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On this week's installment of our series examining attempts to organize unions of soldiers, we move to Western Europe. In a whirlwind tour we discuss Germany, Italy, France, and Spain's various forms of military labor organizations. The refusal of the US to de-Nazify West Germany played a major role in the rebuilt Bundeswehr's conservatism, including on the issue of soldier unions. In France, the history of repeated military coups made government leaders extremely wary of any sort of parallel power structures. In Spain, the attempts at organizing in the military came at the same time the country began the transition from Franco's fascism to liberal democracy. And in Italy, soldiers who supported the powerful communist party and other left groups confronted a state deeply enmeshed in Cold War power struggles.

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