Tradition regarding surrendering officers keeping sidearms?

Factual Questions
1

The U.S. has said that any surrendering Iraqi officers will be allowed to keep their sidearms per tradition. I’ve tried doing some research regarding this tradition but haven’t found anything yet. Does anyone know when or where this tradition started? What is the historical basis for this tradition? Why not take the sidearms to prevent an EPW uprising? Any help on this is appreciated!

2

I don’t know the origin or history of the tradition, but as I recall, the Italian officers surrendering during WWII in Eritrea were allowed to keep there side arms, as this was regarded as the modern equivalent of an officers sword. They were not allowed to keep the ammunition, however. I believe this only applied to ones who surrendered, not ones who were captured. And may have been at the discretion of the local commander.

3

Here’s a link to a CNN Story that mentions:

I gather that this means that U.S./allied forces will just bypass Iraqi forces that follow the surrender protocol and stay out of the way, rather than capturing them and turning them into prisoners of war. In this case, it would make some sense to allow officers to keep their sidearms (handguns) to maintain order and enforce surrender orders.

If they are actually prisoners of war in allied camps, I can’t imagine that the guards would allow officer prisoners to keep loaded handguns. Ceremonial swords, on the other hand, maybe.

4

G’day

My guess is that the traditon goes back to a time before insignia of rank, and to when nobles and gentlemen wore sword in civilian dress at least partly as a sign of social rank. Stripping a gentleman of his sword, his sign of gentle standing (especially when that had ceased to be a militarily significant weapon) would have been an unnecessary insult.

I have an impression that at one stage the protocol of surrender was for the troops to lay down their arms, and for their commanding officer to advance holding out his sword hilt-first. The officer accepting the surrend would take the sword by the hilts, reverse it, and give it back, indicating that he had accepted the surrender and now considered the surrendering officer to be a non-combatant.

Regards,
Agback