1) Please introduce your collective to our readers. What led you to found it, and how long have you been operating?
Our collective was formally created on February 24, 2022, the same day the army of the Russian Federation invaded Ukraine. It was initially created by a group of activists from a small anarchosyndicalist group (CNT-AIT France). But our collective is open to anyone who opposes the war and does not support any army.
We were already in re gular contact with anarchist and anti-militarist groups before the war, both in Russia (KRAS-IWA amongst others) and Ukraine. A week before the war, we translated a text by an anarchist group from Lvov, Tchiorni Stiag (Black Flag), explaining that the Ukrainian bourgeoisie had taken their families to safety abroad. So we understood that war was coming. Some of us had already supported deserters during the war in Yugoslavia, so when the war broke out, we were ready to act and we openly launched our initiative. Our first actions were 1) to morally support our friends in Russia who were protesting the war and who were facing severe repression, and 2) to help the Ukrainian refugees who were starting to arrive in France and who were in total shock.
From the beginning, we set ourselves the goal of translating information about the resistances against the war, both in Russia and Ukraine, that cannot be read in the media (whether mainstream or even activist, because often the activist media took sides).
Although we focus on deserters from Eastern Europe, we also have contacts and support deserters in Israel, Sudan and Myanmar. Wherever there is a war, there are people who resist and desert.
2)Is your collective antimilitarist? What do you imagine by this term and how do you understand it? How would you explain it to ordinary workers so that they understand it correctly?
For us antimilitarism means that you do not support any army, you are against the process of militarization of the society.
For us, the question of antimilitarism is different from the question of violence. Violence is a means, sometimes it is counterproductive, sometimes not, it depends on the context, and also on the objective for which it is implemented. Of course we want the minimum of violence possible to achieve our goal, but sometimes our enemies do not leave us a choice. This is also why the war in Ukraine, triggered by the military invasion of the Russian army, led us to reflect on the difference between war and resistance. We are against war, but we are not against resistance. The question for us is therefore: yes to resistance, but with which allies? Should we participate in the resistance by allying ourselves with the State? Or should we promote total resistance, against all State protagonists, with the population against the State? Should our action consolidate the power of the State or on the contrary maintain distrust of the State?
For us, antimilitarism is the rejection of militarization, including the militarization of the Resistance. The Spanish anarchists in 1936 said “always militiamen, never soldiers”. In 1941 in France, an internationalist anarchist group (its members were French, Spanish, Haitian, Russian, Bulgarian, and even a Czech : Joseph Sperck) led a resistance group. One of its best-known members was Voline, a Russian anarchist who had fought with the Makhnovtschina in Ukraine between 1918 and 1920. In 1943, Voline was the author of a famous poster, the only one produced clandestinely by anarchists in France during the Nazi occupation, which denounced all powers, “whether Nazi, Communist, English or Gaullist”. Voline, who was an anarchist, a stateless person of Russian origin, a Jew, a Freemason, took great risks by denouncing the Nazis during the war. If he had been arrested by the Gestapo he would have been exterminated. But that does not mean that he said to join the official resistance under the American and the British umbrella (and even less by the communists!). We place ourselves in the continuity of this spirit of antimilitarist resistance.
We reject the State, uniformity, discipline, obedience.
We believe that this state of mind of resistance is generally well understood by workers, at least in France where there has always been a rebellious spirit in the working classes. Ordinary people do not like to obey stupid orders. On the other hand, there is a form of resignation in the working classes, a feeling of helplessness and also fear, especially after the repression of the yellow vest movement, repression which was very violent in France in 2018-2020.
This is why this campaign to support deserters seems important to us, because it makes people aware that it is possible to act. The campaign shows that everywhere in the world, even in dramatic situations, there are people who resist, who say « no ». It also shows the strength of solidarity. And that resistance is not necessarily spectacular acts, but small everyday things that everyone can do.
3)Your collective is primarily based on helping deserters? How many deserters have you helped and what does such help look like?
We are a very small group, so we bring assistance to a small number of deserters.
To support deserter is first to create a “safe psychological space” were deserters would be accepted and welcome, without questions. It means to promote the idea that to desert is legitimate, and to convince as much people as possible of it, so that you create a pool of people that are ready to help and participate if necessary. To support deserters you need a logistic network to accommodate, feed, help for administrative papers, help for learning language, to find a work etc … You need reliable people, commited (even if it is for “small” tasks) for a long term, …
Our support is not spectacular. It is hosting someone, accompanying him to administrative appointments, offering him activities so that it does not get bored, supporting him morally without being intrusive, … It is being human in fact. It is also necessary to be several to be able to take turns, because the people who help also have their family life, their work etc …
4) Can you anonymously give us an insight into the life stories of these deserters? In the Czech Republic they are not allowed to talk about them in the media, so it will be of great interest to Czech readers.
To begin, we want to say that none of the deserters or refugees we support are anarchists. We have never asked them their ideological opinion, the mere fact that they refused to kill or be killed is enough. As Russian deserters said at a rally we attended in Paris in December « each deserter brings us closer to peace ».
Here are some fairly representative « portraits » of the people we support:
One of them was a student, Russian mother and Ukrainian father. He was living in Russia with his mother. He is a gay, and already had problem with Russian far-right activists at the university. When he received a paper to go to the military recruitement center, he understood he had to fly away. Has he had a visa for France, he escaped quite easily (it was at the very beginng of the war and the borders where not totally closed at that time). We helped him to have a safe place, in order to stabilize after the trauma of the escape. We also helped him to obtain the asylum status, he was certainly one the first Russian to received it. Now he is autonomous and he is “flying with is own wings”.
Another was a young worker, who received his mobilization order. His brother, who is already fighting at the front, told him to escape and not join the army. So he organised his escape through different countries – ouzbekistan, turkey – before to arrive in France. There he went to Germany as he had some relatives there. But the German police caught him. After some time in a Migrant Detention Center he was expelled to France, where we took him in charge. He is taken in charge by a group of friends in a small city, we helped him with paper, French learning, and to find a job, in order to be autonjomous. We also helped his girlfriend, who is Ukrainian, to join him and to obtain the refugee status.
We supported also a family of 3 Ukrainian women from Kharkov, that we found in a state of shock in the Paris Metro. They told us “we are Russian speakers, we were bombed by Russian army while Poutine said he wanted to liberate us ! We will never go again in Russia ! So we flew to Kiev. There the Official services for refugees refused to help us, they told us first to learn Ukrainian language and come back later. So we flew away to Poland, then we took a bus to France, and 48 laters we were droped in a small village in the French Montains in the south. Nobody was awainting for us, we don’t speak French, we were lost … So we took a train to paris, and our babouchka collapsed in the metro”. Those 3 woman are from working class back ground (grand mother was working in factory, the mother was bus driver and the daughter was working in a shop). We find them a shelter, we helped them with papers.
Another type of support, in a small city in the country side, one of us is sharing its garden for vegetable with an middle-age Ukrainian refugee. The garden provides him not only free vegetables but also is a support for its mental health, by having a positive routine.
5) There is no collective to help deserters and conscientious objectors in the Czech Republic. We will be glad if you share with us practical advice and experience on how to build such an organization? How to start and how to proceed?
Every country and situation is different, so we don’t know if we can really give any advice.
But we think it is important to create an “atmosphere” where to desert is seen as something “normal” and that deserve to be supported.
So to start it is to disseminate the idea about desertion and solidarity, as you do with your paper Dezerter. With the time, you will build a network, you will identitfy on whom you can rely on, and what each one can bring according the principe “From each according to his ability”. To support deserters is a long term project, for some months if not some years. We don’t need “super heros” that make “big spectacular actions” and are exhausted after 2 weeks ; but more a lot of “small ants” that coordinates and cooperates and can stand active for a long time
6) How can people in the Czech Republic support deserters? Where to direct their help to whom to turn specifically?
Your project of magazine is a very good start !
The path is made by walking … and every path begins with a first step
Also we welcome your intiative to establish links with different antimilitarist initiative
7) What would you say to all those who send others as cannon fodder? And what about people who have to obey orders and put on army uniforms ?
We are anarchists, so it means we are for freedom. If some people want freely to put on an army uniform, they are free to do it, meanwhile they can’t force anyone to do it. But for us it is clear that as soon as you put (freely) an army uniform you can’t pretend anymore to be « anarchist ». By pretending so, you lie to the others, and also to yourself.
To all those who send others as cannon fodder and who don’t live in Ukraine, we say « go your self on the front ».
And we say to all those who are forced to obey, but want to throw their uniform, you are welcome, we will do our maximum to support you.
Deserters of the world, unite !
Peace to the huts, war to the palaces !
Source: Solidarité avec les réfugiés,d’Ukraine, Russie