During the fifties twelve wars were being fought each year on average. Today such a low number is unimaginable - it was four times more in the following decades. There are more and more civil wars and their intensity is increasing. If this disarmament process is continued only half as much money will be available for military and armaments at the end of the next decade as at the time of the block confrontation. The scrapping and destruction of superfluous weapons is costly and calls for just as much know-how as their development and production.
Military personnel has to be reschooled and integrated into civilian professions.
The laboratories and factories for armaments must be adapted to their new civilian tasks. Until now only comparatively small amounts of money have been used for the lawful disposal of superfluous weapons. In the future significantly more money will be needed to come to grips with the inheritance of the arms race. The technical challenges and social problems of disarmament and demilitarization are similar in most centuries. Thus there is a desperate need for an international cooperative programm for the research and development of technology for the safe elimination of superfluous armaments goods and for the conversion of military grounds, arms industries and the reintegration of military - and arms personnel into the civilian professional and working life.