Opposition to World War I
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The First World War was mainly opposed by left-wing groups, there was also opposition by Christian Pacifist groups.
The trade union and socialist movements had declared before the war their determined opposition to a war which they said could only mean workers killing each other in the millions in the interests of their bosses. But once the war was declared, the vast majority of the socialist and trade union bodies decided to back the government of their country and support the war. For example, On the 25 July 1914, the executive of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) issued an appeal to its membership to demonstrate against the coming war, only to vote on 4 August for the war credits the German government wanted. Likewise the French Socialist Party and its union, the CGT, especially after the assassination of the pacificist Jean Jaurès, organised mass rallies and protests until the outbreak of war, but once the war began they argued that in wartime socialists should support their nations against the aggression of other nations and also voted for war credits.[1]
The few exceptions were the Russian bolsheviks, the Italian Socialist Party, Karl Liebknecht, Rosa Luxemburg and their followers in Germany, and very small groups in Britain and France. In Sweden, the socialist youth leader Zeth Höglund was jailed for his anti-war propaganda, even though Sweden didn't participate in the war.
Other opposition came from conscientious objectors - some socialist, some religious - who refused to fight in the war. In Britain 16,000 people asked for conscientious objector status, and many suffered years of prison, including solitary confinement and bread and water diets, to oppose the war.
Even after the war in Britain, many job offers were marked "No conscientious objectors need apply".
In Britain in 1916 a "Stop the war now" campaign was big enough to have meetings in even small towns, but remained very much a minority affair.
In Russia, opposition to the war led to soldiers also establishing their own revolutionary committees and helped foment the October Revolution of 1917, with the call going up for "bread, land, and peace". After the revolution, the Bolsheviks called for an armistice, but the world powers refused, worried about the possible spread of revolution.
