-equipped all-volunteer forces, the scale of the latter will grow. Production of major weapons will be restricted narrowly to systems needed by individual nations for defense of their own national territory and to weapons used by the UN and regional organizations for peacekeeping and for multilateral defense against genocide and aggression. Worldwide arms production and trade will cease except for replacements for these two purposes. Nuclear weapons will be completely eliminated in this phase.

PHASE V–ULTIMATE GOALS

As confidence in the global security system grows and military threats diminish, further changes will be desirable and should be possible. These changes, which may occur quickly or slowly, can be considered to comprise the fifth and final phase of the peacemaking process.

During this final phase, all nations will initially convert fully to "defensive security." In other words, they will limit national armed forces strictly and narrowly to national territorial defense (air defense, border defense, and defense of coasts and coastal waters — Japan’s Self Defense Forces offer a good model), leaving large-scale military intervention beyond national borders entirely to the UN and regional security organizations.

GlobalAction: AN EVER-EXPANDING, COALITION-BUILDING NETWORK-IN-FORMATION

The GlobalAction program thus covers the whole spectrum of issues relating to nonviolent conflict resolution, peacekeeping, demilitarization, and disarmament; but it is much more than a catalog of actions to prevent war. It is a 'living platform' that is constantly being updated and improved, with input from new and old supporters.

These features of the GlobalAction program facilitate independent yet mutually reinforcing efforts by supporters. Member organizations can keep the agendas they already have, or modify them in some way. They can choose the specific issues on which they focus and join or form working groups on these topics. Within the broad framework of the GlobalAction program, they can usefully focus on specific short-term goals, or work to make the overall program better understood and more widely supported, or foster broad, long-term moral and cultural change. They can work against nuclear proliferation, or against violence in children’s TV programming, or for universal school education on nonviolent conflict resolution, or for prompt payment of UN dues, or for tolerance and respect among sub-national groups–and equally well identify themselves as active participants in GlobalAction. There are many component areas in which both grassroots and governmental effort for change and improvement are needed. These include but are not limited to:

Arms control and disarmament
Confidence-building measures
Conflict early warning
Reform of the UN and a network of universal-membership regional security organizations
Improvements in multilateral peacekeeping
Steps to build a culture of peace in schools and community mediation programs
Global and regional means of aiding in post-conflict rebuilding and reconciliation
Steps to strengthen international law and the role of international courts

The Phase I goals of GlobalAction are sufficiently diverse that NGOs and individuals as well as governments all over the world will find useful areas for public education and national political debate. On certain issues, however, transnational mobilization is likely to be most effective. For example, a global campaign supporting the development of rapid response brigades, building on current efforts by the government of Canada, Denmark, Norway, and Netherlands and others, would be extremely useful. On issues where the GlobalAction program calls for steps to be codified in international treaties, national and transnational organizations might press their governments to show leadership by taking a unilateral initiative; governments might turn to NGOs to help to gain public support.

Membership and Structure

GlobalAction is a coalition-building 'network-in-formation,' inviting the active participation of old and new supporters, and evolving from a transnational campaign to a global movement. The basic structure for creating this movement is provided by the network of GlobalAction members, a worldwide association of organizations and individuals who support the general thrust of the GlobalAction program.

The GlobalAction network welcomes organizations which relate to the GlobalAction program in different ways. Some groups, such as the Hague Appeal for Peace, Earth Action, or the European Conflict Platform, may resemble GlobalAction in having multi-issue campaigns. Most groups work for specific goals covered by the overall GlobalAction platform. This applies, for example, to Abolition 2000 (a coalition advocating the start of government talks on a plan to abolish nuclear weapons), and to the campaigns against landmines and small arms, and to increase the use of the international courts.

Organizational members of GlobalAction also include organizations and individuals involved in related efforts in fields which would benefit from the success of the GlobalAction program. These fields include humanitarian aid, refugee relief, economic development, human rights, the environment, economic justice, women’s issues, domestic abuse and youth violence, and gun control. In addition, supporters includes businesses seeking stable markets and currencies and peaceful environments for international finance and trade, tourism, and transnational manufacturing industries.

The first step for organizations that are considering membership should be a thorough dissemination and discussion of the program among their members and, where needed, formal agreement by members or boards to endorse the general thrust of the GlobalAction program.

We urge members of the GlobalAction coalition to identify themselves as members in their literature, on their websites, and even on their stationery, by adding the phrase "Member of GlobalAction" or "We support GlobalAction"–and, if convenient, give a link to the GlobalAction website. This small step can have an enormous impact on the progress of all of the many goals included in the GlobalAction program because it instantly brings "brand-name" recognition to the campaign, and it quickly signals the strength in the numbers of organizations and individuals supporting a pro-active approach to war prevention, with diverse, mutually-reinforcing goals.

At the same time, the GlobalAction coalition has the potential to bring greater public, political, and financial support to participating organizations, without a significant investment of money or personnel time. The reason is that donors, politicians, and members of the public know that separate campaigns that are too narrowly based to carry the day will develop tremendous potential for success when backed by a large, diverse supporting coalition.

The GlobalAction coalition will support participating organizations in two ways: it will give support and visibility to the many existing efforts for war-prevention and disarmament; and it will spur new initiatives that would benefit existing programs, such as new pressure for deep cuts in conventional arms and military spending.

Organizational and individual members can choose their own degree of involvement in Global Action activities. Some members may be content to be on a mailing list and perhaps use the public areas of the GlobalAction web site. Others will want to be more actively involved in education or lobbying on specific components of the GlobalAction program (or on the program as whole). Those who are most active will become network nodes for multi-faceted GlobalAction activity and support.

HOW YOU CAN HELP BUILD GLOBAL ACTION TO PREVENT WAR

There are many ways in which individuals can support GlobalAction:

Become an individual Member.
Permit us to include your name in our published Members lists.
Persuade organizations of which you are a member to become Organizational Members: Order and distribute GlobalAction literature, foster discussion and debate, put the program in your own words, and place the issue on the agenda of the organization’s governing board.
Join a working group on a component program of GlobalAction, or keep us posted on your activities on behalf of a component program.
Encourage your local city or town to endorse the GlobalAction program, or, even better, to become an Organizational Member; to support related skills-training and organizing efforts in the community; and to identify these activities as a part of GlobalAction.
Disseminate information about GlobalAction as widely as possible in your community and among your friends, relatives, colleagues, religious and political leaders, and other contacts. Working with other supporters, use public programs, local cable TV, leafleting, petition campaigns, op-ed articles and letters to the editor, newsletters, and mailings to spread the concept.
Lobby Organizational Members with which you are affiliated to identify themselves regularly as a Member of GlobalAction
Work to get government officials and business leaders on board and active in outreach efforts
Help form a local, state or national GlobalAction chapter where you live
Reach out to organizations active on human rights, environmental affairs, development to broaden our coalition.

… Or develop your own form of action–but act!

CONCLUSION

Various aspects of the effort to build a global defensive security system are likely to be mutually reinforcing. As confidence in the global security system grows and national armed forces shrink, the multilateral forces needed to deter and defend against cross-border aggression and other forms of large-scale violence will be both smaller and more likely to succeed. At the same time, as expectations of peace grow, nations and national leaders will become more comfortable with the idea of limiting their armed forces to defense of national territory. In particular, the major military powers, which would give up their capabilities for large-scale military action beyond national borders, will have concluded that their security is better served by the new system than by the current system of continuous war and threats of war and they will actively support the global defensive security system.

Eventually, the world’s nations may reach a degree of commitment to peaceful conflict resolution such that the UN and regional security organizations will have only police functions: verifying adherence to defensive security limits by individual nations, and preventing the use of violence for gain or for political intimidation by nonstate actors such as terrorists and criminal syndicates. At this point we could reasonably say that war had been abolished.

GlobalAction’s deliberate focus is on violent armed conflict. The world also faces fundamental crises of poverty, environmental degradation, and human-rights violations. All these challenges must be met before human security and a just peace can be achieved. To meet these challenges, many efforts must be pursued; no single campaign can deal with all of them. But efforts to address these global problems can and should complement and support one another. Progress toward the abolition of war will make it possible to focus remaining energy and efforts on resolving the fundamental structural problems.

The analogy we like is with domestic violence. Faced with incidents of violence within the family, the first and most urgent order of business is to stop the violence. Only then can we look at probable causes and possible solutions, including, if necessary, separation and divorce.

Success comes from having the courage to fail. Those who have never failed have not tried enough, not pushed themselves hard enough, not tested the limits of their potential.

Text: 7,650 words

Annex 1: GlobalAction to Prevent War -- International Steering Committee

Mariano Aguirre

Director

Center for Peace Research

O’Donnell, 18, 7^th Floor

28009 Madrid, Spain

FAX: 34-91-5774762

e-mail: aguirre@eurosur.org

Colin Archer

Secretary-General
International Peace Bureau

41 Rue de Zurich

CHO-1201 Geneva, Switzerland
41-22-731-6429 FAX: 41-22-738-9419

e-mail: mailbox@IPB.org

Lois Barber

Executive Director
EarthAction

30 Cottage Street

Amherst, MA 01002

413-549-8118 FAX: 413-549-0544

e-mail: lois@earthaction.org

Walden Bello

Director

Focus on the Global South
204 D Tuazon

Quezon City, Philippines

e-mail: waldenbello@hotmail.com

Alejandro Bendana

Director

Universidad Centroamericana

Center for International Studies

Apartado 1747

Managua, Nicaragua

e-mail: aben@tmx.com.ni or pedro46@aol.com

Kevin Clements
Director

International Alert

1 Glyn Street

London, United Kingdom

44-207-793-8383 FAX: 44-207-793-7975

e-mail: kclements@international-alert.org

Merav Datan

Program Director

International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War

727 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02139

FAX: 617-868-2560

e-mail: Mdatan@ippnw.org

Jonathan Dean

Adviser on International Security Issues

Union of Concerned Scientists
Suite 310, 1616 P Street, NW
Washington, DC 20036

202-332-0900 FAX: 202-332-0905

e-mail: jdean@ucsusa.org

Nick Dunlop

EarthAction

17 The Green

Wye, Kent TN25 5AJ, United Kingdom

e-mail: wye@earthaction.org.uk

Rolf Ekeus
Embassy of Sweden

1501 M Street, NW
Washington, DC 20005

202-467-2600 FAX: 202-467-2699

e-mail: rolf.ekeus@foreign.ministry.se

Randall Caroline Forsberg (Chair)

Director

Institute for Defense and Disarmament Studies

675 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02139

617-354-4337 FAX: 617-354-1450

e-mail: forsberg@idds.org

Yong Sup Han

RAND Corporation
1700 Main Street, PO Box 2138

310-393-0411 FAX: 310-393-4818
e-mail: YongSup_Han@rand.org

Felicity Hill

Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom
777 United Nations Plaza

New York, NY 10017

FAX: 212-286-8211

e-mail: flick@igc.apc.org

Rebecca Johnson

Executive Director

Acronym Institute

24 Colvestone Crescent

London, E8 2LH Great Britain

FAX: 44-20-7503-9153

e-mail: rej@acronym.org.uk

Richard Langhorne

Director

Center for Global Change and Governance
Rutgers University

123 Washington Street, Suite 510
Newark, NJ 07102

FAX: 973-353-5074

e-mail: langhorn@andromeda.rutgers.edu

Patricia Lewis

Director

United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research

Palais des Nations

CH-1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland

FAX: 41-22-917-01-76

e-mail: plewis@unog.ch

Vincent O. Makanju

Director
PeaceCorps of Nigeria

Obafemi Awolowo University

Ile Ife, Nigeria
234-36-231733 FAX: 234-36-2332401

e-mail: peacorps@auife.edu.ng

Saul Mendlovitz

Rutgers School of Law

Rutgers University

125 Washington Street

Newark, NJ 07102

FAX: 973-353-1445

e-mail: mtodd@kinoy.rutgers.edu

Bjørn Møller

Senior Research Fellow

Copenhagen Peace Research Institute

Fredericiagade 18

DK-1310 Copenhagen K Denmark
45-33-32-64-32 FAX: 45-33-45-5060

e-mail: bmoeller@copri.dk

Radmila Nakarada

Institute for European Studies

P. Toijatija 2

YU-11070 Belgrade, Yugoslavia

e-mail: radmila@icu.ac.jp

Ricardo Navarro

International Chairman

Friends of the Earth

Apartado 2065, 33 Calleponiente 316

San Salvador, El Salvador

503-220-0046 FAX: 503-220-3313

e-mail: cesta@es.com.sv

Olara Otunnu

Special Representative of the Secretary-General

For Children and Armed Conflict

United Nations, Room S-3161

New York, NY 10017

e-mail: kumarc@un.org

William Pace

Executive Director
World Federalist Movement

777 United Nations Plaza, 12^th Floor

New York, NY 10017

212-599-1320 FAX: 212-599-1332

e-mail: wfm@igc.org

Myrna Peña

Program Director
World Conference on Religion and Peace

777 United Nations Plaza

New York, NY 10017

FAX: 212-983-0566

e-mail: mpena@wcrp.org

Eugenia Piza-Lopez

International Alert

1 Glyn Street

London, United Kingdom

44-207-793-8383 FAX: 44-207-793-7975

e-mail: epiza-lopez@international-alert.org

Joseph Rotblat

Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs

Flat A, 63A Great Russell Street

London WC1B 3BJ, United Kingdom

44-171-405-6661 FAX: 44-171-831-5651

e-mail: pugwash@qmw.ac.uk

Vandana Shiva

Research Foundation for Science Technology

and Natural Resource Policy
105 Rajpur Road

Dhera Dun 2480001, India

91-11-696-8077 FAX: 91-11-685-6795

e-mail: vshiva@giasdial01.vsnl.net.in

Alejandro Soto

International Affairs

Facultad de Medicina UANL

Madero y Dr. A. Pequeno,

Col. Mitras Centro CP 64460

Monterrey NL, Mexico

52-8-3294153 FAX: 52-8-3483373

e-mail: buanasoto@hotmail.com

Majid Tehranian

Director
Toda Institute for Peace

1600 Kapiolani Blvd., Suite 1111

Honolulu, HI 96814

FAX: 808-955-6476

e-mail: mtehrani@toda.org

Ramesh C. Thakur

Vice Rector, Peace and Governance
United Nations University
53-70, Jingumae, 5-chome Shibuya-ku

Tokyo 150-8925 Japan

FAX: 81-3-3406-7347

e-mail: thakur@hq.unu.edu

Panayotis Tsakonas

Special Advisor to Minister of Foreign Affairs

17 Trapezoundos Street

Athens, Greece 17124

30-1-3681597 FAX: 30-1-9356650

e-mail: tsakonas@otenet.gr

Carlos Vargas
Interlaw Consultores Juridicos
Apartado 477-2010 Zapoto

San Jose, Costa Rica

506-253-3760 FAX: 506-234-1126

e-mail: lsimmons@sol.racsa.co.cr

Christopher G. Weeramantry

Judge (ret.), International Court of Justice

International Court of Justice

Peace Palace

2517 KJ The Hague

The Netherlands

31-70-302 23 23 FAX: 31-70-364 99 28

Bo Wirmark

Ovre Slottsgatan 8A

5-75310 Uppsala

Sweden

46-18-714989 FAX: 46-708-70-4989

Annex 2: GlobalAction to Prevent War -- Executive Committee of U.S. Steering Committee

Chair (protem): Jonathan Dean

Union of Concerned Scientists

1707 H Street, NW, 6^th Floor

Washington, DC 20006

202-223-6133 FAX: 202-223-6162

e-mail: jdean@ucsusa.org

James Adams
527 35^th Avenue
San Francisco, CA 94121

415-831-1187

e-mail: jimradams@earthlink.net

Tim Barner

20/20 Vision

618 8^th Street, NE

Washington, DC 20002

202-547-2414

e-mail: kathytim@earthlink.net

John Burroughs

Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy
211 East 43^rd Street, Rm. 1204

New York, NY 10017

212-818-1861 FAX: 212-818-1857

e-mail: LCNP@aol.com

johnburroughs@earthlink.net

Gillian Gilhool

Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom

DC Lobbying Office

110 Maryland Avenue, NE, Suite 102

Washington, DC 20002
202-543-2660 FAX: 202-544-9613

e-mail: ggilhool@ix.netcom.com

Jonathan Granoff

One Belmont Avenue, Suite 300

Bala Cynwyd, PA 19004
610-668-5470 FAX: 610-668-5455

e-mail: jgg786@aol.com

Don Kraus

Campaign for UN Reform
420 7^th Street, SE

Washington, DC 20003

202-546-3956 FAX: 202-546-8703

e-mail: CUNR@cunr.org

Leonard Kurz

Kurz Family Foundation

P.O. Box 10231

Beverly Hills, CA 90213

310-285-9103

Yvonne Logan

World Federalist Association

438 Skinker Street
St. Louis, MO 63130

Alfred McAlister

University of Texas

Houston School of Public Relations

4800 Calhoun

Houston, TX 77204-3474

713-749-7159

e-mail: amcalister@mail.utexas.edu

Bob Moore

Coalition for Peace Action, New Jersey

40 Witherspoon Street
Princeton, NJ 08542

609-924-5022 FAX: 609-924-3052

e-mail: cfpa@eticomm.net

Betty Reardon

Columbia University Teachers College

Peace Education Program

Box 171

New York, NY 10027
212-678-3972 FAX: 212-678-4048

Laura Reed

IDDS

675 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02139

617-354-4337 FAX: 617-354-1450

e-mail: laurareed@rcn.com

Michael Renner

Worldwatch Institute

1776 Massachusetts Ave., NW, Suite 701

Washington, DC 20036

FAX: 202-296-7265

e-mail: mrenner@peconic.net

Virginia Straus

Boston Research Center for the 21^st Century

396 Harvard Street
Cambridge, MA 02138

617-491-1020

e-mail: vstraus@brc21.org

Lucy Webster

Economists Allied for Arms Reduction

211 East 43^rd Street

New York, NY 10017
212-557-2589

e-mail: ecaar@igc.org

Bill Wickersham

4920 Forum Blvd.

Columbia, MO 65203

573-817-1512

e-mail: elblwick@prodigy.net

Jim Wurst

Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy

211 East 43^rd Street, Suite 1204

New York, NY 10017

FAX: 212-818-1857

e-mail: Jhwurst@aol.com

Annex 3: GlobalAction to Prevent War -- International Working Groups, Liaison Groups & Subcommittees

GlobalAction-Launched Working Groups

1. UN Mediators: Create UN Armed Conflict Prevention Center with 50 full-time professional mediators. Chair: Jonathan Dean

2. New GA Committee: Establish an Armed Conflict Prevention Committee of UN General Assembly. Chair: Jonathan Dean

3. Regional Institutions: Establish regional peacekeeping brigades and strengthen regional mechanisms for mediation, reconciliation, protecting human rights, and related judicial processes. Chairs: Panayotis Tsakonas and Carlos Vargas

4. Conventional Disarmament: Achieve a worldwide freeze and full ‘transparency’ in armed forces as first steps toward an initial 25% cut in production and export of major weapons and small arms. Chair: Randy Forsberg

Liaison Groups: Strengthen on-going efforts of other organizations

5. Nuclear Disarmament: Cut US & Russian nuclear warheads to 1,000 each; freeze other nuclear forces. Coordinator: Merav Datan

6. UN Funding: Full, prompt, and unconditional payment of UN dues. Coordinator: Ramesh Thakur

7. UN Police Force: Create a standing UN volunteer police force of 2,000-5,000 men and women. Coordinator: Saul Mendlovitz

8. ICC: Worldwide ratification of the treaty establishing the International Criminal Court. Coordinator: Bill Pace

9. Security Council Reform: Expand permanent members and restrict veto use. Coordinator: Felicity Hill

10. Nonoffensive Defense: Put nonoffensive defense on agenda of UN and regional security organizations. Coordinator: Bo Wirmark

Functional Subcommittees of the Steering Committee

11. Government Relations Chair: Jonathan Dean Members: Panayotis Tsakonas, Carlos Vargas

12. Development Chair: Saul Mendlovitz

13. Transnational Organizational Outreach Chair: Ricardo Navarro (environment)

14. Publicity and Public Relations Chair: Vincent Makanju