Albert Einstein, the scientist whose theories of relativity led to the development of atomic energy and weapons, was a dedicated pacifist and advocate of world government.

He was born March 14, 1879 in Ulm, Germany.

He grew up in Munich where he attended strict schools in which he performed poorly.

His mother insisted he take violin lessons, and his uncles introduced him to mathematics and science.

At the age of 5 he wondered why a compass always pointed north, and at 12 he began a quest to understand the mystery of the "huge world."

He continued to have difficulty in school until he moved to Switzerland where in 1900 he graduated in physics from the reputable Polytechnic Academy in Zurich.

He gained Swiss citizenship and got a job in the patent office in Bern examining inventions.

In 1905 Einstein began to publish important papers in theoretical physics, particularly on the special theory of relativity, which synthesized the law of the conservation of the mass with the law of the conservation of energy into an equivalence in terms of the speed of light squared: E = mc2 (squared), the three-dimensional coordinates of space and the one of time were also joined into the four-dimensional continuum of space-time.

Einstein gained some recognition from eminent physicists and began teaching at universities in Switzerland and Germany.

He moved his family to Berlin in April 1914 to accept a position with the Prussian Academy.

Einstein hated the war and criticized German militarism but he devoted himself to his scientific work. He published "The Foundation of the General Theory of Relativity" in 1916.

Using the space-time continuum concept he postulated that gravity is not a force as much as a field shaped by bodies of mass.

His theory was proved correct when he accurately predicted that even light from stars would bend when passing near the sun; this was measured and verified by Arthur Eddington during a total eclipse in 1919.

Einstein was now internationally acclaimed as perhaps the greatest scientist of the twentieth century.

In 1921 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics. Einstein spent the rest of his scientific career working on his unified field theory, attempting to find the mathematical relationship between the electromagnetic field and the gravitational field.

However, quantum theory and the uncertainty principle thwarted his efforts to find a formula which could predict subatomic events.

Einstein clung to his belief that the universe is comprehensible, saying that God does not play dice with the world.

As a world-famous celebrity Einstein's statements on peace were given considerable publicity.

When the first World War began, Einstein and two others signed a statement by Georg Friedrich Nicholai challenging the "Manifesto to Europeans," which was a blatant promotion of German militarism that had been signed by ninety-three prominent Germans.

Nicolai's statement warned that every nation in the war would pay a heavy price, and he suggested a League of Europeans to achieve unity.

During the war Einstein was a founder and supporter of the New Fatherland League which sought to establish after the war a supranational organization to prevent future wars.

He gleefully smuggled pacifist literature to his friend Nicholai in prison.

In 1915 he signed a declaration by this League criticizing annexationist policies of the Chancellor.

In a letter to the French pacifist writer, Romain Rolland, Einstein compared the "insanity of nationalism" to the religious fanaticism of three centuries earlier which had caused so many useless wars.

In 1917 he wrote again to Rolland suggesting a "military arbitration pact among America, Britain, France and Russia" which any democratic nation could join.

Although Einstein was not religious in the traditional sense, he was proud of being a Jew. Within the war atmosphere that swept up so many around him, he wrote to an academic, "I prefer to string along with my compatriot, Jesus Christ, whose doctrines you and your kind consider to be obsolete. Suffering is indeed more acceptable to me than resort to violence." Late in 1918 when Germany was undergoing revolution, Einstein gave a speech at the Reichstag suggesting to the revolutionary committees, "Our common goal is democracy, the rule of the people," but warning them, "Do not be lured by feelings of vengeance to the fateful view that violence must be fought with violence, that a dictatorship of the proletariat is temporarily needed in order to hammer the concept of freedom into the heads of our fellow countrymen. Force breeds only bitterness, hatred and reaction."

After the war Einstein favored the publication of the war crimes committed by the German High Command in Belgium and France to communicate to Germans how the others felt in order to "prevent the emergence of a spirit of vengefulness."

In 1922 he made a trip to Paris to discuss with political figures methods of preventing wars, and returning to Germany he spoke again in the Reichstag at a meeting of the German Peace Federation calling for goodwill between peoples of different languages and cultures.

In a German pacifist publication Einstein explained how war blocks international cooperation and culture by destroying intellectual freedom, chaining the energies of the young to the engines of destruction, and causing economic depression.

Einstein supported the League of Nations, but he resigned from the League Committee on Intellectual Cooperation in 1923 when France did not agree to arbitration concerning Germany's war-reparations payment. He felt that the League was merely a tool of the dominant nations.

In 1924 he was re-elected to that Committee and decided to "let bygones be bygones" and accept the position, hoping that the League would "live up to its great mission of creating a world of peace."

In 1928 Einstein began recommending that individuals refuse military service and any participation in war activities. During this period Einstein's pacifism was absolute, and he believed that any killing of a human being, even during war, is murder.

He saw how science and technology were changing warfare, and he believed that international conventions to limit the applications of science did not solve the real problem, which was how to end war by establishing international justice.

In pleading for disarmament, Einstein felt that its risks and sacrifices were less than the risks and sacrifices of war. People ought to refuse to kill other innocent people.

However, he saw that Europe was systematically preparing for war, and he predicted, "An impotent League of Nations will not be able to command even moral authority in the hour of nationalist madness."

The production of armaments, for Einstein, was damaging not only economically but also spiritually.

In 1930 he signed a manifesto for world disarmament sponsored by the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.

The same year Einstein warned the Zionist movement that he would not continue to support them unless they made peace with the Arabs.

On December 14, 1930 Einstein made his famous statement in New York that if two per cent of those called for military service were to refuse to fight and were to urge peaceful means of settling international conflicts, then governments would become powerless since they could not imprison that many people.

He struggled against compulsory military service and urged international protection of conscientious objectors. He concluded that peace, freedom for individuals and security for societies depended on disarmament; otherwise, "slavery of the individual and the annihilation of civilization threaten us."

As part of his work for intellectual cooperation Einstein wrote an open letter to Sigmund Freud in 1932 asking him to discuss the causes and cures of war.

In his letter Einstein suggested that an international legislative and judicial body was needed to solve conflicts and maintain security. In his carefully reasoned response Freud came to the same conclusion that Einstein had intuitively grasped.

Later that year Einstein supported the French Premier Herriot's proposal for "a police force which would be subject to the authority of international organs."

Early in 1933 Einstein warned that powerful industrial interests which produce arms were trying to sabotage efforts to settle international disputes peacefully.

When Hitler and the Nazi Party came to power in 1933 Einstein left Germany for good and settled at Princeton, where he joined the Institute for Advanced Study.

He saw that Germany was "secretly arming at a great pace," and noticing "the desire for revenge among the educated," he predicted "the sacrifice of a terrifying number of human lives and untold destruction."

Being realistic about this danger he ceased to be an absolute pacifist although he still recommended a supranational organization of force, in its absence he felt that the democracies ought to prepare to defend themselves.

He was criticized by some pacifists, but Einstein felt that it would be foolish to close one's eyes to the Nazi menace.

He tried to communicate the dreadfulness of Fascism and the Nazis' fanatical drive toward war. He encouraged the United States to join the League of Nations and to make it an effective instrument of international security.

By 1935 he estimated that war would come in two or three years. He reiterated the need for world government: "First, create the idea of supersovereignty: men must be taught to think in world terms; every country will have to surrender a portion of its sovereignty through international cooperation."

In 1937 he declared that true pacifism works for international law, while neutrality and isolation practiced by a great power contribute to international anarchy and consequently to war.

Einstein's famous formula E= mc2 (squared) indicates that a very small amount of matter may be converted into a tremendous amount of energy.

In July 1939 Leo Szilard told Einstein about the work under way which showed that through nuclear fission a chain reaction might be started.

This was a shock to Einstein. Four and a half years earlier he had discounted the likelihood of releasing energy from a molecule, saying, "It is something like shooting birds in the dark in a country where there are only a few birds."

Now he immediately realized the danger if Germany were to get uranium from the Belgian Congo, and he agreed to contact the Belgium government through his friend, Queen Elizabeth.

Alexander Sachs, one of President Roosevelt's unofficial advisors, suggested to Einstein that he address a letter directly to the President.

On August 2, 1939 Einstein wrote to President Roosevelt explaining how nuclear chain reactions in a large mass of uranium could generate large amounts of power and radium like elements.

In fact, in the immediate future, a powerful enough bomb could be built to destroy an entire port. He pointed out that the best uranium is found in Canada, the former Czechoslovakia, and especially the Belgian Congo, and he had heard that Germany had stopped the sale of uranium from the Czechoslovakian mines.

He added, "The son of the German Under-Secretary of State, von Weiszacker, is attached to the Kaiser Wilhelm Institut in Berlin, where some of the American work on uranium is now being repeated."

The letter, with a memorandum by Szilard, actually was not delivered to the President by Sachs until October 11.

President Roosevelt immediately appointed an Advisory Committee on Uranium.

Later Einstein considered the writing of this letter the one great mistake of his life; at the time he felt justified because of the danger that the Germans would make atom bombs.

This was the extent of Einstein's role in nuclear energy; he did not know an atomic bomb had been developed by the United States until he heard of he Hiroshima blast.

For the rest of his life Einstein emphasized the need for a supranational organization with the authority and power to maintain international security.

With the unleashing of the atomic bomb in 1945 his pleas became even more fervent.

As a knowledgeable scientist he felt that it was his responsibility to inform the public of the enormity of the danger. The United Nations was a step in the right direction, but from the beginning Einstein believed that it was "a tragic illusion unless we are ready to take the further steps necessary to organize peace."

There must be effective world law with a Federal Constitution and a permanent world court to restrain the executive branch of the world government from going beyond peace-keeping.

National military power must be abandoned in favor of the supranational authority.

Otherwise war preparations inevitably lead to war, and in the atomic age there is the danger of pre-emptive war and the possibility of total annihilation.

Einstein supported efforts to strengthen the United Nations and give it the powers it needs. Survival, he felt, must be the first priority, and survival depends on world government.

There is no defense against nuclear weapons. Einstein evaluated every nation's foreign policy by one criterion: "Does it lead us to a world of law and order or does it lead us back toward anarchy and death?" He said, "We need a great chain reaction of awareness and communication."

Einstein criticized as political exploitation the policy of stockpiling atomic bombs without promising not to initiate their use.

In 1947 only the United States had atomic weapons; however, the cold war had already begun, and the Soviet Union was developing them also.

Both sides refused to consider supranational control, and Einstein lamented that the victors of the second world war had degraded themselves to the low ethics of their enemy and remained at that level after the war.

In 1948 Einstein predicted that the arms race would increase tension between the United States and the Soviet Union, undermine the democratic spirit in America, impose heavy and unnecessary economic burdens due to the unproductive work, and generate that militaristic spirit which Toynbee said is fatal to civilizations.

For Einstein, the problem of peace and security was far more important than the conflict between socialism and capitalism.

Einstein worked with the Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientists to educate people about the dangers of atomic war and the necessity of effective world government.

By 1949 the Soviet Union had atomic weapons, and the United States had begun working on the hydrogen bomb. Einstein's prophecy that the cold war would threaten democratic principles in the United States came to pass with the operations of the House un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).

He recommended that intellectuals use Gandhi's method of non-cooperation by refusing to testify. Einstein believed that Gandhi held the most enlightened political views and that his method of non-violent revolution is the only way of bringing peace to the world on a supranational basis.

With this method the small countries together could become a decisive factor in the world. Nevertheless he felt that a responsible statesman would not use Gandhi's methods unilaterally until there had been a period of transition .

In the last week of his life Einstein collaborated with Bertrand Russell on a manifesto concluding with a resolution to be presented to a world convention of scientists which read:

In view of the fact that in any future world war nuclear weapons will certainly be employed, and that such weapons threaten the continued existence of mankind, we urge the governments of the world to realize, and to acknowledge publicly, that their purposes cannot be furthered by a world war, and we urge them, consequently, to find peaceful means for the settlement of all matters of dispute between them.

When Einstein died on April 18, 1955 he left a piece of writing ending in an unfinished sentence. There were his last words:

In essence, the conflict that exists today is no more than an old-style struggle for power, once again presented to mankind in semireligious trappings.

The difference is that, this time, the development of atomic power has imbued the struggle with a ghostly character; for both parties know and admit that, should the quarrel deteriorate into actual war, mankind is doomed.

Despite this knowledge, statesmen in responsible positions on both sides continue to employ the well-known technique of seeking to intimidate and demoralize the opponent by marshaling superior military strength.

They do so even though such a policy entails the risk of war and doom.

Not one statesman in a position of responsibility has dared to pursue the only course that holds out any promise of peace, the course of supranational security, since for a statesman to follow such a course would be tantamount to political suicide.

Political passions, once they have been fanned into flame, exact their victims...