GENEVA CONVENTIONS

GENEVA CONVENTIONS, a series of international agreements drafted for the amelioration (improvement)of the treatment of the sick and wounded, in particular—but all prisoners—in land and sea warfare. The first Geneva Convention (1864)covered field armies only. Subsequent conventions extended that coverage to include the sick and wounded at sea, the treatment of prisoners of war, and the protection of noncombatants during time of war. The principles first articulated in the Geneva Conventions have become the cornerstones of international laws regulating conduct in wartime.

The first agreement resulted from the outcry that followed the publication in 1862 of Un Souvenir de Solferino, by Jean Henri Dunant, a cofounder of the Red Cross. His book—describing the suffering of wounded French, Italian, and Austrian soldiers in northern Italy in 1859 because of inadequate medical facilities—resulted in the convocation of an unofficial congress at Geneva in 1863 and, in the following year, of the formal sessions whose convention was ratified by the United States, most other American countries, and twelve European nations. An 1868 convention, while not ratified, expanded the earlier agreement to include naval warfare. The articles of the two conventions were observed during the Franco-Prussian (1870–1871)and Spanish-American (1898)wars.

Another conference was held in 1906 at Geneva, at which the conventions were revised; these were adopted by the Hague Peace Conference of 1907. The brutality of World War I demonstrated the need for clearer international guidelines in regard to what constituted lawful and unlawful conduct in wartime. In 1929, the conventions—signed by forty-seven nations—were widened to include provisions to improve the lot of prisoners of war. On the eastern front of the European theater, as well as in the Pacific, both the Axis and Allied powers routinely violated the protocols of the Geneva Conventions. Nazi Germany, in particular, murdered huge numbers of Soviet prisoners of war. The war crimes committed by the Nazis, coupled with their perpetration of the Holocaust, constituted the major charges levied the German government leaders during the 1946 Nuremberg Tribunal. The latest Geneva Convention—in 1949—was ratified by sixty-one countries, including the United States. Its four articles covered the amelioration of conditions of the wounded and sick in the armed forces, including those in the field and those shipwrecked at sea (articles I and II); the treatment of prisoners of war (III); and, in response to Nazi atrocities in World War II, the treatment and legal status of noncombatants in wartime (IV). The subjects of the last two articles, issues in World War II, were raised also during the Vietnam War. Since the latter was partially a guerrilla war, the distinction between armed combatants in civilian dress and noncombatants was blurred, and the applicability of the conventions to the Vietnam conflict was questioned. The United States and South Vietnam both publicly adhered to the convention, unlike North Vietnam and the National Liberation Front, which were also unwilling to allow the International Red Cross to inspect their prisoner-of-war camps.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Ellis, L. Ethan. Frank B. Kellogg and American Foreign Relations, 1925–1929. New Brunswick, N. J. : Rutgers University Press, 1929; 1961.

Keegan, John. The Second World War. New York: Hutchinson, 1989.

Richard A.Hunt/a. g.

See alsoHague Peace Conferences ; Prisoners of War ; Spanish-American War ; War Crimes Trials .

Geneva Conventions, international agreements which sprang from the founding of the Red Cross in Geneva in 1863. The first, signed in 1864 and eventually agreed to by 48 states, dealt solely with the ‘Amelioration of the Wounded in the Armies in Field’ in a few simple sentences. The second, signed in 1906, widened the original convention, extended its protection to those who treated the sick and wounded, and to the treatment of wounded and sick prisoners-of-war. The third, signed in 1929, further extended the earlier conventions and, for the first time, incorporated a separate convention on the rights and treatment of prisoners-of-war which updated, and superseded, the 1907Hague Convention on the treatment of prisoners. Among the 97 articles were items which delineated the work of the International Red Cross Committee and the Red Cross generally; established that sick and wounded combatants had to be respected and cared for whatever their nationality; and that the personnel, buildings, equipment, and transport used to succour them should be marked with a red cross to give them immunity from attack—though this only applied if they were part of the medical services of the armed forces of a belligerent. In 1939 the conventions had not been ratified by several states, most notably Japan and the USSR.

A protocol which prohibited the use in war of asphyxiating, poisonous, and other gases, and of bacteriological methods of warfare (see biological and chemical warfare), was also signed in Geneva by 29 countries in June 1925, with the USSR signing in 1928. The USA adhered to the protocol in 1925 but did not ratify it until January 1975. The current Geneva Conventions were signed in 1949.

Geneva Conventions (1864).The Geneva Convention of 22 August 1864 was the world's first multilateral humanitarian treaty. Sixteen nations were present, responding to public concern about the sufferings of sick and wounded soldiers, well publicized by the labors of Florence Nightingale in the Crimean War, Clara Barton and the U.S. Sanitary Commission in the American Civil War, and the dramatic book The Memory of Solferino (1862) by Henry Dunant, a Swiss, about the casualties at the Battle of Solferino in 1859. Dunant and four other Genevan philanthropists had already launched, in October 1863, what would become the international Red Cross movement. Now the twelve initial signatories bound their armies to respect and protect the lives and workplaces of each other's ambulance and medical personnel; to incorporate volunteer auxiliaries into their medical corps; and to signify their virtual neutrality by a protective emblem, “a red cross on a white ground.” The United States acceded to the convention in 1882.

Its consequences were mixed. The popularity of national Red Cross societies actually facilitated social mobilization for war purposes. On the other hand, the convention set a valuable humanitarian precedent, of which the most obvious sequels were its successively extended versions of 1906, 1929, 1949, and 1977.
[See also Laws of War; Red Cross, American.]

Bibliography

Dietrich Schindler and Jiri Toman, eds., The Laws of Armed Conflicts: A Collection of Conventions, Resolutions and Other’ Documents, 1973; 2nd ed. 1981.
John F. Hutchinson , Champions of Charity: The Red Cross and the Great Powers, 1995.

Geoffrey Best

Geneva Conventions the first multilateral humanitarian treaty, established in Geneva August 22, 1864. It included provisions to protect all establishments and personnel that treated wounded soldiers, incorporate volunteers into the medical corps, and establish the Red Cross symbol as a sign of neutrality. Subsequent Geneva conventions were established in 1906 and 1929 to extend the provisions and concepts of the first. Another Geneva convention was approved on August 12, 1949, after World War II in response to the need to codify the nature of war crimes. They included torture and other inhumane treatment as violations of the laws of war and extended provisions from previous conventions. On June 8, 1977, two protocols to the 1949 conventions were approved to protect civilians from becoming objects of attack, extend protection to guerrilla combatants, and establish commissions to investigate violations of international law. Over 150 nations have approved the 1949 conventions, and approximately half that number have approved those of 1977. The United States has not approved the latter. The Hague Conventions also established similar treaties.

Geneva Conventions A series of international agreements on the treatment of victims of war. The first was the result of the work of Henri Dunant (b. 1828, d. 1910), founder of the International Red Cross movement, and laid down basic rules for the treatment of wounded soldiers and prisoners of war, the protection of medical personnel, and the safeguard of civilians. The second convention extended the care of the Red Cross to wounded at sea in 1899 (revised in 1906), and in 1929 a convention agreed on international standards for the treatment of prisoners of war, to be supervised by the Red Cross. Finally, the fourth convention of 1946 concerned the protection of civilians in time of war. These four conventions relating to the Red Cross were ratified by almost every country in the world (175 by 1993). A convention in 1951 defined the rights and the treatment to be accorded to refugees, specifying that they should be given abode if they had fled from religious, racial, or political persecution. Finally, the 1972 convention banned the development, production, and deployment of biological weapons.

Geneva Conventions A series of international agreements on the treatment of victims of war, ratified in whole or partially by the majority of states and certain non-state organizations, such as the PLO (the Palestine Liberation Organization) and SWAPO (the South West Africa People's Organization). The first Geneva Convention was established by the Swiss founder of the RED CROSS, Henri Dunant, in 1864, and concerned the treatment of the wounded in war and the protection of medical personnel. Subsequent Conventions in 1907, 1929, 1949, and 1977 covered the treatment of prisoners of war and the protection of civilians, forbidding such acts as deportation, torture, hostage-taking, collective punishment or reprisals, and the use of chemical and biological weapons. The 1977 Convention dealt with more extensive non-combatant protection, and covered problems arising from internal wars.

Geneva Conventions series of treaties signed (1864–1949) in Geneva, Switzerland, providing for humane treatment of combatants and civilians in wartime. The first convention, signed by 16 nations, covered the protection of sick and wounded soldiers and medical personnel and facilities, and was instrumental in the development of the International Committee of the Red Cross . Later conventions extended (1906) the first to naval warfare and covered (1929) the treatment of prisoners of war . As a result of World War II, particularly of the conduct of Germany and Japan, four conventions were adopted in 1949 to strengthen and codify earlier treaties and safeguard civilians.

Geneva Conventions Series of agreements, beginning in 1864, on the treatment of wounded soldiers and prisoners during war, and on the neutrality of the medical services.

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