by Markus Bach

In many places around the world, military legacies worth billions bear witness to the fact that traditional security policy is at an end - "rethinking security" (1) is the alternative. As a former base for US troops, Bad Kreuznach has years of experience in the field of conversion. Now that this process has been completed, the town on the Nahe is set to reap social and scientific benefits.

Political scientist Markus Bach has developed a concept for an academy for communal conversion and peace policy. It is intended to produce scientific studies and draft concepts aimed at formulating security and peace from the perspective of municipalities, cities and regions in order to take them out into the world. Local support comes from the DGB, the peace movement and regional churches.

The idea for an Academy for Communal Conversion and Peace Policy (AKKF) in Bad Kreuznach was born at an event organized by the Bad Kreuznach district association of the German Trade Union Confederation (DGB) with the local network am Turm on the topic of "Swords to ploughshares - just a beautiful dream?" on 19.11.2019. (2)

At this event, Otto König, former member of the Federal Executive Board of the German Metalworkers' Union (IG Metall), described the development of conversion using the example of companies in the metal industry. He linked this to the question of what influence employees, works councils and trade unions have on company conversion and how this influence could be increased. The question was based on the assumption that conversion, and with it a new security and peace policy, can essentially also be conceived, co-determined and secured from below, by people on the ground in companies and communities.

Inspired by Otto König's lecture, I made the proposal to set up a degree program for municipal conversion and peace in Bad Kreuznach. The aim of this institution should be to collect and scientifically evaluate Bad Kreuznach's experiences with the long-term stationing and withdrawal of the US military and to make the knowledge gained available for the future management of conversion in other municipalities worldwide. (3) There was initial support for my idea that evening. Trade unionists suggested discussing my proposal and then developing it into a concept.

Support from the Bad Kreuznach DGB district association

After discussions with people involved in the peace movement, trade unions, churches and peace research, I presented my plan for an AKKF to the board of the Bad Kreuznach DGB district association. They supported it and asked me to hold further talks and then present a concept. At the DGB New Year's reception in Bad Kreuznach at the beginning of 2020, DGB district chairman Michael Simon publicly pledged his support for my academy plan.

Through all these discussions, the vision and objectives for the AKKF also became clearer. Using Bad Kreuznach as an example, it should not just be a recorder of a failed and expiring military strategy of deterrence, at the end of which military goods and structures are transformed into civilian ones. Rather, it must point to the future and be a step towards the realization of peace policy demands in exchange with practice-oriented science.

An end to 'classic' security policy?

The basis for this future orientation is my thesis that 'classic security policy', which is based on the principle of threat up to and including nuclear war, has come to an end:

Firstly, because military threat at the current technological level offers no benefit whatsoever to any of the participants in a conflict after a war, but instead conjures up insecurity and suffering. Secondly, because global problems such as climate change, combating pandemics and food security can only be solved through cooperation. The financial resources for this can come from the budgets that are currently still being wasted on armaments projects. (4) The negative agreement between potential opponents of war to threaten each other in order to prevent war, which in turn makes war more possible because it threatens it, should be transformed into positive cooperation in order to work together on peace for the benefit of all and thus make it more stable in the long term. I believe that a grassroots approach will be increasingly necessary in the future because the failed threat policy is primarily based on national security policy.

Derived from this thesis, political and economic benefits can be derived from operational and municipal levels. This should bring everyday benefits to the people of Bad Kreuznach and regions around the world that have yet to undergo conversion, prevent acts of war and stabilize peace. (5)

In Bad Kreuznach, a company, Bad Kreuznacher Entwicklungsgesellschaft mBH, was founded to organize the conversion, with the task of marketing the former US properties. This gave rise to extensive political, legal, economic, ecological and social issues, some of which are documented. (6) What is missing, however, is an overall academic view of this multifaceted conversion. This must answer the question of what political, labor market policy, economic, tourism, urban planning, religious, social and interpersonal consequences resulted from the conversion and what benefits other regions worldwide can draw from these findings. The extent of the conversion in Bad Kreuznach is shown by an assessment on the Bad Kreuznach town council's homepage:

"A memorial stone in front of the Domina Parkhotel Kurhaus commemorates 50 years of US Army presence in Bad Kreuznach. By the end of 2001, the 1st US Armored Division had completed its relocation to Wiesbaden-Erbenheim. The Americans handed over more than 160 hectares of land to the federal government: barracks, helipad, residential buildings and infrastructure facilities for leisure, health, schools, church, etc. From 1951 to 2001, the headquarters of three divisions were stationed in Bad Kreuznach. Most recently, 4,200 soldiers and their families lived in the community. In 2001, 277 civilians, mostly Germans, still had their jobs there. The departure of the Americans, with whom there were many friendly relationships, including on a private level, is a deep turning point in the history of the town. The army was not only an employer, but also a client for many companies in the region. In addition, hundreds of apartments and houses in the town and district were rented. The loss of purchasing power was estimated at around 50 million euros (calculation from 1990).
However, conversion began immediately after the withdrawal, the conversion of military to civilian use. The basis for this is a framework plan adopted by the Bad Kreuznach town council, which defines the future use of all conversion areas." (7)

The aim of the academy was not only to initiate forward-looking municipal processes. It could also examine conversion processes in armaments companies or armaments-related companies in the greater Bad Kreuznach region in order to find out how armaments dependencies can be transformed into peace-oriented economic activity in a way that is profitable for employees, companies and the region.

The AKKF should therefore be supported by two pillars: the reappraisal of local conversion and the evaluation and development of a municipal foreign policy as a peace policy. These two pillars should be embedded in the development of a mission statement for Bad Kreuznach as a city of peace. (8)

What does municipal foreign policy mean as a peace policy? One immediately thinks of town twinning. They are also meant. Bad Kreuznach also needs to expand them. One of its twin towns is Neuruppin, which also has to face up to conversion, albeit as a result of the withdrawal of the Soviet military(https://www.fokus-net.de/mitwirkende). There are starting points here for a joint conversion policy. This could also be embedded in a municipal foreign policy that jointly takes the results of these processes into the world, wherever they are needed.

Another example of municipal foreign policy is the work of the Reschke brothers (@sea_punks) from Bad Kreuznach. They converted a former Bundeswehr ship to save people from drowning in the Mediterranean. This process, including the advertising for it and the problems associated with it, can be examined as the foreign policy of municipal actors. The examples of municipal foreign policy in Bad Kreuznach must be evaluated and then made available to other municipalities as a toolbox.

The bridge city of Bad Kreuznach based on a model of the Birkenfeld environmental campus

Bad Kreuznach, city of the world-famous bridge houses, should itself become a bridge builder on the path from a policy of threat to a policy of cooperation. To achieve this, the town, which hosted the first Franco-German meeting of leaders de Gaulle and Adenauer on German soil after the Second World War, should as soon as possible adopt the name Bad Kreuznach City of Peace and make bridge-building the leitmotif of its actions.

As a city of peace, Bad Kreuznach could benefit economically, touristically and through the creation of jobs. I pointed this out in my article for the Corona Diary of the City Archive. I presented the AKKF concept there for the first time.

My article in the city archive went online on the day of Franco-German friendship, 22 January 2021: shorturl.at/uPVW2 On this day, the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons also came into force, the implementation of which was pushed through by the Nobel Peace Prize winner ICAN and which Bad Kreuznach's Lord Mayor Dr. Heike Kaster-Meurer (SPD) also supports as a member of @Mayors4Peace(More information about Mayors for Peace). The concept for an Academy for Communal Conversion and Peace Policy in Bad Kreuznach supports Dr. Kaster-Meurer's plan for a university location in Bad Kreuznach. The AKKF is supported locally by the DGB, "Active for Peace" and the Working Group of Christian Churches. The participation of Mayors for Peace would be desirable.

The realization process could culminate in the development of a peace campus in Bad Kreuznach - along the lines of the Birkenfeld environmental campus(rb.gy/2vcfi7). The former district administrator of the Birkenfeld district and later Rhineland-Palatinate State Secretary of the Interior Dr. Ernst Theilen (SPD) launched this as a model for humane transformation. Because only those who dare to create more peace will ensure a humane future - not only on the Nahe, but there too.