Shooting of stretcher bearers and medics administering first aid to a wounded comrade-let them go about their work or treat them as front-line combatants?????
Dosen't the Geneva convention say something about this? I'd have to go with the in-combat theory. So long as the medics are only attemding to the wounded, leave them alone. But if they begin firing, or otherwise enter the fight, they are fair game...
Yeah, leave em alone! As far as Europe on the western front a vast majority of the medics I've spoken with said that the germans and americans left eachothers medics alone. The G. Convention also says that if a medic is captured, he has to keep being a medic, no matter what side. I've got a great picture of a us aid station where the german medics outnumber the us ones!!! I don't know that that kind of adherance to the convention has or ever would happen again. Oh, and this brings up a funny story I read. I think it was in the hedgerows, there was a firefight that had died down, and a german and american medic went out to help the wounded. They were very near eachother. After seeing dead and wounded comrades, they stared eachother down and got in a fistfight. The infantry on both sides watched and cheered. After one medic won, the battered aidmen just continued working on the wounded.
Great story Doc--but who won--the German medic or the Ami medic? Medics are non-combatants--I say leave them alone and let them do their work.
Sounds funny, but what's a fistfight? I say leave them alone too! Have you read the German general casualties list? Why are there so many medics killed there? That's a big doubt I have...
I think you guys call it, Knuckles???? A fist fight is when you use your fists which are balled up and you throw a punch at you opponnent in the hopes of beating the S*** out of him.
A suggestion for those who dint know what a fist fight is: Watch the great Clint Eastwood movies: "Every Which Way But Loose" and "Any Which Way You Can". They are movies about Bare Knuckle Boxing. Clint Eastwoods character--Filo Beddoe, is a Bare Knuckle Champion. He goes areound with his brother who sets up the Bare Knuckle Fights to make money. Their sidekick is Clyde, the Orangutan (Sp?) and the ride in an old pickup truck. Their MA, is a feisty old woman who can cuss the paint off of a Battleship. Then there is the "famous" Black Widow biker gang that Eastwood gets into a few "Fist fights" with. Both movies are extremely funny and well worth renting. The music is great as well. "I was mindin my own business sippin on a beer, when a good ol boy pushed me way too far. I got up to ask him why, then he punched me in the eye, then all hell broke loose in that bar." "There will always be the good guys and the bad guys, some things will never change, Sherriffs in New York, Outlaws on the Range, theyre hangin em in Utah, for breakin the law, burnin the stills in Arkansaw." Or something like that. This is from the song: "The Good Guys And The Bad Guys" which is played in a scene in "Any Which Way You Can." I think im going to rent these movies myself, for this coming weekend--nice change of pace. [ 07 October 2002, 04:47 PM: Message edited by: C.Evans ]
I would rather use a gun. I am very awkward in fighting that way. My brother is a box champion, I could call him. Now, you guys know why I always avoided fighting with my brother...
I assume things have not cahnged that much from WW2 to the present day. But as the Law of Armed Conflict stands, Medics are not to be shot at, and are not to be hindered in their work. Today, medics do carry firearms, but these are only to be used for their own protection, and the protection of those they are treating. I think in WW2 that medics did not carry firearms, at least i have not seen any pics that show them carrying weapons.
