Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illegal)?

Discussions on the Holocaust and 20th Century War Crimes. Note that Holocaust denial is not allowed. Hosted by David Thompson.
Post Reply
User avatar
Webdragon2013
Member
Posts: 72
Joined: 24 Apr 2014, 11:37

Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illegal)?

#1

Post by Webdragon2013 » 05 May 2014, 14:08

To my knowledge partisan warfare is illegal under the war conventions in place during WW2.
Partisans. As in illegal combatants without uniforms who conduct illegal warfare and then hide among civilians when their deed is committed. Oftentimes as history has shown the civilians are the victims of partisan warfare as the occupier takes revenge on the civilians disproportionately.

My questions:
- What is the difference between Resistance (good) and partisans (bad)? Is there a difference?
- Is there any form of legal resistance or is it all lumped under partisan warfare and illegal?

To me legal resistance would be: A civilian who wears a clear patch/armband that says his side and attacks military of enemy, commits no atrocities, and surrenders like normal military unit when cornered.
Illegal would be: No sign whatsover, shooting at military of enemy, not surrendering when cornered and hiding among civilians.

Final question: Were the Germans justified legally and morally in reprisals against civilians in the case of ILLEGAL partisan attacks and especially atrocities (finding a comrade mutilated in worst ways)?

Thanks!

User avatar
LWD
Member
Posts: 8618
Joined: 21 Sep 2005, 22:46
Location: Michigan

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#2

Post by LWD » 05 May 2014, 16:05

Your defintions aren't widely accepted. Resistance forces and or Partisans can both be either legitimate combatants or not. For more details see:
http://avalon.law.yale.edu/subject_menus/lawwar.asp
This has also been discussed on a number of previous threads so this one may not stay open long.

As to this question:
Final question: Were the Germans justified legally and morally in reprisals against civilians in the case of ILLEGAL partisan attacks and especially atrocities
Reprisals were allowed for by the conventions of the time. However due process was required and the reprisals were not suppose to be disperportunate. The German reprisals failed most if not all the time to meet those requirements. So they were not legally justified. IMO there is no moral justification for killing innocents as a reprisal for actions of others.


ljadw
Member
Posts: 15589
Joined: 13 Jul 2009, 18:50

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#3

Post by ljadw » 05 May 2014, 17:53

Moral justifications in a war ?

User avatar
Ironmachine
Member
Posts: 5821
Joined: 07 Jul 2005, 11:50
Location: Spain

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#4

Post by Ironmachine » 05 May 2014, 18:03

Webdragon2013 wrote:surrenders like normal military unit when cornered
8O
AFAIK, surrender is always optional. I can't see why you think that if someone decides to fight to the end he is qualifying as an an "illegal" combatant.

User avatar
wm
Member
Posts: 8753
Joined: 29 Dec 2006, 21:11
Location: Poland

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#5

Post by wm » 05 May 2014, 22:22

Partisan warfare wasn't illegal, at least in the sense atrocities were under any law: German, French or Soviet. There was no "thou shalt not be a partisan" rule. The law said a soldier couldn't be a partisan, nothing more.
But still the other side had the right to execute partisants, or impose limited reprisals.

Although reprisals were legal, first an occupant had his obligations to fulfill, like to behave himself, maintain wealth of the occupied territories, their economic structure, upheld human rights and the existing laws of the occupied territories. The aims of a war had to be limited, "raze the cities, exterminate everyone and we are done" wasn't acceptable.

So because the extermination started early, and the fundamental rules of war were broken by the Germans almost immediately (for example during the 1939 Intelligenzaktion, or the Aktion T4 in Poland), the partisans had the right to use any means they saw necessary to win the war.

User avatar
bronk7
Member
Posts: 396
Joined: 01 May 2013, 03:11

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#6

Post by bronk7 » 22 Oct 2014, 19:32

seems complicated.. as in the American Civil War, there were 'partisans/resistance/robbers/thieves/pirates.....obviously, if they are fighting the ''bad'' guys, they are ''good''....?right?

David Thompson
Forum Staff
Posts: 23722
Joined: 20 Jul 2002, 20:52
Location: USA

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#7

Post by David Thompson » 23 Oct 2014, 17:14

bronk7 -- You wrote:
seems complicated
Well, the general idea is that it shouldn't be simple. Most people think death is a pretty serious thing. That's why nations have laws about killing folks, and when it can be done. Not many people feel comfortable with the notion that they can be arbitrarily killed by somebody else. Most want to minimize the risk.

You also asked:
obviously, if they are fighting the ''bad'' guys, they are ''good''....?right?
Really?

User avatar
wm
Member
Posts: 8753
Joined: 29 Dec 2006, 21:11
Location: Poland

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#8

Post by wm » 23 Oct 2014, 19:12

There were good and bad guys, at least according to the Covenant of the League of Nations. The League had the right to declare a state as an offender/aggressor, and could introduce economic and physical sanctions against that state.
The states in dispute were required to discuss a problem in an orderly and peaceful manner, war was unacceptable. So the offenders which refused to do that were the bad guys.

According to the Hague Conventions there were soldiers, and there were the others.
The soldiers were protected by the Conventions, the others were not - they were subjected to the laws of the occupying force.
So soldiers could become POWs, partisans/resistance/robbers/thieves/pirates couldn't, and could be executed.

BTW, I think the sentence above should be: the partisans had the moral right to use any means they saw necessary. Their status didn't change, they still weren't soldiers.

This is why, some large Polish partisan units, maybe uniquely in Europe, respected the Hague Conventions and were soldiers. For example the Warsaw Uprising fighters were soldiers, and it was accepted by the Germans.

User avatar
bronk7
Member
Posts: 396
Joined: 01 May 2013, 03:11

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#9

Post by bronk7 » 24 Oct 2014, 18:56

doesn't the Viet Cong fit the description of an illegal group? but they were fighting the ''bad'' guys<>American imperialists...??when I said complicated, I meant the labeling of which groups are ''bad'' and ''good''...

User avatar
wm
Member
Posts: 8753
Joined: 29 Dec 2006, 21:11
Location: Poland

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#10

Post by wm » 24 Oct 2014, 22:17

The Hague Conventions don't concern themselves with motives: aggressors, victims, imperialists, good guys, bad guys - all have the same rights. They don't do labeling. The UN does - by a unanimous vote. So the bad guys are those declared by the UN as bad guys.

The Hague Conventions were not applicable in Vietnam. They are the Laws of War (between states) but that war was an internal conflict of South Vietnam - there were no "Hague" soldiers there at all.

The Vietcong was indeed an illegal group - according to South Vietnamese law :), and that was all, it was their own internal problem.

Paradoxically the American pilots bombing North Vietnam weren't soldiers too, maybe even they were pirates as the Communists called them. A war between states requires a declaration of war, and there was none.

But shortly after the WW2 there was a new convention signed, the Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War, and even insurgents (and those American pilots) were granted limited rights - but still weren't soldiers (so couldn't become POWs too).
The rights were: no execution, mutilation, torture, and no humiliating and degrading treatment. The wounded and sick had to be collected and cared for. And they had the right to fair trial.

David Thompson
Forum Staff
Posts: 23722
Joined: 20 Jul 2002, 20:52
Location: USA

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#11

Post by David Thompson » 24 Oct 2014, 22:30

bronk7 -- You asked:
doesn't the Viet Cong fit the description of an illegal group?
The laws of war didn't define an "illegal group." The Hague Conventions on Land Warfare -- Convention II of 1899 and Convention IV of 1907 -- define the rights and duties of soldiers, and impose certain minimum requirements on armies which occupy conquered territories. There are a few acts prohibited there, but being a member of a resistance or partisan movement aren't included.

As wm. points out, the international laws on warfare change from time to time, to deal with problems which weren't apparent before, or when a number of countries decide to resolve long-standing problems.

User avatar
phylo_roadking
Member
Posts: 17488
Joined: 01 May 2006, 00:31
Location: Belfast

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#12

Post by phylo_roadking » 24 Oct 2014, 23:07

I know a lot of people look down on Wiki, but they have a useful description of "partisan" that points up the difference between the two, a difference I've always believed in...and agree with Wiki's definition of one as the subset of the other...
A partisan is a member of an irregular military force formed to oppose control of an area by a foreign power or by an army of occupation by some kind of insurgent activity. The term can apply to the field element of resistance movements, examples of which are the civilians that opposed Nazi German or Fascist Italian rule in several countries during World War II.
Thus under the all-encompassing umbrella term "French Resistance" 1940-45 you had 1/ resisters embedded in the civil population in cells etc., 2/ resisters within the civil population engaged in non-military resistance e.g. union agitation/labour disruption...but also 3/ "partisans" in the form of the "permanently in the field" elements of the Maquis, including a large percentage of French Army holdouts from 1940, often in heavily-forested or mountainous locations like the Jura.

In the East, under the same definition therefore you had the large, permanently-constituted "partisan" armies behind the fronts, operating more as irregular forces and often airdropped to, both supplies and commissars, and broadly operating to Army requirements and strategies. And in the Balkans, you had a virtual "state within a state" controlled by Tito's partisans, again as a permanently-constituted field force.

"Resistance" is a broad term...but "partisan" is a much more restricted definition of resister referring specifically to military or paramilitary forces in the field. But note that it's a definition driven by what they were and what they did, rather than a definition in law.
Twenty years ago we had Johnny Cash, Bob Hope and Steve Jobs. Now we have no Cash, no Hope and no Jobs....
Lord, please keep Kevin Bacon alive...

User avatar
bronk7
Member
Posts: 396
Joined: 01 May 2013, 03:11

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#13

Post by bronk7 » 28 Oct 2014, 13:46

Dave and wm , very good points....""but being a member of a resistance or partisan movement aren't included""<>aren't included in the rights of soldiers or not at all??....

David Thompson
Forum Staff
Posts: 23722
Joined: 20 Jul 2002, 20:52
Location: USA

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#14

Post by David Thompson » 28 Oct 2014, 16:02

bronk7 -- The sentence in question is:
There are a few acts prohibited there [in the Hague Conventions on the Laws of Land Warfare], but being a member of a resistance or partisan movement aren't included.
Your question was:
but being a member of a resistance or partisan movement aren't included""<>aren't included in the rights of soldiers or not at all??....
Being a member of a resistance or partisan movement aren't included in the Hague Convention lists of prohibited acts.

User avatar
bronk7
Member
Posts: 396
Joined: 01 May 2013, 03:11

Re: Difference if any between Resistance & Partisans (illega

#15

Post by bronk7 » 28 Oct 2014, 18:43

Dave, roger that...ty

Post Reply

Return to “Holocaust & 20th Century War Crimes”