#NoWar2023 Debate: Is War in Ukraine Justified?

By World BEYOND War, October 2, 2023

First published by Pressenza.

In this 1.5 hour friendly debate, moderated by Marcy Winograd (coordinator of CODEPINK Congress and co-chair of the Peace in Ukraine Coalition), we hear 3 perspectives debated: 1) Russia had no choice but to invade Ukraine, argued by former CIA analyst Ray McGovern, 2) Ukraine had no read more

There Are Easier Ways to Talk About War and Peace

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, September 27, 2023
Remarks in Charlottesville, Va — Video here.

War and peace could be a very simple issue. We make it very complicated. People say and do things that I simultaneously want to cheer for and condemn.

This week Senator Rand Paul said he wants to stop supporting Ukraine in order to support the United States. The phrase “support Ukraine” is shorthand for fueling a war that is destroying Ukraine, damaging the world, and threatening nuclear apocalypse. read more

Let’s Watch This Antiwar Sylvester Stallone Film

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, September 19, 2023

I confess to not having been aware that Sylvester Stallone had been in a movie in which all wasn’t solved by punching somebody, stabbing somebody, shooting somebody, or blowing somebody up.

Times change, apparently.

Stallone’s first serious movie was made in 1973 and set in 1969. The director, Robert Schnitzer, has now created a Director’s Cut version to show in theaters, beginning with the Lumiere read more

There Is No Nuclear Option

Think about somebody you love. Are you doing it?

Now think about them on fire, and you’re holding a bucket of water. Your course of action is easy and obvious.

Now think about 1,000 people on fire and 1,000 other people holding buckets of water. You use yours and yell for others to do the same, but for some bizarre collection of reasons many of them don’t. People fight over and spill some of the buckets, etc.

Now think about four billion people on fire and 4 billion other people with read more

Act Now to Save Ukrainian Peace Activist from Prosecution

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, September 14, 2023

We’ve just learned that the office of the prosecutor and the “security service” of Ukraine have published press releases claiming to have put a stop to the activities of the “vicious Russian propagandist Yurii Sheliazhenko.”

This is, of course, very strange because Yurii, a Board Member of World BEYOND War, has — like World BEYOND War — denounced and opposed Russian warmaking from Day 1.

Yurii Sheliazhenko read more

Ukraine Solidarity Network’s Unwar

By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, September 13, 2023

Since the day Russia dramatically escalated the war in Ukraine there have been odd conversational confusions. Two people who both claim to oppose the war discover that they oppose opposite sides of the war. Or they discover that one of them opposes both sides of the war (true story, it actually exists, I’m one of them) while the other believes that only Russia is waging war at all, while Ukraine is waging something else entirely.

Since read more