A New York Times article relates a current controversy over Ukrainian soldiers killing Russian soldiers who have surrendered. A media in a Ukrainian unit witnessed such a killing, and was so disturbed that he reported it to the Times. “It is highly unusual for a soldier to speak publicly about battlefield conduct, particularly involving men whom he still considers friends,” the Times says. “But he said he was too troubled to keep silent.”
The Times story’s reporter, Thomas Gibbons-Neff, seems to think this is a scandal, or a scoop, or a suddenly revealed secret, or something. It isn’t, as that scene above from “The Longest Day” should indicate. That incident, like all the events portrayed in the film adaptation of the Cornelius Ryan best-seller, was taken from accounts by D-Day combatants interviewed by the author.
My father, a kind, moral and ethical WW II veteran who hated war despite being very talented at it, often expressed his frustration at the ignorance displayed by anti-war critics of combat actions. “You’re fighting a battle to win the war, and winning the war is the mission. Nothing takes priority over the mission,” he said. “Yes—if you can take and care for prisoners in the field without jeopardizing your force’s ability to prevail in the battle or putting your own men at risk, you do it. If you can’t, and many times you cannot, then you have a problem with no good solutions. In the end, winning is what matters most, and you act accordingly. It’s as simple as that.”
My father said that he never ordered the summary execution of German soldiers who had surrendered, but he witnessed more than one instance of it. “The two situations where it happened were when, as in the “Longest Day” scene, we were mid-combat and couldn’t spare the personnel to handle prisoners, and when a German unit had used what we regarded as unforgivable tactics,” he said. His example of the latter was one episode where the Germans displayed a white flag and then opened fire, killing several American soldiers. “Those Germans were executed out of pure revenge and anger,” he said. “Yes, that’s wrong and unprofessional. It is also inevitable when soldiers are placed in such conditions. Outside observers and armchair moralists literally don’t know what they are talking about.”
Killing prisoners of war is a violation of the Geneva Conventions, which decree that once soldiers surrender or make it clear that this is their intent, they cannot be attacked and must be safely taken into custody. My father said that the rules were fine and important as a guideline, but that they was deliberately naive about the realities of war.
“Yes, absolutely, if you can hold the prisoners without jeopardizing the mission, then you do it. That’s what you hope would happen to you if you were captured. But if keeping the prisoners alive is going to get in the way of winning the battle and the war, then there is only one responsible course.”
It is notable that the Ukraine whistle-blower is a medic, not a fighter. It also is notable that the incidents he described sound like pure cruelty and the actions of undisciplined and poorly led troops. “Making the decision not to take prisoners is a command decision. Individual soldiers must not think they can do it on a whim,” my father said.
“But it’s always a messy grey area.”
My father, as I have mentioned here before, objected to the whole concept of war crimes, and believed that the Nuremberg trials, like their precedent, the Andersonville Trial, were pure hypocrisy. He believed it was important to partition the Holocaust from the war in making a lasting statement against the Nazi atrocities, but admitted that he didn’t know how that could have been done.
“War is a war crime. War is a crime against humanity. Fighting an ethical war is a contradiction in terms,” he said.
Ethics Alarms 
Reminds me of the Colonel Kurtz (Marlon Brando in Apocalypse Now!) letter to his son after he’d been accused of the murder of four (4) suspected Vietnamese Double Agents.
MONEY QUOTE: “We spent months uncovering them and accumulating evidence. When absolute truth was completed, we acted; WE ACTED LIKE SOLDIERS.” (bolds/caps/italics mine)
PWS
ERRATUM: When absolute PROOF was completed
PWS
War is the most abhorrent invention of mankind. It occurs when at least one party wants something other than peace. War wastes human, material, and environmental resources. Typically, the more protracted the war, the greater the waste. Prolonging a war is unethical.
As repugnant as war is, once commenced, it should be prosecuted with the utmost speed. This policy is for the benefit of the belligerents and civilians alike.
The United States is routinely reviled for using atomic bombs in Japan. Accurate civilian death tolls are impossible to come by. How do you count the people totally incinerated by the blasts? Do you count premature deaths 1 week, 1 month, 1 year, 10 years after the bombings? Most estimates are in the 200,000 +/- 50,000. How is this worse than the estimated 300,000 to 350,000 deaths from the firebombing of Tokyo which gets less mention? It is without question the atomic bombing of Japan shortened the war. It resulted in less deaths on all sides than had they not been used.
While I can philosophize that all war is a crime and hence war crimes should not be prosecuted, I find this stance unethical. The industrial killing of Jews and other undesirables by the Nazis should not be given a pass. I think the slaughter of life that serves no military objective is a crime worthy of punishment. Even this simple definition, however, is difficult to apply. Is the indiscriminate targeting of civilians to break the will of an opponent to fight a war crime or a legitimate military tactic? Are war crimes like pornography… you know it when you see it?
Lastly, is revenge killing in the heat and confusion of battle a war crime? In my mind, a one-off is a no. This answer is also subject to degree. There is no black-and-white rule. All war is messy, ugly, evil, and unethical. Yet if attacked, it is not unethical to respond with force.
I’d argue it isn’t wrong or unprofessional when the other side uses perfidy. Once that’s done, those soldiers don’t get another chance. How do you know they don’t have a grenade waiting.
On to the topic of the Ukraine war, there was an example of perfidy recorded that Russian mil bloggers tried to use as an example of a Ukrainian war crime. A group of Ukrainian soldiers had a group of Russian soldiers face down. The Ukrainians were covering the group of Russians with a PKM machine gun and having them get up one at a time to be processed. One of the Russians got up with an AK and started shooting. The Ukrainian manning the PKM opened fire and took them all out. It got a ho hum response in the west, as it should have.
Which leads to the larger fact: The Russians don’t follow the Geneva conventions, at all. They commit mass war crimes. The consequence of that is they don’t get them back. War sucks. If you don’t want to die in a war where you are the aggressor, don’t participate. If you don’t want to die being summarily executed at surrender, don’t participate in a war where you’re the war crime committing aggressor.
Did the “I wonder what ‘Bitte! Bitte!’ means?” moment really happen?
I’ve always figured that that was Zanuck’s artistic license in service to his (baffling, in light of the subject matter) intention to make The Longest Day into an anti-war picture.
I read the book. It’s in there. I trust Ryan. And he worked on the movie.
The strain under which those Rangers operated is unimaginable. I guess such incidents are inevitable. (TY for the info.)
Th Germans were the worst, especially in their treatment (aside from Jews) of the Russians and the British and French colonial troops (Indians, etc.) which they considered little more than beasts. The Russians returned the favor, even after the war was over.
Then there was the time the CO of I Company. 3rd Battalion, 157th Infantry Regiment, 45th Infantry Division, lost his cool during the liberation of Dachau… let’s just say there were some good concentration camp guards as a result, but it was also a big issue.
Patton didn’t press charges, but the Boston Globe ended up doing a lengthy piece on it in 2001.