ARMISTICE. CAPITULATION.
§ 83. An armistice is the cessation of active hostilities for a period, agreed upon between belligerents. It must be agreed upon in writing, and duly ratified by the highest authorities of the contending parties.
§ 84. Armistices may be general, and valid for all points and lines of the belligerents, or special, that is, referring to certain troops or certain territories only.
Armistices may be concluded for a definite time or for an unsettled time, with a stipulated period, which must elapse between the notice given by either party that hostilities will be resumed and the actual resumption of hostilities; or they may be concluded for a definite time, and so much longer as may be found convenient for the belligerents, with the obligation of giving due notice of the resumption of hostilities, a fixed time previous to the actual resumption.
§ 85. The motives which induce the one or the other belligerent to conclude an armistice, whether it be expected to be preliminary for an ultimate treaty of peace, or to prepare during the armistice for a more vigorous prosecution of the war, does in no way affect the character of the armistice itself.
§ 86. Every armistice involves not only the idea of the cessation of actual hostility, that is of attacking the enemy, but also that the hostile armies or troops remain instatus quowith reference to the position of the hostile armies opposite to or fronting one another.
Neither belligerent is allowed to extend his troops to the injury of the other, or to make any change in his front; but each belligerent in the open field, may do whatever he may deem advantageous for securing or fortifying himself in his position, if it can be done without extending or advancing his lines or posts, and he may receive additional troops,supplies, or ammunition. He may levy new troops during the armistice.
§ 87. The law of war is in full action during an armistice except only, as to fighting and hostile changes of the front; or if the armistice is a general one, as to the sending hostile expeditions to distant places.
§ 88. Armistices are binding for the belligerent governments from the day of the agreed commencement; but the officers of the armies are responsible from the day only when they receive official information of the conclusion of the armistice. If any injury results to one or the other party from this difference, which cannot be avoided in war, it belongs to the province of the belligerent governments to seek redress, and to provide for the remedy. Military officers having thus done the injury cannot be made responsible for the same in any way, nor do these injuries amount to cases requiring retaliation.
§ 89. Commanding officers have the right to conclude armistices extending to the district over which their command extends, but such armistice is subject to the ratification of the superior authority, and ceases so soon as it is made known that the armistice is not ratified, even if a certain time for the elapsing between giving notice of cessation and the resumption of hostilities should have been stipulated for.
§ 90. It is incumbent upon the contracting parties of an armistice, to stipulate what intercourse of persons or traffic between the inhabitants of the territories occupied by the hostile armies shall be allowed, if any.
If nothing is stipulated the intercourse remains suspended as during actual hostilities.
An armistice is not a partial or a temporary peace; it is only the suspension of attack or actual injury.
§ 91. When an armistice is concluded between a fortified place and the army besieging it, it is agreed by all the authorities on this subject, that the besieger must cease allextension, perfection, or advance of his attacking works as much so as from the attacks by main force.
But there is a difference of opinion among the martial jurists, whether the besieged have the right to repair breaches or to erect new works of defence within the place during an armistice.
[It is therefore declared by the United States, that they neither claim for themselves, nor allow to their enemies, the right of the besieged to repair breeches or to erect new works of defence during an armistice, unless the contrary be distinctly stipulated in the agreement concluding the armistice.]
The United States expect every American officer to stipulate distinctly for the one or the other, in an armistice which he may conclude with the enemy.
§ 92. So soon as a capitulation is signed, the capitulator has no right to demolish, destroy, or injure the works, arms, stores, or ammunition, in his possession, during the time which elapses between the signing and the execution of the capitulation, unless otherwise stipulated in the same.
§ 93. So soon as an armistice is broken, hostilities recommence in all their vigor on all points, without previous notice.
The injured belligerent government must seek redress.
[Prisoners captured during a breach of the armistice, are nevertheless prisoners of war, whether they are officers or privates.]
§ 94. Armistices and capitulations are sacredly to be observed, in good faith and military honor; and since capitulations imply many conditions and measures which cannot be altered or retraced, if the government does not ratify them, the utmost caution and undaunted fortitude must prevail in agreeing to them.
§ 95. Belligerents frequently conclude an armistice, while their plenipotentiaries are met to discuss the conditions of a treaty of peace; but, as often, the plenipotentiaries meet without a preliminary armistice. In the latter case, the war is carried on without any abatement, and the army mustnot suffer itself to be influenced by any inconvenience which the changes of fortune in the field may exercise on the diplomatic discussions. It belongs to the belligerent governments to adjust these inconveniences, and not to the generals to slacken the war on these, or, indeed, on any other occasions.