Soviet Peace Defence Law

1952_The USSR_100 Questions Answered_Soviet News_e-book

27.—What is the significance of the Soviet Peace Defence Law?

THE Second World Peace Congress, held in Warsaw in November 1950, appealed to the United Nations and Governments of all countries to prohibit all war propaganda as criminal, whatever form it might take.

The Soviet people, educated in the spirit of high respect for other peoples and peace and friendship among the nations, ardently supported this appeal. The chairman of the Soviet Peace Committee, the poet N. S. Tikhonov, reported on this historic document to the regular session of the U.S.S.R. Supreme Soviet, in Moscow in March 1951.

Expressing the will of all the peoples of the Soviet Union, who are striving for peace, the U.S.S.R. Supreme Soviet unanimously supported the appeal of the World Peace Congress, and passed unanimously the Peace Defence Law, which reads as follows:

“The Supreme Soviet of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, guided by the lofty principles of the Soviet policy of peace, which aims at consolidating peace and friendly relations among nations.

“Recognises that the conscience and the sense of justice of the peoples, who in the lifetime of a single generation have gone through the calamities of two world wars, cannot tolerate the impunity with which war propaganda is being conducted by aggressive circles of certain States, and associates itself with the appeal of the Second World Peace Congress which expressed the will of the whole of progressive mankind to prohibit and condemn criminal war propaganda.

“The Supreme Soviet of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics resolves:

“1. That war propaganda, in whatever form conducted, undermines the cause of peace, creates the danger of a new war and is, therefore, a grave crime against humanity.

“2. That persons guilty of war propaganda shall be committed for trial as major criminals.”

The adoption of the Peace Defence Law by the supreme organ of State power in the U.S.S.R. is fresh proof that the peoples of the Soviet Union want peace and are willing to fight for it with all their strength and in every way possible.