Wireless Telegraphy in War
Harvard Law Review · 1905
It has often happened that a belligerent in war has been forced to notice, and define the character of, some new invention which bears upon hostilities.Thus the list of contraband has grown during war beyond the limitations of treaty.Thus the balloon in warfare has been attacked.Thus new and deadly explosives have been denounced.But naturally the belligerent will regard a new engine or weapon or device, which is to work him harm, with a certain prejudice, and his view of its legality will be colored accordingly.It is the outsider who can preserve the judicial attitude, not the combatant, in the heat of battle.It may happen therefore that the opinion of the belligerent must be revised in calmer mood, as when the Hague Code declared balloonists not to be spies, in opposition to Bismark's threat to treat them as such during the siege of Paris.In a similar way we may be sure the Russians' threat to treat as spies those private individuals who make use of the wireless for purposes of war correspondence, will be objected to, for the one thing certain is that such persons are not spies, and if not, they should not be treated as such.Perhaps the new Hague Conference to which Mr. Roosevelt is asking the powers, will take up this question of the status of the wireless in war.Meanwhile, we can at least briefly study the points which will need decision--perhaps find some guiding principle.Wireless telegraphy in the present war in the East, so far as appears, has been used in two ways which are of questionable legality-to maintain intercourse between beleaguered Port Arthur and Russia, and to send war news to a London paper rapidly, and independent of military control, by the paper's own steamer rigged for the purpose.As for the use of wireless