Dunant's dream: war, Switzerland and the history of the Red Cross

The International Red Cross was the inspiration - the dream - of Henri Dunant, a 31-year-old businessman appalled by the butchery and lack of medical care for injured soldiers during the battle of Solferino in 1859. With Gustave Moynier, another Swiss, Dunant set out to create an international organization which was not only to alter irrevocably, the fate of all those wounded in every war, but which moved rapidly into international humanitarian law, refugee work, prison conditions and the tracking of people parted by warfare. The original Geneva Convention of 1864, for which the Red Cross was directly responsible, is one of the most important international instruments of humanitarian law ever formulated. Today the Red Cross has 137 national societies and 250 million members. Yet it remains an inscrutable institution - very much the same animal today as in the 1870s - governed by the Swiss alone, but highly dependent for its diplomats and staff on foreigners - all of whom are required to sign a pledge of secrecy. This text traces the origins of the Red Cross, its main areas of work including some of its most difficult and contentious interventions, and its work with refugees. It investigates the secretive paranoia of the headquarters and uncovers some truths about the Red Cross and its relationship with some of the most horrific and barbaric political regimes of the 20th century. It also examines the concept of neutrality - central to the Red Cross - and its feasibility in the modern world.