‘We won’t survive a war in Europe’

german-foreign-policy.com: Almost a year has passed since we first spoke about the role of trade unions in the anti-war movement. Since then, the arms build-up, the dismantling of welfare systems and the preparations for war have only intensified.

Ulrike Eifler: That’s right. The German government will spend 139.7 billion euros on its rearmament next year. At the same time it is halving the budget for hospital infrastructure. It’s effectively planning the largest programme of impoverishment in this country’s history, including major cuts in pensions, care budgets and health services. But it is not only a matter of diverting money intended for our pensions, our healthcare system and our education into the coffers of arms makers. Rearmament is, after all, not an end in itself. Its purpose is to prepare for war. It is, above all, about restructuring the state and society to make us fit for war. As militarisation unfolds, the trade unions’ ability to operate will be severely blunted. For example, we are seeing that the attack on the welfare state is not only removing the institutional power of the trade unions, but also involves active encouragement for employers to openly challenge previously secure labour and trade union rights. Only last week, the employers’ associations called for restrictions on the co-determination rights of works councils, the longstanding system of worker participation in company management. The management of the Charité Hospital in Berlin secured a court injunction just a few days ago to ban a staff strike. It is becoming increasingly clear that, in times when preparations for war are in full swing, confident workers, effective staff councils and free trade unions are seen as a hindrance.

german-foreign-policy.com: Arms build-up, social cuts and preparations for war are not confined to Germany, of course. They are Europe-wide phenomena.

Ulrike Eifler: That’s absolutely right. Across Europe, governments are now preparing ruthless attacks on their welfare states. Public services are being rigorously cut back in order to procure warships, missiles and uniforms. In the Netherlands, families are even being required to pay a so-called ‘freedom levy’ of 450 euros per year. But it is not only the national governments that are pushing rearmament; Brussels is also an active player as European imperialism joins the arms race. Under the ‘ReArm Europe Plan’ the EU is set to channel up to 800 billion euros into arms. At the same time, new rules are being introduced to strengthen the position of European capital. Massive attacks on labour law, environmental standards and social security are planned – measures that will have enormous consequences for workers. A ‘capital markets union’ is planned with an eye to financing Europe’s position in geostrategic competition. The idea is to channel the population’s pensions and private savings into a single market for money, savings and investment that can mobilise these resources for rearmament. Steps are also being taken to remove any obstacles to the centralisation and monopolisation of capital by, for instance, watering down antitrust rules. Corporate giants are to be allowed to dictate the rules and expand their influence over politics. At the end of this process we will arrive at a situation in which competition between companies turns into competition between states – at which point war would not be far off.

german-foreign-policy.com: You have helped organise several major events against militarisation and war, such as the second international anti-war conference in London in June. Looking back, how would you assess their success?

Ulrike Eifler: The London conference was primarily organised by the Stop the War Coalition in the UK, but it is a key step towards building a Europe-wide movement against war. Following the gathering in Paris in October 2025, it was the second conference with this international focus. These conferences have the long-term potential to strengthen the labour movement’s defensive struggle in Europe. In London, some three-thousand anti-war activists from 28 countries spent two days discussing how they could coordinate their protests better. There was strong participation from European trade unions and Unison, the UK’s health workers’ union, was involved. Various trade union leaders made it clear in their speeches that the fight against militarisation and the fight for workers’ rights are two sides of the same coin. Spain’s largest and oldest trade union, the UGT, summed it up well in the wake of the London conference, saying that trade unions must not remain indifferent to preparations for war. For peace, it argued, is not a passive stance but can only be achieved through the active struggle for social justice, democracy and solidarity. That was the spirit of the London conference.

german-foreign-policy.com: In July, the Vierte Gewerkschaftskonferenz für den Frieden (4^th Trade Union Conference for Peace) took place in Würzburg. How would you describe the development of these regular annual conferences since the first one in Hanau in 2023?

Ulrike Eifler: Over the last three years, our conferences have grown in size and attracted a younger audience. Their agenda has become more diverse. The first conference, in 2023, was still strongly characterised by a stance of our moral imperative as trade unionists. The message was that, given our history, trade unions simply had to be part of the peace movement. If we look at history a little more closely, we find that, yes, the labour movement has always been the most important force in the struggle against war, but the road to an anti-war position has always been beset with contradictions and mistakes. Over the course of these conferences, we have shifted our focus to the concrete impact on workers and workers’ rights. This is the angle from which we are building the anti-war stance of trade unionism. The Würzburg conference, in particular, highlighted an aspect which, in my view, is central: war is incompatible with collective bargaining, with limits on working hours, with the right to strike, and with the existence of free trade unions. Trade union mobilisation against war therefore stems less from a moral voluntarism and more from an objective set of interests. With this focus, the conferences have become one of the most important points of reference for trade unionists committed to peace. They have played a significant role in the developing trade union positions on peace policy.

german-foreign-policy.com: Looking at how many activities against militarisation and war have been announced for the coming months, it seems we’re facing a full-blown “autumn of protest”. Do you share this assessment?

Ulrike Eifler: There is indeed a whole series of national and international days of protest scheduled for this autumn. This is great because it ensures the issue of peace remains on the public agenda. It is particularly necessary given the backdrop of the German government’s utterly irresponsible escalation of tensions in German-Russian relations. At the same time, however, this results in a very packed schedule: on 21 September, we have IG Metall’s nationwide day of action against the crisis in the automotive industry; on 25 September, the school strikes; on 26 September, the trade unions’ day of action against welfare cuts. Just one week later, on 3 October, there’s the nationwide demonstration organised by the peace movement. Another week later, on 10 October, there’s the international day of action against the genocide in Palestine. However, what this packed schedule also shows is that actions that belong together have not yet come together in a concerted protest. There is a risk of the movement weakening through fragmentation. In my view, we need to focus more on creating structures that allow us to take our causes onto the streets together.

german-foreign-policy.com: Within this fairly wide-ranging protest movement that seems to be emerging, where do you see the role of the trade unions?

Ulrike Eifler: I think the protests have three levels: firstly, there’s the fight against the dismantling of the welfare state. Here, the trade unions play an important role in mobilising for nationwide days of action – even if more should be done to emphasise the link between welfare cuts and the arms spending. This link is vital because we can’t successfully defend the welfare state unless we say where the money is to come from. Secondly, there is the struggle against rearmament and concrete preparations for war. There is now a whole range of trade union bodies and active trade unionists who are supporting the protests by the school strike movement against compulsory military service. They will be organising demonstrations in Berlin and Stuttgart on 3 October. It would certainly be desirable for the trade unions to play a stronger role in this regard, but the trend is in the right direction and activities look set to grow rather than diminish. And thirdly, there is the struggle against the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and against the US’s multiple violations of international law in its actions against Cuba and Venezuela. Initiatives here include ‘Trade Unionists for Cuba’, which build on traditional forms of trade union solidarity work. This is good and important but, more generally, there needs to be a wider debate within the trade unions about rapid and destructive geopolitical developments. This is particularly important in the case of the Volkswagen plant at Osnabrück where components for the Iron Dome are to be produced in future as part of a cooperation deal between the German and Israeli governments.

german-foreign-policy.com: But shouldn’t safeguarding jobs be the trade unions’ top priority?

Ulrike Eifler: Well, yes, that’s clearly a key task for trade unions. But, as the Spanish UGT says, peace is not simply a passive stance but can only be achieved through active struggle for social justice, democracy and solidarity. This means we cannot remain indifferent to the fact that the German government is cooperating with a government that has bombed the densely populated Gaza Strip turning its homes and hospitals into rubble. Nine out of ten buildings have been destroyed. There is an acute shortage of food, drinking water and medical care. There are no longer any schools or universities. Between October 2023 and June 2026, almost 70,000 children were killed or injured in Gaza – many by targeted headshots fired by the Israeli army, as X-rays have repeatedly proved. And although there has formerly been a ceasefire since October 2025, the killing and the dying in the Gaza Strip continues. The pride and strength of the trade union movement does not stem from a blinkered focus on the workplace alone with indifference of the wider world. A lesson of the past 150 years of trade unionism is that we are strengthened by the power of solidarity and the courage to stand up for grand visions of a better society. We have always raised the question not only of how we want to work, but also, and without fail, how we want to live. When we confidently criticise the abhorrent crimes of the Israeli government and reject arms production in Osnabrück, it does not mean we are any less concerned about our colleagues’ jobs. Rather, it means demanding that job security be based on civilian, peace-oriented production rather than on murderous war production. This, incidentally, is what distinguishes our interests from those of employers.

german-foreign-policy.com: Can the decisions by governments across Europe to direct resources into rearmament and war preparations still be reversed?

Ulrike Eifler: Policy decisions are made and they can be reversed. Indeed, they must be reversed, because we will not survive a war in Europe.