DDPS wants to put an end to Swiss neutrality

“Neutrality is by far the most important principle of Swiss foreign policy. It is the guiding principle in major foreign policy issues. Over the centuries, Switzerland has adhered to it – and foreign countries have judged the Confederation by it.”¹ (Ambassador Paul Widmer)
    We have already become used to quite a bit when it comes to the Federal Council. But what Federal Departement of Defence, Civil Protection and Sports (DDPS) head Viola Amherd has taken the licence to do with her hand-picked, largely pro-NATO “Study Commission on Security Policy” breaks every mould.² After foreign forces and – far worse! – certain circles at home have already been sawing at the branch of Switzerland’s perpetual armed neutrality for 30 years, Amherd and her people now want to put an end to our neutrality once and for all. The unique Swiss state model is to be incorporated into NATO and the EU.

“Farce” – “complaisance report”

Anyone reading the report will be struck by the blatant results of the Commission’s so-called democratic votes on the individual issues: mostly eighteen votes to two or the like. And why does a study commission have to vote at all? It is not a democratically legitimised institution, but a team appointed by Viola Amherd, which has simply confirmed her policy. The fact that 14 people come from the administration, the economy, the army, etc. and 6 from parliament³ does not make the committee any more balanced. According to the daily newspaper “Blick”, the few parliamentarians with an unerring eye for neutrality described the commission’s work as a “farce” (National Councillor Marionna Schlatter, Green Party) or as a “complaisance report” (National Councillor Thomas Hurter, Swiss People’s Party). SP National Councillor Pierre-Alain Fridez resigned early, according to “Le Temps” of 22 August 2024, and that “with the approval of the leaders of his party” (!).⁴ The so-called basic documents, mostly issued by the DDPS or the DFA, and the input papers on the individual topics are, as the reader can easily see, completely one-sided: Nato-critical speakers were completely absent.
    Against this background, a few key points taken from the study commission’s report will be addressed here. Several of them will be mentioned in the interview with ^{Franz Grüter,} member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National Council. Others still need to be evaluated.

“Deepened, institutionalised
cooperation with NATO”

Eighteen out of twenty people in the study commission dismiss neutrality “as an instrument and not a purpose of the state” (p.30). What ignorance! Perpetual armed neutrality is an indispensable maxim of the Swiss state, otherwise the unique state model would collapse. For those Swiss who lack the necessary historical and constitutional foundations ist no place neither in the Federal Council nor in a “group of experts” closely connected to it.
    “In the face of the current turning point in history”, Swiss neutrality policy should be “revised” and “made more flexible”, according to the Commission (p. 28f). What is meant by “flexibilisation” has already been explained by the Federal Council in a report from January 2024 – in open denial of its constitutional duty to uphold the country’s neutrality. There it explained “how deeper, institutionalised cooperation with NATO in the area of defence can be achieved without joining the Alliance […]” (p. 31; emphasis mw). In plain language: How do we scrape past the obligatory referendum actually necessary for joining NATO?
    In order to prepare the population for NATO operations, our militia soldiers are in future to be forced to perform their compulsory service abroad with NATO troops, i.e. service abroad is no longer to be voluntary. (p.40). However, this will only be possible with an amendment to the Military Act – the referendum against this is certain.

Playing with fire

The clique in the DDPS Commission even goes one better than the NATO defence alliance exercises in accordance with Art. 5 of the NATO Treaty, demanding Switzerland’s participation “in a joint defense against ballistic missiles” (p. 40), knowing full well that “such cooperation [...] presupposes a revised understanding of neutrality” (p. 35).” They are indeed playing with the fire of a NATO war into which Switzerland could be drawn: “For geographical reasons alone, NATO must include Swiss territory in its defense planning”, while in the event of an attack on a European NATO country, Switzerland “basically [has] two options: it can invoke its neutrality or [...] give up its neutrality and participate in the defense of Europe.” (p. 35) The “clique” are turning into arsonists.

Switzerland as a henchman
of NATO arms industry?

“Arms production and procurement must be coordinated with NATO and the EU in the interests of interoperability. The programmes aligned with this demand and aimed at strengthening the European arms industry […] are to be utilised […].” (p. 40) And yet it is necessary that Switzerland’s interest must focus on the question of what armaments and equipment our army needs to defend its own country and population.

Commission pushes weapons
exports contrary to neutrality

The Commission calls for “a longer-term and more far-reaching revision of the War Material Act than the adjustment currently being discussed in Parliament […].” (p. 30) That’ll be the day, if the DDPS is to lay down the law for Parliament and the sovereign and to determine what law they should set.

The mendacious spin about “alignment of neutrality with the UN Charter”

Alignment with international law, especially international humanitarian law, the Geneva Conventions and the goals of the ICRC is part of the essence of Swiss neutrality policy. However, under point 2.2.3 (legal basis under international law), the majority of the Commission talks about something completely different. It is trying to confuse people’s minds by demanding “a stronger alignment of neutrality with the UN Charter” “and thus a distinction between the aggressor and the victim, who is entitled to the right of defense” (p. 29).
    However, there is no mention in the UN Charter of a duty on the part of UN member states or even neutral states to distinguish between aggressor and victim. This is pure fiction. The Charter states which “measures may/should be taken by the Security Council in the event of a threat to or breach of the peace and of acts of aggression” (Chapter VII) and that every UN member state has “the inherent right of individual or collective self-defense […]until the Security Council has taken the measures necessary to maintain international peace and security.” ( Art. 51)
    The distinction between “aggressor” and “victim” is diametrically opposed to Switzerland’s policy of neutrality, since its globally valued good offices and especially the protecting power mandates are based precisely on providing humanitarian and diplomatic assistance to all warring or conflicting parties who turn to Switzerland. If a neutral state is urged to differentiate between “good” and “evil”, it has already lost all credibility.

“In the face of the
current turning point in history”

Anyone who studied Swiss history at school will know that the war in Ukraine is not the first conflict in which Swiss neutrality has been called into question. In numerous wars, foreign powers have demanded that Switzerland take their side. Paul Widmer reports that even the Napoleonic Wars were alleged to be “a unique battle between right and wrong. Napoleon was no ordinary enemy, he was the ‘ennemi du monde’, the enemy of mankind. […] Neutrality was accepted for traditional wars – or what was considered to be such – but not for the existential struggle in which one was currently engaged. Swiss neutrality was repeatedly challenged along these lines.”⁵

Franz Grüter comments: “Being neutral is nothing comfortable. It is much more comfortable to take sides and say that the other is the bad guy and these are the good guys. That is why there are many politicians who can barely tolerate neutrality, because there is usually pressure from both sides.”
    We Swiss must not let this put us off: If you bear neutrality within yourself as an indispensable identifying feature of our state, you will steadfastly maintain it – for the good of our country and of the world.   •

1   Widmer, Paul. Schweizer Aussenpolitik (Swiss foreign policy). Zurich 2014, p. 24
2   Report of the Security Policy Study Commission 08.2024. https://www.admin.ch/gov/de/start/dokumentation/medienmitteilungen.msg-id-102256.html 
3   Report. Appendix, p. 64
4   Ballmer, Daniel. “Is Amherd only using the Commission to support her course?” in: Blick of 29 August 2024
5   Widmer, Paul. Schweizer Aussenpolitik (Swiss foreign policy). Zurich 2014, p. 27