Subject: US Violates the Geneva Conventions of War
By Jim McMicahael
One of the cases from history recently cited is the arrest of German
soldiers who landed secretly on the North American continent with
plans to commit acts of sabotage. President Truman authorized their
trial before a military tribunal and subsequent execution.
I have never understood how the US could imprison or execute those
Germans without running afoul of the Geneva Conventions of War, to
which the US had been a signatory since 1929
(http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/geneva02.htm).
Article 1 of that treaty incorporates the July 29, 1899 Hague treaty
on the Laws and Customs of War on Land
(http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/hague02.htm), which
defines "prisoner of war" as follows:
In case of capture by the enemy, [combatants and non-combatants]
have a right to be treated as prisoners of war ...
The 1929 Geneva Convention, Article 1, continues as follows:
... [and] all persons belonging to the armed forces of belligerent
parties, captured by the enemy in the course of military
operations at sea or in the air ... {Article 2] ... must at all
times be humanely treated and protected, particularly against acts
of violence, insults and public curiosity ... Measures of reprisal
against them are prohibited."
(http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/geneva02.htm)
According to the US Constitution, ratified treaties have the force
law in the United States.
Why is the US now boasting that it illegally tried and executed
German prisoners of war?
The 1929 treaty required many things of the captors, including a
continuance of the soldier's regular pay while in captivity, freedom
from imprisonment, the right to practice their own religion, normal
sanitation, and so forth.
ARTICLE 45 reads as follows:
Prisoners of war shall be subject to the laws, regulations, and
orders in force in the armies of the detaining Power. An act of
insubordination shall justify the adoption towards them of the
measures provided by such laws, regulations and orders.
(http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/geneva02.htm#art45)
In other words, an Arab prisoner of war in US captivity who steals
money must be tried and treated according to the same laws and
procedures that would apply to a US soldier of the same rank accused
of the same crime.
That is the ONLY case allowed by that treaty for using a military
court on a prisoner of war.
Measures of reprisal against them are prohibited."
(http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/geneva02.htm#art2)
ARTICLE 46:
Punishments other than those provided for the same acts for
soldiers of the national armies may not be imposed upon prisoners
of war by the military authorities and courts of the detaining
Power.
Rank being identical, officers, noncommissioned officers or
soldiers who are prisoners of war undergoing a disciplinary
punishment, shall not be subject to less favorable treatment than
that provided in the armies of the detaining Power with regard to
the same punishment.
Any corporal punishment, any imprisonment in quarters without
daylight and, in general, any form of cruelty, is forbidden.
Collective punishment for individual acts is also forbidden.
(http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/geneva02.htm#art46):
This clear language outlaws the killing of the Germans who were
captured during WW II. The treaty also strictly forbids killing
prisoners of war after the hostilities cease:
ARTICLE 75:
When belligerents conclude at convention of armistice, they must,
in principle, have appear therein stipulations regarding the
repatriation of prisoners of war. If it has not been possible to
insert stipulations in this regard in such convention,
belligerents shall nevertheless come to an agreement in this
regard as soon as possible. In any case, repatriation of prisoners
shall be effected with the least possible delay after the
conclusion of peace.
Prisoners of war against whom a penal prosecution might be pending
for a crime or an offense t of municipal law may, however, be
detained until the end of the proceedings and, if necessary, until
the expiration of the punishment. The same shall be true of those
sentenced for a crime or offense of municipal law.
On agreement between the belligerents, commissions may be
established for the purpose of searching for dispersed prisoners
and assuring their repatriation.
(http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/geneva02.htm#art75)
Thus, any Taleban soldiers or civilians captured during this "war"
must be freed at the cessation of hostilities, providing they are not
charged with disciplinary infractions as prisoners of war.
Collective punishment for individual acts is forbidden. The US may
not generalize from one terrorist act in the US to anyone in power in
Afghanistan.
If the attack on New York was an act of war, as President Bush is fond
of saying, all actions stemming from that incident fall under the
conventions of war. We cannot kill prisoners in reprisal, we cannot
generalize guilt, and we MUST repatriate after martial hostilities.
Permitting them to live is not "amnesty", as we are told recently. It
is simply international treaty law.
But if the attackers are criminals, let the suspects be tried in the
ordinary criminal courts for the crimes, and let us apply the rules of
evidence to the case.
What we have here is confused application: Military courts used to
try (and maybe execute) prisoners of war in retaliation for acts of
war.
If US citizens were caught in one of the many US acts of terrorism,
from car bombings to assassination King Lumumba of the Congo in 1961
(http://www.wsws.org/articles/2001/jan2001/lum-j10.shtml), what would
be the US response if the CIA agent perpetrators were tried in secret
and killed?
As Alice said of Wonderland, this land of ours is becoming
curiouser and curiouser.
J
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