Where public figures stand on War & Peace
29 people have a position on record here, ordered from the most liberal to the most conservative overall rating. The position is an editorial reading; the statements it rests on are on each profile.
Independent MP for Islington North; former Labour leader
Anti-war, anti-complicity
Frames UK arms sales as moral complicity requiring public inquiry.
observed 2025-06-04 – 2025-07-18
Artist and activist
Witness wars; art as response to conflict
His 2025 Ukraine work positions the artist as front-line witness against escalating global violence.
observed 2025-09-22 – 2025-09-22
Founder and outgoing leader, Reiwa Shinsengumi
Japan's military buildup is money stolen from the poor and obedience bought by Washington.
He opposes the Takaichi government's accelerated 2%-of-GDP defense spending and the associated defense tax as 'riding on America's coattails,' and treats the 80-trillion-yen US investment pact as extortion dressed as a business opportunity. His argument is distributive as much as pacifist: he had the Diet Library read out research on how military spending crowds out health, education and disaster preparedness, and contrasts 6.4 trillion yen for strategic industries including defense with roughly 400 billion for small business.
observed 2025-11-06 – 2025-12-15
Former Federal Minister for Foreign Affairs; Greens co-leader
Uses multilateral forums, especially the UNSC, to condemn Russia's war and support Ukraine within UN legal frameworks.
Uses multilateral forums, especially the UNSC, to condemn Russia's war and support Ukraine within UN legal frameworks.
observed 2024-02-23 – 2024-02-23
President, Five Star Movement (M5S)
Reject military victory strategy; prioritise negotiation
Conte repeatedly calls EU rearmament and hopes for Ukrainian military victory a failed bet, urging diplomacy and saying Europe should accept US-led negotiations.
observed 2025-05-13 – 2026-06-10
Novelist and essayist
Treat U.S. annexation/pressure talk as historic sovereignty threat; lean on NATO deterrence
Atwood casts current Canada–U.S. tension as the most direct threat since 1812 while noting both countries' NATO membership as a grim check on escalation.
observed 2025-05-30 – 2025-11-09
President of South Korea (Democratic Party)
Deter hard, talk anyway
Inaugural pairs US-alliance deterrence with reopened inter-Korean channels and the line that peace is cheaper than war.
observed 2025-06-04 – 2025-06-04
Former Vice Chancellor and Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Action; Greens co-leader
Strong pro-Ukraine stance; argues Germany must act faster and more decisively than Scholz's incremental approach.
Strong pro-Ukraine stance; argues Germany must act faster and more decisively than Scholz's incremental approach.
observed 2024-11-10 – 2024-11-10
Former Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister of Canada
Sustained support for Ukraine against Russian aggression
From wartime sanctions advocacy to an unpaid Zelenskyy economic advisory role, Freeland frames Ukraine as central to the global fight for democracy.
observed 2022-03-10 – 2026-01-13
Leader of Azione; Senator of the Italian Republic
Unconditional support for Ukraine as Europe's front line
Kyiv interviews and Foglio columns treat Ukraine's fight as NATO's border war and reject neutrality that benefits the Kremlin.
observed 2026-02-12 – 2026-07-23
Leader of Italia Viva; former Prime Minister of Italy
Italy must stay at the Western peace and security table
Renzi argues Meloni's balancing act excluded Italy from Russia-Ukraine diplomacy and Gulf crisis coordination that France, Germany and Britain lead.
observed 2026-06-24 – 2026-07-28
Founder and co-leader, Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW)
Supports negotiated settlement and reduced arms flows; demands transparency on Nord Stream sabotage.
Supports negotiated settlement and reduced arms flows; demands transparency on Nord Stream sabotage.
observed 2024 – 2025
Former Chancellor of Germany; SPD Bundestag member
Supports Ukraine within cautious escalation limits; pioneered Zeitenwende rearmament but resisted deepest-strike weapons.
Supports Ukraine within cautious escalation limits; pioneered Zeitenwende rearmament but resisted deepest-strike weapons.
observed 2022-02-27 – 2024-11-10
Adviser, Centrist Reform Alliance; Prime Minister 2011-2012
Deterrence yes, improvisation no: a prime minister must not free-associate about going to war.
A security moderate rather than a pacifist, Noda accepts the alliance and the Self-Defense Forces but insists that a prime minister who is also commander-in-chief has a duty of verbal discipline. He condemned Takaichi's unscripted suggestion that a Chinese blockade of Taiwan could trigger Japanese collective self-defense as reckless and as arbitrary decision-making that damaged relations with Beijing.
observed 2025-11-26 – 2025-11-26
President of Ukraine
Peace only with security guarantees — and ammunition until then
From refusing evacuation in 2022 to co-producing Patriots in 2026: negotiate whenever talks are real, arm regardless, and never trade recognition of occupation for quiet.
observed 2022-02-26 – 2026-07-28
Member, House of Representatives; Prime Minister 2024-2025
Build the deterrent hard and quietly; announcing what you would do in a Taiwan war buys nothing and costs plenty.
Ishiba wants Asian collective defense, a revised Status of Forces Agreement and an honest debate about the US nuclear umbrella, but he treats declaratory hawkishness as a strategic mistake: as prime minister he refused to revisit the three non-nuclear principles, and out of office he has repeatedly said Japan's Taiwan posture must stay deliberately unstated. His critics inside the LDP read the same record as a man who wrote the loudest hawkish manifesto of his generation and then policed everyone else's.
observed 2024-09-25 – 2025-11-23
Minister of Defense
Japan should break its own debate taboos, including on nuclear deterrence, to deter China.
As Defense Minister, Koizumi argues Japan's security environment has deteriorated so far that subjects long treated as unspeakable, above all the role of nuclear weapons, must be discussed openly, while insisting the buildup is defensive and that Japan's door to dialogue with Beijing stays open.
observed 2026-05-31 – 2026-07-19
Former US Director of National Intelligence
Anti-interventionist to the core: no more regime-change wars — even when the president waging one is her boss.
She built her brand denouncing 'warmongers' in both parties and warning of nuclear annihilation, and as DNI kept stating intelligence that undercut the case for war with Iran. Yet she stopped short of opposing Trump's strikes, deferring to him on whether Iran was an 'imminent threat.'
observed 2022-10-11 – 2026-03-18
Host, The Tucker Carlson Show
Every new Middle East war is a betrayal of America First — including Trump's.
Opposed the Iran war from the first Israeli strikes, calling Trump 'complicit' in 2025 and the joint 2026 US operation 'absolutely disgusting and evil,' and apologizing to his audience for helping elect a president who promised no new wars. Wants interventionists driven out of the Republican coalition.
observed 2025-06-13 – 2026-07-25
Chancellor of Germany
Atlanticist continuity on Ukraine and NATO; treats European security as immediate, not deferrable.
Atlanticist continuity on Ukraine and NATO; treats European security as immediate, not deferrable.
observed 2025-02-23 – 2025-06-24
Prime Minister of Japan
Deterrence beats ambiguity: a Chinese blockade of Taiwan could be Japan's own survival crisis, and Japan should say so out loud.
In November 2025 she became the first sitting Japanese premier to publicly tie a Taiwan contingency to the possible use of Japanese force, and she refused Beijing's demand for a retraction through eight months of travel advisories, seafood bans and export controls. She paired this with pulling defense spending up to 2% of GDP two years early and an accelerated rewrite of the three strategic documents.
observed 2025-11-07 – 2026-02-20
Former President of South Korea; serving life sentence for insurrection
Hardline against North; frame opposition as pro-Pyongyang
Martial-law justification invoked North Korean communist threats and "pro-North anti-state forces" inside domestic politics.
observed 2024-12-03 – 2024-12-03
Director of the Office of the Central Commission for Foreign Affairs; Foreign Minister
Deterrence plus mediation — but zero compromise on Taiwan
Wang casts China as Asia's peace broker while treating any Taiwan contingency talk by Japan as casus belli rhetoric.
observed 2026-02-14 – 2026-02-14
47th President of the United States
Wars end on his timetable — deals first, force as leverage
Promised to end the Ukraine war in a day, later calling that sarcasm; in 2026 he alternates strikes on Iran with pauses for talks, keeping "all options on the table."
observed 2023-05-10 – 2026-07-26
Former US Representative (GA-14)
No more forever wars — not even Trump's.
Says America First means staying out of foreign wars: she calls Trump's Iran campaign a betrayal by the 'peace president' that is killing US troops, and wants the US to stop funding wars abroad, including Israel's in Gaza.
observed 2025-07-28 – 2026-07-21
Prime Minister of Italy
Back Trump-led peace diplomacy; Nobel if Ukraine war ends
Meloni hopes US mediation can deliver a just lasting peace in Ukraine and says she would support nominating Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize if he succeeds.
observed 2026-01-23 – 2026-01-24
Prime Minister of Israel
Iran is the eternal red line
From the 2015 Congress speech against the nuclear deal to the 2025-26 conflicts, his through-line is that Iran must never be accommodated — whatever it costs allies' patience.
observed 2015-03-03 – 2026-04-10
US Secretary of War
Executive war powers are sufficient — lethality over lawyers
The Iran campaign runs on existing authority, in his telling; congressional war-powers objections are process noise, and the department's job is warfighting, not paperwork.
observed 2025-09-05 – 2026-07-21
Member of the European Parliament; Leader of Futuro Nazionale
Stop arms to Ukraine; openness to non-Western funding
Opposes prolonging the war through arms transfers; ECFR documents willingness to accept Russian or Chinese party funding.
observed 2026-06-14 – 2026-07-11
