# Medics and World War II **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 16, 2002, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633 "2002-03-16T17:31:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Hirka\_T\_Bawa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/db5fbb/32.png) [@Hirka\_T\_Bawa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hirka_T_Bawa)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2002, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/1 "2002-03-16T17:31:34Z")
Ok, I just finished watching Band Of Brothers episode 4., and I have a question I think y’all can answer. In the second episode of Band Of Brothers, the axis stopped shooting when a ally went up to a dead axis guy looking for a lugar, and his friends said that they thought he was a medic. In the beggining of the forth episode an ally was shot and then a medic ran up there to save him, and then was shot in the leg. So, the question is: During World War II, did the axis or allies shoot medic’s? ---
**Author:** ![Crusoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/49beb7/32.png) [@Crusoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crusoe)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2002, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/2 "2002-03-16T17:35:52Z")
There may have been theoretical restrictions, but in the heat of battle I imagine all nations ignored/respected medics. ---
**Author:** ![Crusoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/49beb7/32.png) [@Crusoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crusoe)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2002, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/3 "2002-03-16T17:42:51Z")
Sorry. That was a really unhelpful answer. [This site](http://home.att.net/~steinert/) suggests that Germans mostly respected ceasefires for US medics. I’ve seen books and films (sorry, anecdotal evidence only) that suggests that Germans and Russians saw each medics as fair game on the Eastern Front. ---
**Author:** ![d12](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/71c47a/32.png) [@d12](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/d12)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2002, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/4 "2002-03-16T17:49:49Z")
> [@](#): > > He gave first aid to his wounded comrades and helped them out of the line. More often then not they faced the enemy unarmed… Above quote comming from the site mentioned by Crusoe. I was always told that medics were only issued a sidearm but would frequently pickup heavy arms from the dead or steal them. I’ve seen pictures of medics in some cases with a submachine gun in their hands. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2002, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/5 "2002-03-16T18:25:39Z")
I’d be curious to see references to that, **d12**. I am sure that some medic at some time picked up a weapon and shot back, but from what I have read by guys on the ground, (Ernie Pyle, Bill Mauldin, S.L.A. Marshall, and others), that would have been a really rare event. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2002, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/6 "2002-03-17T01:10:48Z")
It varied by individuals on the actual field of battle, and more generally in the various theaters of the war, but as a general rule, the fight between the Germans and the western allies was a very ‘clean’ fight, with the Geneva Conventions being adhered to. In the war between Russia and Germany, they pretty much slaughtered eachother to the best of their ability. American medics in the pacific theater got rid of their red cross and disgused themselves as regular soldiers, because the Japanese specifically targetted medics. ---
**Author:** ![kuroashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e9a140/32.png) [@kuroashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kuroashi)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 5:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/7 "2002-03-18T05:40:38Z")
My grandfather was a medic (half-track ambulance driver) at the Battle of the Bulge. He said he picked up a pistol from a fallen enemy since he didn’t have a weapon and REALLY felt like one would be VERY useful while they were under siege. ---
**Author:** ![cornflakes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@cornflakes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cornflakes)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/8 "2002-03-18T13:04:27Z")
IIRC, **kuroashi** , Lt. Col. Pieper, one of the German commanders at the Bulge, ordered his troops to kill all captured enemy troops so that the processing of prisoners would not slow the German advance. This might have been why your grandfather wanted a sidearm at such a late point in the war. ---
**Author:** ![toadspittle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c0e974/32.png) [@toadspittle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/toadspittle)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/9 "2002-03-18T18:55:53Z")
IIRC, the author’s father in _Flags of our Fathers_ (one of the Iwo Jima flagraisers and a medic) carried a .45 (as standard issue). He was a Navy corpsman who ended up training with and fighting with the marines. As previously mentioned, the Japanese, at least at Iwo Jima, targeted medics–even going so far as shouting out, “Medic!”–mimicking American cries for help–so that they could attract and kill medics. ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/10 "2002-03-18T19:46:35Z")
The Germans generally accorded American medics a lot of leeway, _if_ they weren’t Waffen SS or those little bastards in the _Hitler Jugend_ division. In _Citizen Soldiers_, Stephen Ambrose tells a touching story about an American ambulance that took a wrong turn and ran into a German sentry. Seeing the wounded, the German waved the ambulance driver in the direction of the American lines. A few hours later, another ambulance pulled up. The driver got out and dropped a few cartons of cigarettes on the ground, waved a “thank you,” and drove away. But “a lot” in wartime often isn’t very much at all. My own reading shows that instances like the above were far less common than medics being hit either intentionally or acidentally in the field. It all depended upon the individual who was shooting at you. Today, at least among elite American units, the medics carry rifles and use them, and in one particular instance I know of, simultaneously. ---
**Author:** ![Hirka\_T\_Bawa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/db5fbb/32.png) [@Hirka\_T\_Bawa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hirka_T_Bawa)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/11 "2002-03-18T21:52:43Z")
See, this is why I love The Straight Dope, get all sorts of great answers to your questions 🙂 Thank you all for answering my question, now I know a lot more about World War II medics in Germany. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/12 "2002-03-19T04:59:24Z")
> [@](#): > > the medics carry rifles and use them, and in one particular instance I know of, simultaneously. As opposed to the normal situation in which they use them without carrying them. ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/13 "2002-03-19T05:16:05Z")
On simultaneous particular instances, even! ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/14 "2002-03-19T06:06:41Z")
I’d think the U.S. military would issue rifles to _all_ medics, if only so they could share the burden of sentry duty. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2002, 7:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/15 "2002-03-19T07:08:44Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Sofa King \* > \*\*The Germans generally accorded American medics a lot of leeway, _if_ they weren’t Waffen SS or those little bastards in the _Hitler Jugend_ division. > \*\* Actually, it’s not very accurate as a whole to classify waffen SS divisions as Evil Baby Killers. Oh, and BTW, the medics are allowed to carry a pistol by the Geneva conventions, I figured you knew that. It’s a self defense weapon. Rifles are offensive weapons. ---
**Author:** ![Walrus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/51bf81/32.png) [@Walrus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walrus)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2002, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/16 "2002-03-20T14:02:10Z")
One of my Uncles, serving in the RAMC claimed to have been issued a Sten (sub-machine gun) as his personal weapon to allow him “to defend his charges” as an Ambulance driver. The thought behind this was that the smg, using pistol 9mm ammunition, was a “defensive” weapon. Regards Walrus ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2002, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/17 "2002-03-20T18:20:26Z")
> [@](#): > > Actually, it’s not very accurate as a whole to classify waffen SS divisions as Evil Baby Killers. I’d like to draw your attention to the Nuremberg trials: > [@](#): > > there occurred seven cases of violations of the laws of war, involving the shooting of 64 unarmed Allied prisoners-of-war in uniform, many of whom had been previously wounded and none of whom had resisted or attempted to escape ; that the perpetrators were members of the 12th S.S. Panzer Division, the so-called Hitler Jugend Division ; that enlisted men of the 15th Company of the 25th Panzer Grenadier Regiment of that Division were given secret orders to the effect that S.S. troops shall take no prisoners and that prisoners are to be executed after having been interrogated; that similar orders were given to men of the 3rd Battalion of the 26th Panzer Grenadier Regiment of the Division and of the 12th S.S. Engineering and Reconnaissance Battalions ; and that **the conclusion was irresistible that it was understood throughout the Division that a policy of denying quarter or executing prisoners after interrogation was openly approved.** [Trial of Major German War Criminals, Day Twenty-Four, 20 December 1945, testimony of Major Farr, page 175](http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/imt/tgmwc/tgmwc-03/tgmwc-03-24-06.html) (my bolding). And whatever the Geneva convention states, most modern American elite forces do not deploy single-purpose medics into the field. Rather, fighting men are trained as medics, but they still fight–with rifles–as well as tend to the wounded. ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2002, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/18 "2002-03-20T18:52:52Z")
In case you doubt me about rifle-toting medics, [here’s one from the horse’s mouth](http://www.suasponte.com/history/modern/panama/torrijos/1.html), the Battalion Surgeon of 1/75 Ranger: > [@](#): > > The elephant grass must have been about 5 or 6 feet tall because I could just make out the outline of two shadows approaching me. I knew they weren’t Rangers because they couldn’t have gotten out of their chutes before me. Now I was scared. My rifle was in its container keeping it from being damaged on the jump. … The only thought the remained was something like: “Oh shit, I have been studying for my whole life to be a doctor and now some bastard is going to kill me before I even get a chance to use those skills that took me my whole adult life to acquire.” … I took off the harness, pulled my CAR15 out of the container and tossed a frag in the direction opposite of where I was headed. ---
**Author:** ![Rodd\_Hill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/3ab097/32.png) [@Rodd\_Hill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodd_Hill)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2002, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/19 "2002-03-21T00:18:27Z")
The Waffen-SS were responsible for many atrocities on east and west fronts during the Second World War: In Le Paradis, France, June 1940: about 90 British POWs of the Norfolk Regiment were lined up and machine-gunned by members of 2nd Infantry Regiment, SS ‘Totenkopf’ (Death’s Head) Division. Two men survived to tell the story (see “Private Pooley’s Revenge:” [http://www.stephen-stratford.co.uk/pooleys\_revenge.htm](http://www.stephen-stratford.co.uk/pooleys_revenge.htm)) The _very next day_, 80 more British POWs were murdered at the nearby village of Wormhoudt, this time by No7 Company, 2nd Battalion of the SS Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler. September-October, 1941: 8th SS-Kavallerie Division Florian Geyer killed 259 Soviet troops and 6,504 civilians during a summer mopping up operation in the Pripet marshes of Byelorusia. Near the French town of Ascq, on April 2, 1944, 70 civilian men were shot alongside railraod tracks that had been sabotaged. The men were rounded up at random from nearby houses and shot by members of 12th SS Panzer Division ‘Hitler Jugend.’ Over 130 Canadian POWs were murdered June 8, 1944, in Normandy, at Abbaye Ardenne, by Kurt Meyer’s 12th SS Hitler ‘Hitler Jugend.’ An excellent video has been produced by the Canadian War Amps about this episode: [http://www.waramps.ca/video/tnop.html](http://www.waramps.ca/video/tnop.html) June 9, 1944: Tulle, France: 98 civilian men were rounded up and shot by the Pioneer platoon of SS-Panzer Aufklarungs Abteilung 2, in revenge for attacks on German troops by the Resistance. June 10, 1944: 2nd SS Panzer Division ‘Das Reich’ Division murder 245 women, 207 children and 190 men in the small village of Oradour-sur-Glane. June 10, 1944: Units from SS-Panzergrenadier Regiment 7 on an antipartisan sweep, massacre circa 218-300+ Greek civilians in the village of Distomo. August 12, 1944: 560 civilians, including 110 children are murdered in Santa Anna di Stazzema, Italy by 16th SS-Panzergrenadier Division “Reichsführer-SS.” Aug 17-27, 1944: Divisional units of 16th SS-Panzergrenadier Division “Reichsführer-SS” massacre 369 Italians in anti-partisan operations, Bardene San Terenzo. August 29, 1944: an unknown SS unit kills all males in the village of Robert-Espagne (49) and 26 more civilian men at the next village, Couvonges, in retaliation for a German staff car and occupants ambushed by the Resistance. September 29-August 1, 1944: a mixed Wehrmacht-SS force kills some 1800 men, women and children in the area around Monte Sole, in Italy. December 17, 1944: Kampfgruppe Peiper, a composite battalion made up of various Waffen SS units, led by SS Major Joachim Peiper, murder 86 US POWs at Malmedy, Belgium. And this is all without taking into consideration Waffen SS participation in the crushing of the Warsaw Ghetto, the “Final Solution,” both assisting the Einsatzgruppen in the field, and as guards at concentration camps. ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2002, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medics-and-world-war-ii/98633/20 "2002-03-21T05:31:07Z")
Right the hell on, **Rodd**. I don’t use the term “bastard” loosely. Sometimes.