"For reasons of conscience": fighting conscription then, and again

On November 1, 2024, my father Anton Fertl passed away on his farm in Australia aged 74. Retired, living alone among the trees, plants (not least his beloved orchids), animals, and insects, few locals knew of his youthful adventures, traveling overland from Bavaria to Australia (and back again, and then to Australia again!). These tales take quite the telling, but are for another time. Yet another achievement that he proudly carried with him throughout his years was his refusal to allow himself to be conscripted into West Germany's Bundeswehr at age 19, and the battle he fought to win this small victory for peace and reason. This is a tale worth telling - not least because of the rapid and reckless militarisation taking hold of Europe once more - but also, because in sorting through his paperwork, I've come across the key documents again, and so it seems opportune. First, however, some quick background.

In the Shadow of the War 

The Second World War ended in Europe with the unconditional surrender of the Nazi Wehrmacht on May 8, 1945. In November 1945, conscription in Germany was abolished, and the Wehrmacht itself was disbanded in August 1946. Influenced by the anti-war, anti-militarist sentiment that formally drove the development of the post-war German state, the 1949 Grundgesetz (constitution) of the new Federal Republic of Germany explicitly mentioned the possibility of Kriegsdienstverweigerung (conscientious objection), but made no such reference to Wehrpflicht (conscription).  

When the current German army - the Bundeswehr - was formed in 1955, it was promoted as a "parliamentary army" made up of "citizens in uniform", and with a revised definition of military obedience, all of which was meant to prevent future Nazi-style excesses. This new army was, however, tainted from the outset: in the late 1950s, the Bundeswehr hired 300 officers from the Waffen-SS to fill its ranks, and more than 12,000 Wehrmacht officers were soon serving in the Bundeswehr - including over 40 Nazi-era generals. 

Unfortunately, this was only one aspect of a widespread rehabilitation of Nazis in the new West Germany. At local, institutional, and civic levels, former members and collaborators were welcomed back into the fold. Military barracks were named after "good Nazis", even as the myth of German collective responsibility for the Nazi horror was expounded, providing a smokescreen for the generals, the industrialists, the politicians, and others, all themselves guilty as sin of helping the fascists take - and keep - power. This myth has also allowed those most responsible to shift blame onto a collective "national failing", rather than face justice for their role in constructing and supporting a fascist dictatorship, of which the first victims were the West German left and the representatives of the working class. Meanwhile many elements of the antifascist and communist left were vilified, hounded, and even banned outright. 

My father's generation had few illusions in the greatness and goodness of their rulers and betters - they knew exactly who their parents, uncles, grandparents, and neighbours were - and inspired by social movements and student protests elsewhere they dreamed of a better, fairer society than the patronising, smug, suffocating capitalist one into which they had been born and raised, under the shadow of the Cold War and nuclear sabre-rattling. Simultaneously, the war in Vietnam provided a stark reminder that actual, blood-soaked, war hadn't ended with the fall of Hitler, and that imperialist violence and mass murder continued to reap a grim harvest among the world's population beyond the borders of Europe.

Cold War and Social Discontent

In the 1950s, the Cold War was in full swing, and as part of the associated military build-up across Europe, West Germany underwent a rapid Wiederbewaffnung (rearming). With the entry into force, in April 1957, of the Military Promotion Act, all West German men born after June 30, 1937, were once again subject to military service. A decade later, in 1968, this requirement was modified to allow for the option of substitute service due to "reasons of conscience", reflected in the following text enshrined in the West German Constitution:

Art. 12a [obligation of service]

(1) Men may be obliged to serve in the armed forces, the Federal Border Guard or a Civil Protection Association from the age of eighteen.

(2) Anyone who refuses military service with weapons for reasons of conscience may be obliged to provide a substitute service. The duration of the replacement service must not exceed the duration of military service.

1968 was also the peak of several years of protests and strikes across France and West Germany. In West Germany, these were led by a student movement deeply disillusioned with a political establishment heavily populated by former Nazis, worried that it was becoming increasingly authoritarian. In 1962, several journalists had been briefly arrested for "treason" for writing about the weakness of the Bundeswehr in the magazine Der Spiegel. In the fallout of the affair, the suddenly-unpopular ruling Christian Democratic Union was force to form a first "grand coalition" with the Social Democratic Party in 1966. However, the appointment of Kurt Georg Kiesinger - a former Nazi with close links to Joseph Goebbels - as Chancellor did nothing to quell fears of a quiet Nazi restoration.

In June 1967, first-time student protester Benno Ohnesorg was shot in the back of the head by a police officer at a protest in West Berlin against a visit by the Shah of Iran - a murder that further spurred the growth of the student movement and radicalised it. Then, on 11 April, 1968, German student leader Rudi Dutschke was also shot in Berlin in an attempted assassination attempt by a Josef Bachmann, a petty criminal with links to neo-Nazis, inspired by the murder of Martin Luther King Jr. only days earlier. The right-wing Springer Press was accused of complicity for its vilification of Dutschke and the student movement, and demonstrators tried to storm the Springer house in Berlin and set fire to Bild delivery vans. In Munich, a demonstrator and a policeman were killed when students ransacked the Bild editorial offices. Over a thousand people were arrested. 

Federal Chancellor Kurt Kiesinger claimed the protests had a "revolutionary character", and on May 30, 1968, the Notstandsgesetze (Emergency Acts) were passed (by a government controlling 95 percent of the Bundestag and led by an ex-Nazi). They inserted emergency clauses into the West German Constitution allowing the government to restrict civil rights (such as privacy and freedom of movement) during crises such as natural disasters, uprisings, or war. Critics drew parallels to the emergency decrees power of the Weimar Republic, which Adolf Hitler had used to establish a totalitarian dictatorship by "legal" means.

Indeed, by 1968, such was the scale of the protests, which had spread - especially in France - to the trade unions and other sectors of society - that there was discussion in both countries about deploying the army against protesters, and in West Germany there was also talk of using widespread preventive detention. In West Germany, ultimately only the police were deployed, but the fact that the police were - then, as now - deeply infiltrated by Nazis and the far-right only intensified the fear that right-wing authoritarianism was once again being imposed on West Germany's fragile democracy.

And so, in this broader context, on January 14, 1969, my 19 year old Bavarian father was called in for muster and a physical examination for conscription into the Bundeswehr, with a special Wehrpaß (military passport) quickly issued to him, dated March 14, 1969. Already on February 28, however, he had indicated his intention to register as a conscientious objector - taking advantage of the renewed recognition of that right - and he was given until April 21 to submit his justifications and grounds for refusing to serve. Submit them he did indeed, as we shall see. 

No to War and all its Trappings

Perhaps ten years ago, my father took me through his most prized papers and documents. These included various stamp-filled passports, photos from his journeys through Iran, India and South-East Asia, papers for the purchase of the farm in Australia, the charge sheet for an arrest in Munich 1970 for possessing hashish, and his official renunciation of the Catholic Church in 1973. (This letter only formalised a mundane reality that had already taken hold when he was 8, and had decided he would rather go fishing with his friends, or play table tennis in the priest's garage, while the rest of the village suffered through mass). But pride of place in these documents were his letter justifying his conscientious objection, and another (which we shall come to below) that accompanied it.

The full text of my father's letter is as follows:

Betrifft: Begründung meines Antrags

Sehr geehrte Herren!

Aus Gewissensgründen habe ich mich gegen den Dienst mit der Waffe entschieden. Krieg oder Kriegsdrohung oder schon allein die Existenz von riesigen Armeen als politisches Machtmittel erkenne ich nicht an. Denn der Krieg ist für mich das schrecklichste und folgenreichste Verbrechen, das es je unter den Menschen gab.

Krieg ist nicht nur sinnlos, sondern auch menschenunwürdig, grausam und verbrecherisch. Er ist die Summe alles Bösen schlecht-hin. Darüber erübrigt sich jegliche Diskussion.

So will ich nicht nur selbst passiv und zugleich aktiv meinen Beitrag zum Frieden leisten, indem ich mich dem Waffendienst verweigere, sondern ich versuche auch, andere von der Verabscheuungswürdigkeit des Krieges und seiner Vorbereitung in der Bundeswehr wie in allen Armeen zu überzeugen.

Die Summen, die die Kriegsmaschinerien in aller Welt jährlich verschlingen, müßten nach meiner Überzeugung besser und nutzbringender für Bildung und Entwicklungshilfe aufgewandt werden. Auf diese Weise wären sie ein Beitrag für dauerhaften Fortschritt und langfristige Entspannung zwischen der jetzigen Dritten Welt und den hochindustrialisierten Ländern.

Hauptgrund für die Verweigerung ist meine Überzeugung als katholischer Christ, daß es ein immer und überall geltendes Gesetz sein muß, fremdes Menschenleben zu achten. “Du sollst nicht töten!" gilt für mich ohne Ausnahme. (Extreme Fälle ziviler Notwehr sind Ausnahmen) Nächstenliebe und Gewaltlosigkeit sind aber nicht nur christliche, sondern auch ethische Prinzipien, die das friedliche Zusammenleben der Menschen besser garantieren als waffenstarrende und Jederzeit für das kollektive Morden einsatzbereite Armeen. Diese sind für die Zerstörung ausgebildet, nicht für den Frieden.

Es gilt also, die Armeen in Ost und West abzuschaffen. Jeder muß dazu seinen Beitrag leisten. Natürlich können das nur aufgeklärte, denkende Menschen, die frei sind von dem Wussch, ihr mögliches Groskapital mit dem Einsatz fremder Menschenleben zu verteidigen. Natürlich hat ein Staat das Recht, sich selbst zu verteidigen, aber die beste Verteidigung ist die Überlegenheit seiner Kultur, und im Notfall (an den ich nicht glaube) passiver widerstand gegen eventuelle Unterdrücker, jedenfalls kein Blutvergießen um irgendwelcher propagandistischer Fiktionen willen wie “freiheitliche Ordnung", “Vaterland", "Heimat" etc.. "Freiheitliche Ordnung" ist deshalb als Fiktion zu sehen, weil sie selbst bei uns recht relativ ist und im Begriff ist, die Ordnung zu werden, die die Freiheit der Herrschenden garantieren soll. Hierbei ist a die Jüngste Entwicklung zu denken, vor allem a die Verabschiedung der Notstandsgesetze und die Pläne für die faschistische Vorbeugehaft. "Freiheitliche Ordnung " in Opposition zu kommunistisch-diktatorischer Unfreiheit im Osten ist ebenfalls fragwürdig, denn diese Gegenüberstellung ist zweifelsohne einseitig und dient nur propagandistischer Hetze, nach der unsere Nachbarn im Osten böse und äußerst angriffslustig sind. Gegen sie gelte es aufzumarschieren. In der Tat ist die Kommunistenhetze schon traditionell und die Höhe, die sie im Dritten Reich erreichte, wurde in der Ära des Kalten Kriegs fast wieder erreicht.

Aus all diesen Gründen leite ich ab, daß das bei uns existierende Recht auf Kriegsdienstverweigerung nicht nur erhalten, sondern voll ausgenützt und sogar zur moralischen Pflicht erhoben wird. Brat wenn dies erreicht sein wird, wird es einen "ersten deutschen Friedenstaat” geben. Ulbrichts Staat ist aus diesem Grund nicht dieser erste deutsche Friedensstaat.

Der nach den Notstandsgesetzen mögliche Einsatz der Bundeswehr im Inneren gegen demonstrierende Arbeiter und Studenten stellt für mich einen weiteren Gewissensgrund dar, diesen “Dienst" zu verweigern. Wer kann es noch als Dienst am deutschen Volk ansehen, auf demonstrierende und unbewaffnete Menschen, noch dazu möglicherweise auf Bekannte und sogar Verwandte zu schießen.

Besänftigende Worte können diese reale Möglichkeit nicht aus der Welt schaffen.

Anton Fertl 

In English:

Subject: Reasons for my application 

Dear Sirs! 

For reasons of conscience, I have decided against serving with a weapon. I do not recognise war, the threat of war, or even the mere existence of huge armies as a political means of power. For me, war is the most terrible and consequential crime that has ever existed among humans.

War is not only senseless but also inhuman, cruel, and criminal. It is the sum of all evil, plain and simple. Any further discussion is unnecessary.

Thus, I want not only to make my own passive and active contribution to peace by refusing military service, but I also endeavor to convince others of the abhorrence of war and its preparation in the Bundeswehr, as in all armies. 

It is my conviction that the sums that war machines around the world devour annually should be better and more usefully spent on education and development aid. In this way, they would contribute to lasting progress and long-term détente between the current Third World and the highly industrialised countries. 

The main reason for this refusal is my conviction as a Catholic Christian that respecting the life of others must be a law that applies always and everywhere. "Thou shalt not kill!" applies for me without exception. (Extreme cases of civilian self-defense are exceptions.) Love for one's fellow man and nonviolence are not only Christian but also ethical principles that better guarantee the peaceful coexistence of people than armies armed to the teeth and ready to commit collective murder at any time. These are trained for destruction, not for peace. 

Therefore, the goal must be to abolish the armies in East and West. Everyone must contribute to this. Of course, this can only be done by enlightened, thinking people who are free from the desire to defend the potential for big business by sacrificing the lives of others. Of course, a state has the right to defend itself, but the best defense is the superiority of its culture, and in an emergency (which I don't believe we are in), passive resistance against potential oppressors, certainly not bloodshed for the sake of any propagandistic fictions like "Free [Democratic] Order," "Fatherland," "Homeland," etc.. "Free Order" should be viewed as a fiction because, even here, it is quite relative and is in the process of becoming an order that is meant to guarantee the freedom of those in power. Recent developments are important to consider here, especially the passage of emergency laws and the plans for fascistic preventive detention. "Free Order" in opposition to communist-dictatorial oppression in the East is also questionable, because this juxtaposition is undoubtedly one-sided and only serves propagandistic agitation, according to which our neighbors in the East are evil and extremely aggressive, and it is necessary to march against them. Indeed, anti-communist agitation has a long tradition, and the heights it reached during the Third Reich were almost matched again during the Cold War era. 

For all these reasons, I conclude that the right to conscientious objection that exists in our country must not only be preserved but fully used - and even elevated to a moral duty. Only when that has been achieved will there be a “first German peace state.” For this reason, Ulbricht’s state is [also] not this first German peace state. 

The possibility, under the emergency laws, of internal deployment of the Bundeswehr against demonstrating workers and students represents, for me, yet another reason of conscience to refuse this "service." Who can still consider it a service to the German people to shoot at demonstrating and unarmed people, and possibly even shooting at acquaintances and relatives?

Soothing words cannot erase this real possibility from the world.

Anton Fertl 

A father's support

Together with this letter was a shorter one written by his father in support of his case. My father and grandfather were never that close. My uncle - 8 years the senior - was their father's heir (even sharing his name), and he was similarly distant to my father, being almost of a different generation. My father, on the other hand, was his mother's son, and more a product of the post-war era. He was quickly caught up in dreams of social change, and bewitched by vistas of far-off lands - a very different worldview to his village-dwelling blacksmith father. So, to receive such a letter of support from his own father meant the world to mine, still bringing tears to his eyes fifty years later. 

Erklärung 

Ich bin politisch nicht besonders interessiert, aber soviel an elementarenn Überzeugungen besitz ich, daß ich mit der Kriegsdienstverweigerung meines Sohnes Anton vollkommen übereinstimme. Er und mein weiterer Sihn Hans haben mich von der menschlichen Notwendigkeit dieser Verweigerung überzeugt.

Ich selbst war nicht an der Front, habe aber genug Elend miterlebt, un alles war eine Folge des Krieges, den von den aufgehetzt durch die Propaganda, aber heute soll das meined Söhned ersparts bleiben und ich halte ihre eigene, verantwortliche Entscheidung für mutig und richtig. 

Auf einzelne Äußerungen kann ich mich natürlich nicht entsinnen, das wäre zuviel verlangt. Ich hoffe, daß die Gewissensentscheidung meaines Sohns anerkannt wird.

Johann Fertl 

Again, in English:

Declaration 

I'm not particularly interested in politics, but I possess enough fundamental convictions to completely agree with my son Anton's conscientious objection to military service. He and my other son, Hans, convinced me of the human necessity of this refusal. 

I was not at the front myself, but I witnessed enough misery, and it was all a consequence of the war, incited by propaganda. But today, my sons should be spared that, and I consider their own responsible decision to be courageous and right. 

Of course, I can't recall individual statements; that would be asking too much. I hope that my son's decision of conscience will be recognised. 

Johann Fertl 

My grandfather's disavowal of politics here is not quite as disingenuous as my father's invocation of Catholic values earlier, which some readers may have picked up on. The burden of the War fell heavily on Johann Fertl, who had lost his four year old daughter to Scarlet Fever because the Wehrmacht had taken all the medicines, and was later provided a (very non-optional) "job" working at a chemical weapons factory near the Austrian border. The facility was a satellite camp of Dachau Concentration Camp, and used slave labour, as well as forcing more "free" Germans to work there as well (under strict supervision and controls). Already a political outsider in the village for his progressive politics, my grandfather's subsequent PTSD and alcoholism after the War served to further drive him, a somewhat broken man, away from politics.

Even so, he recognised the importance of making himself heard here - and not only for my father's benefit. The possibility of a civil alternative to military service, justified by "reasons of conscience", had only been introduced the year before, and my father claimed that he was one of the first (perhaps even the first) in Bavaria to avail of this avenue to avoid military service. When I asked him what he would have done had such an option not existed, he said "Go to prison, perhaps. Or leave Germany - but where would I have gone?".

So convinced was my father of the moral imperative to oppose war and militarism, he managed to convice two of his friends to make similar arguments and to refuse to serve, and he even convinced his elder brother - who had already carried out his own military service, and had continued in a non-commissioned role - to abruptly end his own association with the military (indeed, my grandfather's letter makes references to both his sons in this regard). 

War drums beat once more

This, one of my proudest memories of my father, is now a core motivating issue for me too, nearly 60 years later. As I write, the German government has breached its own austerity-mad, quasi-religious spending cap to enable enormous expenditure on weapons (ensuring megaprofits for the arms companies), remilitarising in a way not seen since the Third Reich. The German government is also threatening to reintroduce conscription if enough people "fail" to volunteer for the new, expanded army reserve. 

At the same time, Germany is defending - and has helped arm - an Israeli government hell-bent of carrying out a genocide against the Palestinian people of Gaza. Germany's own dark history has now been twisted so far by those in power that - for "reasons of state" - the population is expected to support war crimes and genocide without question, while those who call for the defence of international law, and decry the deliberate murder of tens of thousands of children, are demonised as "anti-semitic" (ironically, disgustingly even, this includes Jews in Germany and elsewhere critical of the slaughter). Recent polls show that ordinary Germans overwhemingly oppose Israel's war crimes, but the media and political elites allow no such opinion to enjoy oxygen.

The European Union, too, is beating the drums of war loudly, with its ReArmEU agenda - ostensibly driven by the need to defend the bloc from Russia since its ongoing aggression escalated into a full-blown invasion of Ukraine, but in reality part of a larger agenda, including a resurgent European imperialism, and expansionist NATO politics. Whether Russia, under Putin's fascistic leadership, poses a threat to Europe, or not, is entirely irrelevant to this militarisation of Europe - there are warmongers on all sides. Indeed, the European Commission's Vice President and High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Kaja Kallas, seems hell-bent on picking a fight with Russia anyway, calling for it to be broken up into smaller states.

The other side of my family has roots in Ireland, which - due to its centuries-long experience of colonial violence by Britain - has been militarily neutral for years (at least in the part not still occupied by Britain). But, here too, the media, government, and establishment are busily undermining the country's "triple lock", to enable the country to join in the military projects underway across the continent and further afield. The European Union - supposedly formed as a "peace project" for Europe, is rapidly being converted into a "war project", with military spending joining austerity in the hearts of Brussels' policy-makers. Even Denmark's traditionally "frugal" (that is, pro-austerity) government has recently distanced itself from its penny-pinching outlook in order to facilitate expanded military spending across Europe.

This last example is particularly relevant, for I too am a father, with a young daughter growing up with dreams and hopes in the relative safety of Denmark. I say "relative" with some bitterness: as of July 1 2025, Denmark's (admittedly limited) military conscription has been lengthened to 11 months and extended to include women - ostensibly in the name of "equality". While military experts, and even the Danish military union, opposed the move (many arguing against conscription entirely, for being expensive, ineffective, and damaging to education, careers, and even to democracy itself), the political class - including even the country's main radical left party - all supported the change. The dark reality, of course, has less to do with defence, and more to do with preparing the population for the idea of a coming war (when conscription would likely be extended much further, creating a generation of cannon fodder).

If Denmark's conscription law remains as it is now, and my daughter remains in Denmark, when she reaches 18 she will be entered into a lottery to serve in a military force that has joined in brutal illegal invasions and occupations, such as Afghanistan. Words cannot express my rage. Fortunately, the right to conscientious objection also exists in Denmark too - for now - and my father's words ring in my head: "the right to conscientious objection that exists in our country must not only be preserved but fully used - and even elevated to a moral duty". 

As the far-right rises in many countries once again, and the sabres rattle louder than ever, resisting normalisation of war, stopping the far-right, and putting an end to militarism and war entirely - redirecting the countless billions spent on bombs to be spent on books, beds, and a better future for all the world - must be a paramount struggle, alongside the fight to rescue a liveable climate on this small planet of ours. For my father, and my daughter, I can demand nothing less.