A common situation in war fiction is the squad or lone soldier who escapes a battle by stealing one of the enemy’s vehicles, such as a tank, fighter plane, submarine, whatever.
It is my understanding that it is against the rules of war to disguise yourself as a member of the enemy, for example by wearing captured enemy uniforms in combat.
How does this apply in real life when, on the field, your squad swipes an enemy vehicle with national markings from the enemy? E.g. suppose it is WW2 and you are an American platoon. You raid a nearby German encampment and end up with a captured Jeep covered with Iron Crosses and Swastikas. Can you drive this around legally (laws of war), or do you first need to repaint it or somehow mark it as a captured vehicle first? What if it’s an emergency and you need a vehicle to retreat in (your squad vehicle is in 50 pieces, there are only 3 of you left, and 1000 enemy soldiers will be at your location in 10 minutes), but don’t have any paint or anything you can drape over the enemy markings?
I know that in the long term, the Germans did paint their own recognition symbols on captured gear.
In the short term, I’d think the major threat wouldn’t be any sort of legal question, but rather, if you’re tooling around in a captured halftrack and run across your own guys, they’re going to take you out if they can, thinking you’re the enemy.
In the modern era, ground vehicles are hardly marked at all. Soldiers are trained to recognize enemy vehicles by their type. (M60 good, T62 bad) This can lead to confusion. During the suppression of revolutions in Eastern Europe, Soviet vehicle were marked with white lines (Lengthwise on the body, crossways on the turret). In the first attack on Iraq, Coalition forces sported bright recognition panels. All nations have used national flags on vehicles from time to time to aid recognition.
Ruses of war are prohibited to the extent that they are used to treacherously secure a military advantage. Stealing an enemy jeep to escape, retreat, or disengage from battle wouldn’t be prohibited.
I thought of that too. A while back, I used to play an online game where one could “capture” enemy vehicles, and I had to keep using team chat to remind people that I was flying around in a stolen fighter, so please don’t blast me. (The fighters were marked in terms of what side they were originally from, not which team was flying them). Lots of fun.
I’m thinking that might be a dangerous proposition - being in the field and having to get a message out to all your buddies by radio - “hey, if you see a Panzer, check it’s registry number. Panzer 553 was stolen by Sgt. Smith and Cpl. Jones after their APC overturned in mud, so don’t blast it please.”