WI: Germany abandons the Geneva Convention in 1945

From February or early March 1945, Joseph Goebbels advocated Germany’s withdrawal from the Geneva Convention. He believed that this would discourage German soldiers from surrendering to the Western Allies. His proposal found little support — even Martin Bormann opposed it — but Goebbels continued to write in his diaries that it would have been the right thing to do.

Presumably, Goebbels believed that shooting Western Allied soldiers trying to surrender (as well as POWs already held) would cause the Wallies to shoot Germans, and that this would make the Germans fight to the last man and the last bullet — which they were supposed to do anyway.

What would’ve happened if Germany abandoned the Geneva Convention in 1945?
 
Knowing that the war was coming to a close and that they would likely get relatively good treatment from Americans and British captors, especially compared to what the Soviets would offer, how many German soldiers on the Western Front would actually change their behavior in practice?
 
Well the US did circumvent the convention:
upload_2019-7-23_8-25-27.jpg

Giant GI watches over tiny Germans.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rheinwiesenlager
 
You have a choice of surrendering to the Wallies and living. You know the war is lost. Why the fuck are you going to queer that deal up? You could be serving on the Eastern front after all...
 
From February or early March 1945, Joseph Goebbels advocated Germany’s withdrawal from the Geneva Convention. He believed that this would discourage German soldiers from surrendering to the Western Allies. His proposal found little support — even Martin Bormann opposed it — but Goebbels continued to write in his diaries that it would have been the right thing to do.

Presumably, Goebbels believed that shooting Western Allied soldiers trying to surrender (as well as POWs already held) would cause the Wallies to shoot Germans, and that this would make the Germans fight to the last man and the last bullet — which they were supposed to do anyway.

What would’ve happened if Germany abandoned the Geneva Convention in 1945?

The war would have ended in 42. Germany abandoned the Geneva convention when they used Polish and French PoW as slave labour and executed civilians and launched indiscriminate bombing attacks on civilian targets.
 
Germany abandoned the Geneva convention when they used Polish and French PoW as slave labour and executed civilians and launched indiscriminate bombing attacks on civilian targets.

The point wasn't whether they violated Geneva III 1929 whenever they thought it convenient. The point was whether they'd officially denounce it, stating through diplomatic channels that they were no longer bound by its provisions.
Note this would not necessarily equate with a take-no-prisoners policy. This would still be forbidden by Hague IV 1907. Geneva III 1929 had only added a long series of rights and guarantees for the POWs, but it was entirely possible to survive as a POW under Hague IV 1907.
The issue would be how the German soldiers - and the Western Allied soldiers - would perceive this. Goebbels thought the Westerners would no longer look like people willing to take prisoners, so the German soldiers on the Western front would be as desperate die-hards as those on the Eastern one (note that German soldiers in the East did surrender).

Would this come true? Difficult to say. The Westerners might well come up with a propaganda campaign stating that, no matter what the Germans might do to their prisoners, Germans surrendering would still get the full Geneva treatment in the West, with protection, food and shelter. And they could inform the German soldiers of such a policy through leaflets. Would the Western Allies do this, would the German soldiers believe this... difficult to say.
 
From February or early March 1945, Joseph Goebbels advocated Germany’s withdrawal from the Geneva Convention. He believed that this would discourage German soldiers from surrendering to the Western Allies. His proposal found little support — even Martin Bormann opposed it — but Goebbels continued to write in his diaries that it would have been the right thing to do.

Presumably, Goebbels believed that shooting Western Allied soldiers trying to surrender (as well as POWs already held) would cause the Wallies to shoot Germans, and that this would make the Germans fight to the last man and the last bullet — which they were supposed to do anyway.

What would’ve happened if Germany abandoned the Geneva Convention in 1945?
Thread topic is misplaced. Germany may say it abided by the Geneva Convention, but 10mm Soviet and Polish POWs and 15mm Slavic civilians would disagree. Only the Luftwaffe POW camps abided in some manner with the convention, and that was only minimally.
 
Thread topic is misplaced. Germany may say it abided by the Geneva Convention, but 10mm Soviet and Polish POWs and 15mm Slavic civilians would disagree. Only the Luftwaffe POW camps abided in some manner with the convention, and that was only minimally.

There's no Geneva Convention protecting civilians before 1949.
 
There's no Geneva Convention protecting civilians before 1949.

However the Hague convention of 1899 does.

In any event the reaction is known. The Germans at one point threatened to execute troops of the FFI as bandit/terrorist ( 44 I believe) the French government then grabbed an equal number of German Officers and threatened reprisal. Eisenhower as SAC backed the French and made it clear that the FFI were allied troops and if executed he would hold the entire chain of command responsible and court martial them.

In 45 German troops were running over German Civilians with tanks in their efforts to get west and surrender. The juvenile rantings of a journalist holed up in a bunker are not going to stop them.
 
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