NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #27/NN_1992_27.iso/spool/soc/history/9551

Internet Message Format | 1992-11-18 | 4.8 KB

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From: [e-mail] (David Bofinger)
Newsgroups: soc.history
Subject: International Law and Blockades
Date: 19 Nov 1992 05:34:24 GMT
Organization: Theoretical Physics, Australian National University
Lines: 82
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In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail]
(Jon Livesey) writes:
> [...] Now you are claiming that the British didn't sink neutral
> ships "only because they didn't have submarines and didn't need to,
> having a powerful surface navy."

>     2.    What gives you the idea that a powerful surface navy can't
>     sink neutral ships just as well as submarines?   the British
>     could have engaged in a guerre de course if they wanted to,
>     but they chose not to.

The Germans sank neutral shipping because it was taking supplies to the UK.
If anyone had been shipping supplies into the Germans through the British
blockade the Royal Navy would undoubtedly have taken action as violent as
was necessary to prevent them, but since the Royal Navy was obviously far
too tough to get past, nobody was silly enough to try. The British didn't
sink neutral shipping bound for Germany because there basically wasn't any.
The Germans did get some shipping in through friendly neutrals (Vichy
France, Italy, Russia (why does nobody call them the Soviet Union?) Sweden?,
 Turkey?, Spain?) but the British kept their hands off that for political,
not moral reasons.

>     1.    International Law lays down rules for naval blockades.

I'm not sure what you mean here by "International Law". As I understand
it, there are two things you could mean: international agreements like
The Hague and Genevaa Conventions, which nearly everyone civilised agree
to, or what might be called "common" international law, which is based
on precedents, i.e. "what did we let people get away with last time?"

I know that the laws of blockade described in the first kind of
international law have tended to change through history whenever the
kind of blockade they described turned out to be impractical. For
instance, blockade at one time legally required the blockaders to station
adequate naval force immediately outside each port they were blockading
that ships would have to enter gun range to pass. I believe that the
rewriting of the treaty came well after various powers began to ignore
it.

As far as the second kind of international law is concerned, the precedents
were probably set during the Napoleonic wars or so, and one can imagine the
Germans feeling that since their country didn't even exist then, the fact
that somebody (presumably the British) had decided on certain rules (that,
unsurprisingly, were to their advantage) was hardly relevant during either
world war.

> Germany [...] could have decided not to use [U-boats], as they decided
> not to use poison gas - in WWII.

They probably decided not to use poison gas because 1. It didn't work all
that well in WWI, 2. The tactical opportunities for its use weren't common
in WW2, 3. They thought the British had nerve gas too and would retaliate.
Actually, the British were a long way behind, which didn't stop them
planning to use mustard gas as a last ditch effort versus Operation
Sealion. People with their backs to a wall have no time for morals.

> This argument, that Germany was forced to break international law
> in its use of submarines, is similar to another argument that says
> "Britain's guarantee of Beligian neutrality made it impossible for
> Germany to occupy Belgium legally in 1914, so it was actually Britain
> that forced Germany had to occupy Belgium illegally".

Does anyone know how the allies justified their invasion of Iceland?

> That's funny.   I thought we decided at Nuremburg that their actions
> actually were "morally inferior".   Didn't we?

Not clear the poster was one of the judges at Nuremberg. :-) The winners
of WW2 were so upset with these nazi monsters they decided to punish them,
and legalities be damned. There were no similar investigations of alleged
allied atrocities, for instance. Not clear it was a bad idea to do it, but
not something I'd be happy using as precedent.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
David Bofinger  AARNet: [e-mail]
                Snail:  Dept. of Theoretical Physics, RSPhysSE, ANU, ACT, 2601
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"It is the logic of our times
 No subject for immortal verse
 That we who lived by honest dreams
 Defend the bad against the worse" -- Cecil Day Lewis