I can’t see why that would be considered aid and comfort. The rules are different for medical personnel and chaplains. They are not POWs. They are “retained personnel”, and have different privileges and obligations. Treating the enemy wounded is a requirement if you hold them captive, I can’t see why it would be any different in spite of the role reversal.
It’s important to note that while I have gone through the training and am familiar with the rules as they apply to me as a potential POW, I cannot speak authoritatively on the subject of retained personnel because it has no application in my case and was only briefly discussed. I could therefore be wrong in some of the details. That said, the above is my understanding of the situation.
Let’s make it really simple. You are entirely incorrect. POWs and detainees have no obligation to help their captors with anything at all. A POW could conceivably sit down and never move again if his SRO (Senior Ranking Officer) tells him to and he is not given a lawful order by his captors. A POW need not speak other than to give his captors the required information.
Look, this sort of thing is absolutely routine for a whole host of peope nowadays - for example the BBC send most staff going overseas on hostage survival courses as an insurance requirement, banks, accountancy and law firms ditto - it’s mandatory, and sometimes it feels like half of the professionals in London have been on a course.
One thing it absolutely isn’t though is a Geneva 2 situation i.e. a war environment in which the military aspect of the Geneva Convention applies.
There really isn’t going to be too much online becasue there courses cost £several hundred-grand per day, here’s the briefest outline see ‘Surviving Capture’
Ah, Elsie, you’ve only been here two minutes and you’re already predictable. You initially stated that “nobody was forced to do anything”, but now you’re trying to wrangle your way out of that by trying to intimate that the only way somebody can perform an action under duress is if they are subjected to “American style torture”. Nice try.
I wonder if the sporadic announcements of show trials for espionage and possible risk of execution could have contributed to the way that they behaved? Who knows? Well, the Innocence Project, for one:
I think it was perfectly clear what I meant.
As has been pointed out already, this is plainly false.
The initial claim was the female was “forced” to wear a “veil” - I asked the following:
“Also didn’t know anyone was “forced” to do anything - any links appreciated ?”
Which you now interpret as:
"You initially stated that “nobody was forced to do anything”
So (a) i didn’t initiate this aspect and (b) I didn’t say what you claim - apart from that, you’re spot on.
btw, the link I was asking for didn’t come.
You then introduced “duress” in relation to these particular detainees.
By way of supporting your claim of “duress” you link to a Rupert Murdoch rag and some other stuff - two questions:
What constitutes “duress”, what would be the lower threshold, iyo ?
What information are you relying on to support your assertion of “duress” in the case of the 15 sailors ?
I wonder if the sporadic announcements of show trials for espionage and possible risk of execution could have contributed to the way that they behaved? Who knows? Well, the Innocence Project, for one:
I think it was perfectly clear what I meant.
As has been pointed out already, this is plainly false.
[/QUOTE]
Since the UK is not at war with Iran, I do not see how the Geneva Convention(s) can apply.
As for duress, wearing those ill fitting suits would not have been voluntary
Anyway, the main thing is that it is over, possibly a few deals have been struck, but I think it is more likely that channels like Syria and the Iraqi ‘government’ started a ‘dialogue’.
IIRC the last time we had an undeclared naval war it was the ‘Cod War’ with Iceland, the weoponary was limited to bags of flour.
You asked for the link because you knew that no link exists. You are attempting to use the call for a cite as a battering ram to “win” the debate, when in fact it’s perfectly obvious to anyone with the neuronal capacity greater than that of an amoeba that the female sailor was being forced to wear the veil and the sailors were forced to publicly apologise on Iranian TV (so yes, people “were being forced to do something”) given the extraordinary circumstances that the personnel found themselves under.
Your initial claim that it’s standard practice for military personnel to co-operate with their captors has been shown to be plainly false. Given that we have a group of professional soldiers appearing on Iranian TV “apologising” for straying into Iranian waters, and given that we know that this isn’t standard practice for military prisoners, why should we give any credence to a hypothesis that they did so without duress?
Nice ad hominem. What factual errors have you discovered in the links I provided? None, I presume.
I think it’s reasonable that:
certain groups close to the Iranian President claiming that a “show trial” is appropriate
the calls for execution for the prisoners from a segment of the Iranian government
the awfully convenient riots in Tehran outside of the British embassy against Britain
certainly contribute to a feeling of coercion, don’t you?
So we have “forced”, “duress” and now “a feeling of coercion”.
My position is this; I have no idea what happened to the 15 sailors, but I refuse to become hysterical about it at the bidding of the UK/USA media, or becasue people associate themselves a little too closley with the flag at the price of objectivity.
If you want to be a victim of the jingoistic-imperial UK tabliod media then by all means join in with hyperbolic and absurd language; I stand by my two points:
a) I have yet to see any mistreatment of these 15 detainees, and
b) It is standard military training to cooperate with captors and to do everything you can (as a detainee) to diffuse situations.
Please give me some quotes or other evidence* in relation to these particular detainees*, pref without the girls dorm hysteria ?
If you watched TV you saw the 15 wearing garb which was not theirs, coerced or forced into wearing it or go naked?. Forced to appear on Iranian TV because of threats of trial, execution, imprisonment.
What other evidence is required?
See Airman Doors posts about co-operation.
Don’t ask for quotes or evidence when you are perfectly aware that none is available.
Same goes for cites, there are NONE, this you know so stop asking for them
From elsewhere, this seems to about sum things up - unless you’re a whipped up, near hysterical member of the great British public, of course:
Britain: Can I have my ball back please?
Iran: No, I was here first.
Britain: No you weren’t. Give me my ball back!
Iran: Not until you admit that you smell of poo.
Britain: Don’t be ridiculous, just give me the ball back.
Iran: Not until you say that you smell of poo.
Britain: [sighs] This is so stupid. OK, I smell of poo.
Iran: Did you hear that everyone? Britain said he smells of poo! [throws ball back]
Britain: I only said that to get my ball back. Everyone knows I don’t smell of poo. Anyway, I had my fingers crossed when I said it. Everyone hates you. You’re just a big bully.
I don’t know; seems a bit silly to be arguing over what degree of coercion the sailors and marines night have undergone when no one has any hard facts as yet. I mean, go ahead if you must, but I think I’ll wait until I hear something about this from one of the ex-captives before weighing in.
Meanwhile, some mouthpieces of the UK and US right, including the Daily Express and the ever-predictable Rush Limbaugh, seem positively enraged over the captives being released at all. Jeez, it seems almost as if they would have preferred to see these people executed, just so they’d have a better excuse to bomb the crap out of Iran.
El_Kabong - in complete agreement. What’s fascinating is the extent to which some people desire to imply behaviour in order to feel, say, ‘humiliated’ or ‘vengeful’ - the UK media creates these extremes out of absolutely nothing and as if a perfectly reasonable, patient, diplomatic course of action doesn’t exist, and such a percentage of the population knee-jerk on cue.
It is, of course, how Blair managed to get the majority of the country to back invading a complete non-threat several thousand miles away on entirely bogus pretexts in the first place.
Give them any old bogus bone, and they’re like rottweilers on acid, with a little help from the ‘papers.
