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During both World War I and World War II, Switzerland managed to keep a stance of armed neutrality, and was not involved militarily. However, precisely because of its neutral status, Switzerland was of considerable interest to all parties involved, as the scene for diplomacy, espionage, commerce, and as a safe haven for refugees. ==World War I== Switzerland maintained a state of armed neutrality during the First World War. However, with two of the Central Powers (Germany and Austria-Hungary) and two of the Entente Powers (France and Italy) all sharing borders and populations with Switzerland, neutrality proved difficult. From December 1914 until the spring of 1918 Swiss troops deployed in the Jura along the French border over concern that the trench war might spill into Switzerland. Of lesser concern was the Italian border, but troops were also stationed in the Unterengadin region of Graubünden. While the German-speaking majority in Switzerland generally favored the Central Powers, the French- and, later, Italian-speaking populations sided with the Entente Powers, which would cause conflict in 1918. However, the country managed to keep out of the war. During the war Switzerland was blockaded by the Allies and therefore suffered some difficulties. However, because Switzerland was centrally located, neutral, and generally undamaged, the war allowed the growth of the Swiss banking industry.〔 For the same reasons, Switzerland became a haven for refugees and revolutionaries. Following the organisation of the army in 1907 and military expansion in 1911, the Swiss Army consisted of about 250,000 men with an additional 200,000 in supporting roles. Both European alliance-systems took the size of the Swiss military into account in the years prior to 1914, especially in the Schlieffen Plan. Following the declarations of war in late July 1914, on 1 August 1914 Switzerland mobilized its army; by August 7 the newly appointed general Ulrich Wille had about 220,000 men under his command. By August 11 Wille had deployed much of the army along the Jura border with France, with smaller units deployed along the eastern and southern borders. This remained unchanged until May 1915 when Italy entered the war on the Entente side, at which point troops were deployed to the Unterengadin valley, Val Müstair and along the southern border. Once it became clear that the Allies and the Central Powers would respect Swiss neutrality, the number of troops deployed began to drop. After September 1914, some soldiers were released to return to their farms and to vital industries. By November 1916 the Swiss had only 38,000 men in the army. This number increased during the winter of 1916–17 to over 100,000 as a result of a proposed French attack that would have crossed Switzerland. When this attack failed to occur the army began to shrink again. Because of widespread workers' strikes, at the end of the war the Swiss army had shrunk to only 12,500 men.〔 During the war "belligerents" crossed the Swiss borders about 1,000 times, with some of these incidents occurring around the ''Dreisprachen Piz'' or Three Languages Peak (near the Stelvio Pass; the languages being Italian, Romansh and German). Switzerland had an outpost and a hotel (which was destroyed as it was used by the Austrians) on the peak. During the war, fierce battles were fought in the ice and snow of the area, with gun fire even crossing into Swiss areas at times. The three nations made an agreement not to fire over Swiss territory which jutted out between Austria (to the north) and Italy (to the south). Instead they could fire down the pass, as Swiss territory was around the peak. During the fighting, Switzerland became a haven for many politicians, artists, pacifists, and thinkers. Berne, Zürich and Geneva became centers of debate and discussion. In Zürich two very different anti-war groups would bring lasting changes to the world, the Bolsheviks and the Dadaists. The Bolsheviks, a faction of Russian socialists, centered around Vladimir Lenin. Following the outbreak of the war, Lenin was stunned when the large Social Democratic parties of Europe (at that time predominantly Marxist in orientation) supported their various respective countries' war efforts. Lenin (against the war in his belief that the peasants and workers were fighting the battle of the bourgeoisie for them) adopted the stance that what he described as an "imperialist war" ought to be turned into a civil war between the classes. He left Austria for neutral Switzerland in 1914 following the outbreak of the war and remained active in Switzerland until 1917. Following the 1917 February Revolution in Russia and the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II he left Switzerland on the ''Sealed Train'' to Petrograd, where he would shortly lead the 1917 October Revolution in Russia. While the Dada art movement was also an anti-war organization, Dadaists used art to oppose all wars. The founders of the movement had left Germany and Romania to escape the destruction of the war. At the Cabaret Voltaire in Zürich they put on performances expressing their disgust with the war and with the interests that inspired it. By some accounts Dada coalesced on October 6, 1916 at the cabaret. The artists used abstraction to fight against the social, political, and cultural ideas of that time that they believed had caused the war. Dadaists viewed abstraction as the result of a lack of planning and of logical thought-processes. When World War I ended in 1918, most of the Zürich Dadaists returned to their home countries, and some began Dada activities in other cities. In 1917 Switzerland's neutrality came into question when the Grimm–Hoffmann Affair erupted. Robert Grimm, a Swiss socialist politician, travelled to Russia as an activist to negotiate a separate peace between Russia and Germany, in order to end the war on the Eastern Front in the interests of socialism and pacifism. Misrepresenting himself as a diplomat and an actual representative of the Swiss government, he made progress but had to admit to fraud and return home when the Allies found out about the proposed peace deal. Neutrality was restored by the resignation of Arthur Hoffmann, the Swiss Federal Councillor who had supported Grimm but had not consulted his colleagues on the initiative. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Switzerland during the World Wars」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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