A desire among the members of the military to meet in sports arenas instead of battlegrounds was nothing new when the CISM was founded in 1948. Just after the First World War, the first Inter-allied Games were organized on the initiative of General “Black Jack” Pershing (1860 – 1948) and his entourage, with 18 nations representing five continents. In 1919, 1500 athletes competed in 24 different sports in front of a large audience in the Paris suburb of Joinville. Following the Second World War, the Allied Forces Sports Council was revived. The second Inter-allied Games were held in Berlin in 1946. On May 1946, the Allied Forces Sports Council was set up. Unfortunately, because of political discord, the Allied Forces Sports Council ceased operations in 1947. However, on Feb. 18, 1948, the International Military Sport Council (CISM: Conseil International du Sport Militaire) was founded by representatives of five nations: Belgium, Denmark, France, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands, who were meeting at the time in Nice, France during a fencing event. There is a document on the CISM website with the dates of Feb. 15, 16, & 17, 1948 which supports their origin. However, the name of the organization at that time was Conseil des Sports des Forces Allies.1 Although only European countries were present, the CISM founding nations did have a global project in mind. Today it has 134 member countries. The CISM’s motto is “Friendship through Sports”, and pursues peace through healthy competition on the Sports Field rather than the Battlefield.
Discussions on hosting World Military Games, began in 1956, but did not come to fruition until 1995. This delay in the games was, at least in part, due to the Cold War, but when that ended, the 1st games were held as a commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the end of World War II. These first Games were held in Rome, Italy, followed by: Zagreb, Croatia (1999); Catania, Italy (2003); Hyderabad, India (2007); and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2011). CISM maintains a website. Click here to access.
Dr. Gianni Gola (Italy), former president of CISM, organized the 1st World Military Winter Games in Aoster, Italy which were held from March 20 to 25, 2010. Since then, the Winter games have been held in Annecy, France (2013), and Sochi, Russia (2017), but the 2021 games, which were scheduled to be hosted by Germany, were postponed due to COVID-19. They are scheduled to resume in 2025 in Lucerne, Switzerland. The CISM Winter Sports does maintain a website. Click here to access.
CISM also sponsors other games, such as the Military World Football Cup, Military Men’s Rugby Challenge, Military Functional Fitness Challenge, Military Running Challenge, Military Cadet World Games, World Military Football (Soccer) Championship for Women, etc.
From Oct. 2nd to the 11th, 2015, Korea hosted the 6th World Military Athletics Championship경북문경 세계군인체육대회 also known as Mungyeong 2015 (문경2015). The event was hosted by the Republic of Korea Ministry of National Defense, North Gyeongsang Province. The primary city for the games was Mungyeong 문경, North Gyeongsang Province, but some events were held in seven other cities in North Gyeongsang Province (Pohang포항, Gimcheon 김천, Andong안동, Yeongju 영주, Yeongcheon 영천, Sangju 상주 and Yecheon 예천). There were 246 events in 23 different sports and one demonstration sporting event. It was attended by approx. 8700 participants from 110 nations (attendance numbers vary by source). North Korea has participated in the World Military Games, but did not attend this event in South Korea.
Korea maintains a webpage for the 2015 games. Click here to access.
The game’s Female Mascot is “Haeraoni” 해라오니 and is a combination of “Hae”, “Raon”, “Ni”, pure Korean words meaning “Happiness”, “Pleasure”, and “Close by”.
Footnotes:
- That document can be found here. Contained within that document is a Coca-Cola Challenge.