Noncombatant

“ Coordinator for Counterterrorism Footnotes ↑ For purposes of this definition, the term noncombatant is interpreted to include, in addition to civilians, military personnel who at the time of the incident are unarmed and/or not on duty. ”

“ In the conduct of war, an effort has been made by civilized nations, particularly in re- cent centuries, to limit the horror by distinguishing between com- batants and noncombatants, by recognizing the deliberate killing of noncombatants as "war crimes," and by entering into conventions governing the mutual protection of prisoners of war. ”

“ Aged men, helpless women, and children appeal in vain to the humanity which should be inspired by their condition for immunity from arrest, incarceration, or banishment from their homes. Plunder and devastation of the property of noncombatants, destruction of private dwellings, and even of edifices devoted to the worship of God; expeditions organized for the sole purpose of sacking cities, consigning them to the flames, killing the unarmed inhabitants, and inflicting horrible outrages on women and children, are some of the constantly recurring atrocities of the invader. ”

“ No one offered to turn us back, and only once or twice did a sentry insist on looking at our passes. In the light of fuller experiences I know now that when a city is about to fall into an enemy's hands the authorities relax their vigilance and freely permit noncombatants to depart therefrom, presumably on the assumption that the fewer individuals there are in the place when the conqueror does come the fewer the problems of caring for the resident population will be. ”

“ But war has a horrible vitality of its own and goes its own way, moulding men more than it is moulded by them. These things follow inexorably from the very character of modern warfare, which is no more a struggle between armies, but between nations. Noncombatants have ceased to exist, and those who make wars must reckon on babies as cannon fodder. ”

“ When a commander of a besieged place expels the noncombatants, in order to lessen the number of those who consume his stock of provisions, it is lawful, though an extreme measure, to drive them back, so as to hasten on the surrender.
19.
Commanders, whenever admissible, inform the enemy of their intention to bombard a place, so that the noncombatants, and especially the women and children, may be removed before the bombard­ment commences. But it is no infraction of the common law of war to omit thus to inform the enemy. Surprise may be a necessity. ”

“ Such crimes were sometimes punished by the officers. They were in some cases offset by acts of humanity and kindliness. But when an army is directed or permitted to kill noncombatants on a large scale the ferocity of the worst natures springs into fuller life, and both lust and the thirst of blood become more widespread and more formidable. Had less license been allowed to the soldiers and had they not been set to work to slaughter civilians there would have been fewer of those painful cases in which a depraved and morbid cruelty appears. ”

“ If they convert their soldiers into incendiaries and robbers, and involve us in a species of war which claims noncombatants, women, and children as its victims, they must expect to be treated as outlaws and enemies of mankind. ”

“ One has always heard that the soldiers who have done the actual fighting have never the same hatred toward each other as the noncombatants, and perhaps we Red Cross workers stand somewhere in between the two. ”

“ Very well, then when you have warfare things happen; people suffer; the noncombatants suffer as well as the combatants. And so it happens in civil war. ”

“ Monday, October 5th, the night before the city emptied itself of non-combatants, was almost a festive occasion at the St. Antoine. The British entry gave tremendous confidence to the stricken city and the tired Belgian soldiers—a bit of pride before the fall. New faces turned up, friends in the English army met, shook hands, and discussed the outlook. ”

“ But in almost every engagement of the present campaign our stretcher-bearers with their officers have gallantly advanced during the progress of the fighting and attended to the wounded under fire. Such plucky conduct as this merits the warmest praise. In the non-combatant, who has none of the excitement bred of actual fighting to sustain him, it requires a high decree of courage to kneel or stoop when every one else is lying down, and in this exposed position first to find the tiny bullet puncture, and then bandage the wound satisfactorily. ”

“ When an enemy attack was to be met with cold steel he was the first to follow the company officers “over the top,” to cheer and encourage the onrushing Americans in the anxious semi-calm which follows the lifting of a barrage. A non-combatant, unarmed and fifty-three years of age, he was always in the van of the fierce onslaught with which our men repulsed the enemy, ready to pray with the dying or help bring in the wounded, and always fearless no matter what the conditions. ”

“ As has been very truly said, "What these vast expeditions, consisting of more or less disorderly masses of curiously mixed races, all in the panoply of war, all eager for booty, even if bent on a peaceable mission, meant for the countries through which they slowly ate and robbed their way, it is not quite easy to picture to one's self in these civilized days, when, even in the fiercest war, the non-combatant has no reason to go in fear of a violent death or having his women outraged before his eyes, and his house razed to the ground." ”

“ The lives of non-combatants are not to be respected any more than the lives of men in uniform, for modern war is not a military game between small bodies of professional soldiers, as in the old days, but a struggle to the death between one people and another. The blockading of the enemy's ports, the slow starvation of a besieged city, which is allowed by military purists of the old and sentimental school does not spare the non-combatant. The woman with a baby at her breast is drained of her mother's milk. There is a massacre of innocents by poisonous microbes. ”

“ No blood upon the lintel can save the inmate; not even the cross of blood on the hospital tent or ship. Wounded or whole, combatant or non-combatant, its beak and talons tear the tender flesh of all and its lust is not sated.
In Belgium and Serbia it is believed that more women and children perished than men. Things too hideous for words were done publicly in the market-squares. Neither age nor sex escaped fire and sword. The innocent babe was left to suck the breast of its dead mother or was dandled on the point of the bayonet. What resistance can the Belgian swan make to the German eagle? ”

“ The non-combatants suffer more even than the combatants. That is to say, a far greater number of people suffer who have nothing to do with the fighting than those who actually carry on the murderous work. ”

“ The ordinary laws of war as practised by civilized countries depend essentially upon drawing a sharp distinction between combatant and non-combatant. The combatant has his particular privileges, the non-combatant has his particular privileges. ”

“ It is the record of a hero and a philanthropist, of high military ardour subordinated to still higher duty both to the cause he was serving and to the comrades whose lives were under his care. The valour of a non-combatant makes no less a demand on the virile stamina than the valour of the soldier,—oftentimes indeed more, since he lacks the stimulus of active conflict and confronts danger passive and unarmed. ”

“ During the last two centuries, though every war was marked by shocking incidents, there was a growing feeling that non-combatants should be protected, and a serious purpose to restrain the excesses of troops invading a hostile country. ”

“ She set the flaring dip on the bureau, and came back to the bed. "We thought of you, too," she said.
His restless hand, fumbling the quilt, closed on hers; his eyes were shut, but his lips moved, and she bent nearer to catch his words:
"We non-combatants get into heaps of trouble—don't we?" ”

“ The German soldiers, who were guarding me, seemed to be decent sort of men, and treated me fairly well, as soldiers who have been fighting each other usually act. All through my army experience I have found that those in safe non-combatant positions are the most fierce and relentless towards those who are disarmed and helpless. My captors allowed me to use my first aid bandages, with which I bound up my hurts as best I could. ”

“ They are, however, like non-combatant members of the armed forces, exposed to all injuries indirectly resulting from the operations of warfare. Thus, for instance, when a town is bombarded and thousands of inhabitants are thereby killed, or when a train carrying private individuals as well as soldiers is wrecked by a mine, no violation of the rule prohibiting attack on private enemy persons has taken place.
[243] See Grotius, III. c. 4, §§ VI. and IX.
As regards captivity, the rule is that private enemy persons may not be made prisoners of war. ”

“ The Huns shot Captain Fryatt because, as they said, he was a non-combatant and tried to defend himself. The rule that non-combatants should not attack military forces was made with the understanding that military forces would not war on non-combatants. ”

“ It can be used to invest the most barbarous acts with a specious plausibility, and can be turned against the very people whom it was designed to protect. Any one who takes the trouble to study the official proclamations of the German military authorities, or the introductory memorandum to the German White Book, cannot fail to be struck by this. A civilian who fires on the enemy forfeits under international law the privileges of a non-combatant. ”

“ I imagine that in this ideal war as compared with the war of to-day, there will be a very considerable restriction of the rights of the non-combatant. A large part of existing International Law involves a curious implication, a distinction between the belligerent government and its accredited agents in warfare and the general body of its subjects. ”

“ Non-combatants are enemy subjects who are neither fighters nor auxiliaries of the armed forces, such as chaplains and members of the medical service in the army, persons in civil life and occupation, old men, women, and children. ”

“ Have those, who now raise such outcries, any right to accuse us, those who allowed their friends and relatives to trust themselves on a ship whose destruction was announced with perfect clearness in advance? When our enemy's blockade method forces us to measures in self-defense, the death of non-combatants is a matter of no consequence. ”

“ It will be remembered from above, § 79, that numerous individuals belong to armed forces without being combatants. Now, since and in so far as these non-combatant members of armed forces do not take part in the fighting, they may not directly be attacked and killed or wounded. ”

“ In waging war, we do not terrorize helpless non-combatants, if it is within our power to avoid so doing. Wanton killing, torture, cruelty or the working of unusual and unnecessary hardship on enemy prisoners or populations is not justified in any circumstance. ”

“ The worst is that we have scraped together a preposterous number of non-combatants—some of them the wives and children of the sowars, of course, but a good many of them Hindus and bazaar-people of that sort, whom it would have been sheer murder to leave outside, but who will be no good to us whatever. All the old soldiers have been re-enlisted, and the boys are to make themselves useful, but there is a helpless crowd of women and children and elderly people to dispose of somehow. ”

“ Thus in no case will American resources be available for the military purposes of a belligerent who had entered upon a war refusing to submit his case to enquiry and the necessary delay, and to adhere to certain rules necessary for the safeguarding of innocent non-combatant life. ”

“ The laws of war, as embraced in the works of Brynkershoeck, Vattel and Wheaton, clearly sanction the principle, that all persons taken in battle, or who may be forced to surrender, whether officers, soldiers, or followers of the enemy’s army, are prisoners of war. * * *
“Among savage nations, it is universally known and admitted, that in war they have no non-combatants, excepting only such as are physically incapable of wielding arms. Every man, without regard to age or color; every boy able to fire a gun, or wield a hatchet, or an arrow, is a warrior. ”

“ The spirit of war is deified. Obedience to the state and its war lord leaves no room for any other duty or feeling. Cruelty becomes legitimate when it promises victory. Proclaimed by the heads of the army, this doctrine would seem to have permeated the officers and affected even the private soldiers, leading them to [134] justify the killing of non-combatants as an act of war, and so accustoming them to slaughter that even women and children become at last the victims. ”

“ They're easy enough to get.'
'You mistake my case,' he said bitterly. 'I experienced no sudden conviction about the justice of the war. I stand where I always stood. I'm a non-combatant, and I wanted a change of civilian work . ”

“ Ford shows that in an industrial city, as found in the United States, three-fourths of the population belong to the non-combatant category, and he lists more than a hundred trades or professions which, according to the natural law, exclude their members from the category of combatants. Direct attacks on such a population clearly would constitute unjustifiable killing or wounding of non-combatants. ”

“ It has been well remarked that the right of non-combatants to be unmolested in war was recognised by generals before it was ever proclaimed by the publicists. [30] And the same truth applies to many other changes in warfare, which have been oftener the result of a temporary military fashion, or of new ideas of military expediency, than of obedience to Grotius or Vattel. They set themselves to as futile a task as the proverbial impossibility of whitening the negro ”