Broken rifle

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"Broken Rifle": In the form shown - stylized compared to the original variants of the same motif - it was used for decades from 1931 as the logo of the international umbrella organization of political anti-militarists and conscientious objectors, War Resisters International , which still exists today . Some of their national sections, including the US War Resisters League, have also adopted the logo in this form.

The broken rifle - or in most variants of the pictorial representation more precisely referred to as “ hands break rifle ” - is a symbol of peace that has been proven since the first decade of the 20th century and its meaning is self-explanatory . It expresses the political premise of a pacifist and principally anti-militarist stance.

At the beginning of the 1920s it became the logo of War Resisters International (WRI), the world's largest association of conscientious objectors to date , which over the decades has sometimes been joined by several national peace movement organizations from around 40 to 50 countries. Since 1986, WRI has also published a magazine as an international newsletter under the title The Broken Rifle .

Up to the present day the broken rifle has served as the “trademark” of a politically organized offensive pacifism and anti-militarism. It is distributed in various graphic variants, including on stickers , textile prints ( banners , items of clothing such as T-shirts, etc.), graffiti or as a pin in the appropriate environment.

Older, historical uses

The broken rifle as a pin from 1935

The first example of the journalistic use of the broken rifle can be found in the header of the January 1909 issue of “ De Wapens Neder ” ( Die Waffen Nieder ), a monthly magazine of the then International Antimilitarist Union named after the German-language model published by Bertha von Suttner from 1892 to 1899 based in the Netherlands.

In 1915 it appeared on the cover of a pamphlet of the Norwegian Social Democratic Youth Association under the title " Under det brukne Gevær " ( Under the Broken Gun ).

A war victims association founded in Germany in 1917 used the symbol on an association flag.

During a demonstration by Belgian workers in La Louvière on October 16, 1921 , some demonstrators showed banners depicting a soldier breaking his rifle.

After the First World War it was some groups of the Free Youth that emerged from the youth movement for life reform , especially in connection with the working class youth , who made the broken rifle their symbol. As a result of the experience of the war, they had become increasingly politicized and initially turned against war and militarism in general. They were primarily shaped by anti-authoritarian and internationalist and party-independent ideas of socialism . A substantial part of the groups of the Free Youth went from 1923 to the Syndicalist-Anarchist Youth of Germany (SAJD).

Commemorative plaque inaugurated in 2002 at the first location of Ernst Friedrich's International Anti-War Museum in Berlin-Mitte (Parochialstr. 1–3)

The anarcho-pacifist Ernst Friedrich , himself a protagonist of the Free Youth in Berlin, used the broken rifle in 1924, for example, in advertisements to distribute his book Krieg dem Kriege , a photo documentation on the First World War with a detailed anti-war appeal to the “ people of all countries ” in four Languages ​​(German, French, English and Dutch). The book, published on behalf of the Free Youth Berlin , was successful in Germany during the Weimar Republic and caused a sensation in the feature pages. With the proceeds from the sale of the work, Friedrich financed the operation of his anti-war museum, which opened in Berlin in 1923 . Above the front door he put a bas-relief with the motif of the broken rifle. After the seizure of power of the Nazis , the museum was seized in 1933 by the new rulers and dissolved. The anti-militarist regalia were destroyed or removed, and the building was converted into an SA meeting place . It was not reopened until 1982 at another location in the Berlin district of Wedding with its original purpose.

In 1950, the German visual artist Otto Pankok took up the motif of the broken rifle and, with one of his most famous works, the woodcut "Christ breaks the rifle", gave it a religious ambition that complemented the political issue . This image was also widespread in later peace movements, especially in the 1980s in Christian- inspired organizations such as the Catholic Pax Christi or the evangelical Action Reconciliation Peace Services . The weekly magazine der Spiegel used Pankok's woodcut in a colored modified form on the cover picture in June 1981 (issue 25/1981) as a lead story for one of its first major reports on the peace movement at that time against the NATO double resolution .

Recent Uses / Gallery

WRI magazine The Broken Gun

Since 1986, the magazine Das zerbelte Gewehr has been published at irregular intervals - about three to four times a year - as an international newsletter from War Resisters' International . It is published in German, English ( The broken rifle ), French ( Le fusil brisé ) and Spanish ( El fusil roto ) and primarily contains news and background information on peace and human rights activities around the world supported by WRI. The 100th issue of the magazine was published in October 2014. The editions and articles of the newsletter Das Zerbelte Gewehr published since December 1996 are available online on the WRI website.

Web links

Commons : Broken Gun  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
  • broken rifle , explanations of the historical use of the broken rifle on the pages of the Peace Pledge Union (ppu.org.uk)
  • The broken Rifle , article on wikisymbol.com
  • Anti-War Books of the 1920's: the War Against War (English). Subpage of the website greatwardifferent.com with a summary of Ernst Friedrich's book “ Krieg dem Kriege ”; in the illustration the version of the broken rifle used by Ernst Friedrich as a symbol of the free youth (top picture), on the third picture a photograph of the front facade of the anti-war museum from the 1920s with the relief of the same, graphically modified symbol above the entrance door.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Member organizations of WRI: List of national sections and associated organizations of WRI worldwide ( Memento of September 30, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) (sorted alphabetically by country)
  2. ↑ a b c d Bill Hetheringon: Symbols of Peace, Housmans Peace Diary 2007 ; London, Housmans Publishing House, 2006
  3. ^ On the history of the syndicalist-anarchist youth movement since 1918 ; Article on Schattenblick.de - originally published in the magazine Direct Action , No. 195, September / October 2009
  4. ↑ Christ breaks the rifle , click on the last picture to enlarge it ; Article on the work of Otto Pankok with sample images of his works (at www.pankok-museum-esselt.de)
  5. ↑ Re: cover picture ; Editorial for the cover picture including the image of the cover picture itself ( DER SPIEGEL , issue 25/1981, June 15, 1981)
  6. ↑ German-language online presence of the magazine Das zerbbreche Gewehr , with links to the individual issues and articles since December 1996 (accessed on June 14, 2015)