Page 496 - Le Operazioni Interforze e Multinazionali nella Storia Militare - ACTA Tomo II

1136 XXXIX Congresso della CommIssIone InternazIonale dI storIa mIlItare • CIHm

Conclusion
Although the Commemorations had a clear thematic focus on the mobilization in
1939, the speakers did not only refer to topical historical images of Switzerland at the
time of the Second World War, but rather to the imaginations of “struggle for liberty” in
the tradition of the Old Confederacy in medieval times. Within the speeches these two
topics were seen in correlation. The active duty generation was invoked as a homogene-
ous group which was considered to be the guardian of the heroic forefathers’ heritage.
Together the heroic forefathers and the veterans of the Second World War were identi-
fied as an intergenerational common destiny, fighting for freedom and liberty and bound
in honor and oath.
In the context of Cold War semantics contemporary military strategic concepts like
“Dissuasion” and the so called “Gesamtverteidigung” (a Swiss version of Total War
strategy) could be integrated in the frame of interpretation which was given by the Dia-
mond Commemorations. In the manner of dissuasion the willingness to fight and the
will to self-sacrifice were postulated as a common Swiss national character: A true Swiss
confederate is always willed to defend his country. Or, as the Swiss Federal Council re-
cited and expressed this idea in the information-brochure to the initiative of the abolition
of the armed forces: “Switzerland has no army. Switzerland is an army.” 26
Of course this was a highly constructed common identity, based on a just as con-
structed collective memory. But we should not forget one thing: Only because a collec-
tive identity is constructed – and ultimately all collective identities are constructed – it
does not affect less real to those who are committed to this collective. Those, who op-
posed to this ideal and those, who opposed to the Swiss armed forces on the other hand,
were consequently seen as “the others”, which were not willed to fight for freedom and
independency. They were distinguished as incoherent to the postulated common Swiss
national character. The others were not seen as positioned in the common shared system
of values. Either they did not access to the common shared collective memory or they
interpreted it in another way, which was seen as a false way, as untrue.
To reach a conclusion: The question of abolishment divided the supporters and the
opponents of the Swiss armed forces not only in the area of political decision-making
but rather, or all the more, in the area of commemorative culture, on a deeply emotional
level by the construction of a collective identity through alterity. The analysis of the
Diamond speeches suggests the assumption that the struggle against the Swiss armed
forces – probably not only in the ninety eighties - must be seen and analyzed as a process
of social and cultural differentiation.

The willingness to fight is still present. Another sort of framework program were open house presentations
in companies according to the military-industrial complex. They depicted in what extent a region was
economically addicted to the demand of the armed forces: That affected the visitors directly. Thus the effects
of a possible abolition of the armed forces on the labour market were stylized as a central argument in the
campaign against abolition. Bürgin, Die Diamantreden, 89-103.
26 Botschaft des Bundesrats über die Volksinitiative “Für eine Schweiz ohne Armee und für eine umfassende
Friedenspolitik”, 25.05.1988, in: BBl 1988 II 967.