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Russian soldiers ‘blow themselves up’ to avoid capture
(www.telegraph.co.uk)
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this post was submitted on 08 Oct 2026
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That's right, he surrendered using his own initiative.
Yes, and plenty of soldiers do. Many of them are then shot for cowardice.
Now, did he surrender thinking "This is clearly legitimate and I will not face serious penalties" or did he surrender thinking "Either we all die to the Germans, or I am found guilty of cowardice and executed, but at least my men will live"? This is not a question we can really answer, unless the dude did some writing on the topic which I am unaware of.
While digging further, I have not found any examples of stare decisis resulting from this decision. However, I did find that military courts in the UK do not follow common law. So that may be a fool's errand.
Either way, I don't find the idea of soldiers dying rather than surrendering particularly far-fetched. Although, based on previous conflicts, countries that carry out more executions for surrender/desertions/cowardice tend to be the ones that lose wars. Like I said earlier, not great for morale.
I'd hazard a guess individuals being punished for surrender was not a common theme since WW1, at least for the allies.
Cowardice on the other hand was an issue. Do you have some data to backup your claims on the losing side executing more people?
Ya know I was thinking about it some more, and I wonder how this ties in with Umberto Eco's 11th point. "Heroic" death on the battlefield.
I found this: https://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=222008 claiming around 15k germans executed for desertion. Disclaimer: I am VERY skeptical of any forums that focus on axis military history. Same reason that I'm EXTREMELY skeptical of dudes that are "really into history" but only WWII and the roman empire. However, the books they mention do in fact exist.
Whenever I search for allies executing soldiers for desertion, I get a shitload of articles about Eddie Slovak, and that is making it difficult to find specific numbers for other allied nations. Similarly, the focus on the wehrmacht makes it difficult to find exact numbers for Italy and Japan, although Japan had the shattered jewel policy.
Basically I'm extrapolating from the magnitude of those numbers. Although, WWI numbers do seem to show the opposite--More british and french soldiers executed than germans. That being said, the official count of 49 german executions seems. Undercounted.