When did the parole of prisoners of war become unacceptable?
score:14
The officers were paroled, and without any ransom as late as at start of WW1. For example the later marshal Tuchachevsky was a "poruchik" (senior lieutenant) then and was taken as a prisoner by Germans. As with all other officers, he was allowed to walk into the town and had his freedom, only he gave his honest word that he'll return into the barracks.
But he tried to escape. 5 times! The fifth attempt was successful. You can imagine the "strictness" of the guard! Only after the first attempt to escape and a mutiny he was forbidden to have walks in the town!
So, the parole system worked. But for officers only.
As for the system "free for a promise not to fight", the last war that used it, as far as I know, was the Russian-Japan war of 1904/5. And it worked these times.
The same system was tried for use by Chechens in the first year of the first Russian-Chechen war (1995-98). But then it didn't work. The fact of "word" was irrelevant to the contemporary Russian state machine.
So, the question is not in acceptability, but in usability of the practice.
Upvote:0
In summer 1940, the German Wehrmacht had captured 2 million Dutch, Belgian and French soldiers. All of the Dutch and Flemish and about a third of the French POWs were released on parole because the Germans coulnd't supply them and already had half a million Polish POWs as workforce (de facto: slaves). Mark Mazower, Hitlers Imperium: Europa unter der Herrschaft des Nationalsozialismus. C.H.Beck, Munich 2009. Page 152
Upvote:4
Military paroles became impractical when mass conscription led to the formation of armies of tens or hundreds of thousands of men that were too hard to keep track of.
Military parole was used as late as the American Revolution. This was when "armies" typically numbered in the thousands, and both sides spoke the same language (English). Also, the British armies contained a number of pro-British Americans, who could often identify and recognize their "countrymen" on the other side. The American military paroled a whole army, the one that they captured at Saratoga (although Congress reversed this parole). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convention_of_Saratoga#Convention_of_Saratoga
Paroles typically preceded prisoner exchanges. The prisoner was set free, on the condition that he refrained from fighting, unless exchanged as a prisoner of war.
During the Napoleonic Wars, which followed the American Revolution, armies were ten times as large, making parole impractical. It was not generally practiced after the 18th century, although there were some attempts in the "smaller" conflicts.
The reasons that nobles were "paroled" (for ransom) in the Middle Ages was because there were only a few hundred of them, and they were well known internationally. So they were easy to keep track of.
More post
- 📝 Why during the colonial era were Berber countries referred to as “Arab”?
- 📝 State budget spending of Roman Empire
- 📝 Baldwin IV, the Leper King
- 📝 When did the first riots between Hindus and Muslims happen in India?
- 📝 What prevented the USS Franklin (CV-13) from sinking in March 1945?
- 📝 Are there confirmed cases where a country changed its language without being conquered?
- 📝 When did ancient religions start to experience dropping numbers of adherents in Europe?
- 📝 What is the ancestry of the Robertians, progenitors of the Bourbon dynasty?
- 📝 Troy: How could a city be built on top of an older one?
- 📝 How much power and influence could a child monarch have?
- 📝 Was game theory used during World War II?
- 📝 Has any war in recorded history ever resulted in the complete annihilation (civil and military) of an enemy - all of them killed with no survivors?
- 📝 Germany's "Economic Miracle"
- 📝 What were paper airplanes called before there were real airplanes? (i.e. untethered winged flyers, not kites or balloons)
- 📝 When did the Running of the Bulls begin?
- 📝 When did it become customary to address the King/Queen of England as Majesty?
- 📝 Historically, how did people living in distant regions communicate?
- 📝 Is this excerpt from an AI-generated answer re Portugal in WWII based on any real events?
- 📝 Why are there naked ancient statues?
- 📝 What surface area per person is required for hunter-gatherers?
- 📝 Who flew the T-38 "Missing Man" formation at the Challenger Memorial service at JSC, 31 January 1986?
- 📝 Looking for 3 examples of prisoners of war being incorporated into the conquering army
- 📝 When did Germans begin to call themselves "Deutsche"?
- 📝 How close was the Soviet Union to collapsing during WW2?
- 📝 What words were obliterated from the Great Colonnade at Palmyra?
- 📝 What allowed the British to be able to burn Washington D.C. in the war of 1812?
- 📝 What is the earliest example of Aryanization in Germany?
- 📝 Were union disputes the only reason for low female employment in WWI German factories?
- 📝 How much did brigs of 200 tons vary in 1800?
- 📝 What new technology/tactics allowed the breakthrough of the trenches in WW I western front?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 When did the parole of prisoners of war become unacceptable?
- 📝 When did the "Great War" become "World War 1"?
- 📝 When did dueling with weapons become socially unacceptable in the western world?
- 📝 Why did Britain and France not declare war against the Soviet Union when it invaded Poland in WW2?
- 📝 When and how did the USA and the UK become allies?
- 📝 When did h*m*sexuality become unacceptable in Europe?
- 📝 When and how did the Han ethnic group become by far the biggest ethnic group in China?
- 📝 When did books first become affordable to the general population?
- 📝 When did the acceptance of diversity become such an important social goal in Western countries?
- 📝 When did the American War of 1812 actually end?
- 📝 When did the British monarch become an emperor?
- 📝 When and why did smiling at strangers and in photos become customary in the United States?
- 📝 When did the First Barbary War start?
- 📝 When did the practice of formal declaration of war start?
- 📝 How did slavery become permissible in the French West Indies when it was forbidden in France?
- 📝 When did the Taxi become associated with the checkered pattern?
- 📝 When did monogamy become the norm in Ancient Greece?
- 📝 When did the tilt of the tower of Pisa become seen as a feature instead of a defect?
- 📝 How did the Swedish army deal with prisoners of war in the Thirty Years War?
- 📝 When did "whites only" signs (racial segregation) become illegal in the USA?
- 📝 When did "Africa" become the name of the whole continent?
- 📝 When did furniture become common in the homes of most people in the British Isles?
- 📝 When did the Vietnam War start?
- 📝 When did French become the official language of France?
- 📝 When did the modern visa system become widespread?
- 📝 When did it become openly known that Wilson supported the Balfour Declaration?
- 📝 When and how did Thailand cease to be Siam and become the modern Thailand?
- 📝 When did it become customary to address the King/Queen of England as Majesty?
- 📝 When did prostitution become illegal in the United States and why?
- 📝 When did $10,000 banknotes become available to the public in the British colonies of South East Asia?