¹ FM 27–10; Rules of Land Warfare (Washington, D. C., 1940), p. 2, Art. 6. [Hereafter cited FM 27–10]. Drawn up and published by order of the Secretary of War, this manual codifies the accepted international laws of warfare as well as the customs of war, together with the American interpretation of these rules. The contents of the manual are mandatory upon American forces in the field; they can deviate from these rules only by express permission of higher political authority.

² Ibid., p. 76, Art. 284.

³ For example, see Akzin, B., “When Our Troops Occupy,” Harper's Magazine, Feb., 1943Google Scholar; Fortune, “Prepare to Occupy,” Feb., 1943; Motherwell, H., “Military Occupation and Then What?—AMGOT and Its Future Headaches,” Harper's Magazine, Oct., 1943.Google Scholar The winter issue (1943) of the Public Opinion Quarterly was entirely devoted to military government problems; its fourteen articles vary greatly in quality.

⁴ On early American military governments, consult Thomas, D. Y., A History of Military Government in Newly Acquired Territory of the United States (New York, 1904).Google Scholar Also see Gabriel, R. H., “American Experience with Military Government,” in this Review, Vol. 37, No. 3, June, 1943Google Scholar, for a concise account.

⁵ For this salient point, I am indebted to Professor Ralph H. Gabriel, of Yale University, currently teaching in the Charlottesville School of Military Government, who emphasized its importance in a paper read before a meeting of the American Historical Association in New York City, December, 1943.

⁶ Moore, J. B., A Digest of International Law (1906), Vol. VII, p. 261Google Scholar, and see following.

⁷ This concept is expressed in the Doctrine Rousseau-Portales, recognized in the nineteenth century, and strongly reflected in the spirit of the Hague Regulations. Its pristine qualities have greatly deteriorated as a result of the allied “hunger-blockade” in the First World War and mass bombing techniques in the present war. These developments primarily affect combat conditions, but they influence as well the measures adopted by a hostile belligerent in occupied territory. During the last war, for instance, the Germans offered economic reprisal in retaliation for the British blockade as one of the reasons for removing machinery and tools from Belgium.

⁸ Humane treatment of civilians also stemmed partially from the devotion of the ordinary soldier, and particularly the officer, to the word of the law. His origin in a common law state strengthened this tendency.

⁹ See Randall, J. G., The Civil War and Reconstruction (New York, 1937)Google Scholar, passim. The scandalous régime of General Butler in New Orleans, however, can by no means be considered typical.

¹⁰ See Hopkins, J. and Alexander, M., Machine-Gun Diplomacy (New York, 1928)Google Scholar, passim. Examination of military government practice in the Philippines leads to important general considerations. It appears that a case could be developed historically to show that military governments tended towards severity when operating in backward regions if the purpose was to destroy the separate political entity of the territory, and permanently to bring it under the sovereignty of the occupant. Many examples are found in the overseas expansion of European states during the latter part of the nineteenth century.

¹¹ We are not concerned here with the ultimate sanction behind military government, which is political, but focus attention upon the military instrument responsible for the establishment and administration of a civil affairs policy in occupied territory. The Hague Regulations, 1907, Section III, Arts. 42–56, “On Military Authority over the Territory of the Hostile State,” codify the main body of written international law on the subject. The best recent treatment of the rules and customs of war as they apply to military government is Feilchenfeld, E. H., The International Economic Law of Belligerent Occupation (Washington, D. C., 1942).Google Scholar A brief but incisive analysis may be found in Barber, C. F., “Trial of Unlawful Enemy Belligerents,” Cornell Law Quarterly, Vol. 29, No. 1 (Sept., 1943), p. 53 ff.Google Scholar

¹² “Military Government,” Coast Artillery Journal, Vol. 86, No. 2 (Mar.–Apr., 1943), p. 22.

¹³ The doctrine of unaltered sovereignty was later clearly implied in the title of Section III, Hague Regulations, 1907, which reads: On Military Authority over the Territory of the Hostile State. FM 27–10, pp. 73–74, Art. 273, states that occupation “… does not transfer the sovereignty to the occupant….”

¹⁴ See FM 27–10, p. 1, Art. 3.

¹⁵ Akzin, B., Data on Military Government in Occupied Areas, Library of Congress, Legislative Reference Service (Washington, D. C., 1942), p. 6.Google Scholar Article 44 was reserved by Germany, Austria, Japan, Russia, and Montenegro (FM 27–10, p. 80, Art. 307). Article 44 reads: “It is forbidden a belligerent to force the population of occupied territory to furnish information about the army of the other belligerent, or about its means of defense.”

¹⁶ It was not a legal barrier, for instance, which prevented the German and British governments from reaching an accord on maritime law which was being woefully abused by U-boat warfare and the off-shore blockade in the war of 1914. The reasons were political, and dictated by military necessity.

¹⁷ Belligerent occupation in the course of hostilities is only one form entailing the erection of military government. There are several other forms, such as occupation under an armistice, occupation of a neutral country by agreement, and so on. See B. Akzin, Data on Military Government, passim.

¹⁸ Authorities on international law are not agreed on the precise application of the Hague Regulations to post-armistice military governments.

¹⁹ Witness Poland.

²⁰ Feilchenfeld, E., The International Economic Law of Belligerent Occupation, p. 21.Google Scholar

²¹ Hague Regulations, Section III, Art. 43. Also see F. Feilchenfeld, op. cit., p. 77.

²² Ibid., p. 89.

²³ Thus press reports indicate that in their retreat from Russia German forces compel undetermined numbers of Russian nationals to go along as a source of labor.

²⁴ Major General Allen W. Gullion, “Military Government,” op. cit., p. 22.

²⁶ Article 52 reads as follows: “Requisitions in kind and services shall not be demanded from municipalities or inhabitants except for the needs of the army of occupation. They shall be in proportion to the resources of the country, and of such a nature as not to involve the population in the obligation of taking part in the operations of the war against their country.”

²⁶ Article 43 reads: “The authority of the legitimate power having in fact passed into the hands of the occupant, the latter shall take all the measures in his power to restore and ensure, as far as possible, public order and safety, while respecting, unless absolutely prevented, the laws in force in the country.”

²⁷ Feilchenfeld, E., The International Economic Law of Belligerent Occupation, p. 86.Google Scholar

²⁸ FM 27–10, p. 76, Art. 285.

²⁹ Ibid., pp. 76–77, Arts. 286 and 288.

³⁰ Ibid., pp. 74–75, Art. 273.

³¹ Hague Regulations, Section III, Art. 52. Also see FM 27–10, p. 79, Art. 303. Requisition of services is limited to the needs of the army of occupation. This is entirely different from the illegal German practice of drafting labor in occupied countries for work in Germany. The German argument that labor in Germany indirectly supports the army of occupation does not cover the point in law. To argue that such labor is voluntary is only a thin disguise. On the question of labor, see Feilchenfeld, E., The International Economic Law of Belligerent Occupation, pp. 12, 19, 91–92.Google Scholar

³² FM 27–10, p. 78, Art. 300. Protection of the individual and respect for private property does not preclude the appropriation of property, such as houses, for temporary and military use, and the invader reserves to himself the right of taxing both people and property as well as levying forced loans (ibid., p. 83, Art. 325).

³³ Ibid., p. 78, Art. 301.

³⁴ Authoritative opinion on the question of war treason is still in a state of flux. American and British field manuals employ the term.

³⁵ FM 27–10, p. 89, Art. 357. Also see pp. 59–60, Art. 205–214; and p. 87, Art. 350.

³⁶ Ibid., pp. 87–88, Art. 351.

³⁷ Ibid., p. 89, Art. 358.

³⁸ Ibid., pp. 89–90, Art. 358, d.

³⁹ FM 27–10, p. 90, Art. 358, e. Also see p. 86, Art. 344.

⁴⁰ Ibid., p. 90, Art. 358, e.

⁴¹ Ibid., p. 75, Art. 280.

⁴² Ibid., p. 5, Art. 12.

⁴³ Ibid., p. 87, Art. 349. The same penalty is applicable “in event of conspiracy to rebel, whether or not such conspiracy shall have matured by overt act of hostility” (ibid., Art. 349).

⁴⁴ FM 27–10, p. 75, Art. 280.

⁴⁵ This is well illustrated by the German position in Jugoslavia today. Under the leadership of Marshal Josip Broz, certain areas of that country appear to be in a state of leveé en masse. These districts have not been permanently abandoned by the Nazis. The Germans elected to stay, not only because withdrawal would weaken their political position, but also because a retreat would cut off communications with their forces along the Adriatic and parts of the northern Mediterranean.

⁴⁶ Notwithstanding the tremendous scope of these legal powers, actual practice in military government has consistently grown harsher since the beginning of the century. This tendency has accelerated since 1939, finding convenient gaps in the Hague Regulations through which the requirements of political strategy and military necessity can assert themselves. See Feilchenfeld, op. cit., passim, but especially p. 24.