On Wed, 30 Aug 2000, Ron Twellman wrote:

++++++ [CLIP] ++++++

> Of course we also get items from the winning side of wars and the legalities
> there are more complicated.  What some service people were able to retain
> when they were mustered out others had to turn in before they were released.
> I wouldn't doubt there was some convoluted official governmental policy on
> this, but in practice it seems to have varied with who was in charge at a
> particular place and time.  The reality is that the governments concerned
> are not likely to incur the wrath of their veterans over ownership of
> obsolete uniforms and equipment - and we accept appropriate items under the
> same assumption.
>
+++++++++++++

>
> Could we get in trouble over any of this?  Sure the possibility exists, but
> it's extremely small.  I'm more concerned with the inherent vice some of
> these items contain in the way of radioactivity or hazardous chemicals than
> over their dubious legal provenance.


=====================================

Ron:

These are very interesting questions on several grounds.

As international law has gradually evolved over the past 350+ years since
the Peace of Westphalia, and especially during the century since the first
Hague Laws of War of 1899 and 1907, the ancient traditional rights of the
victor/conqueror in relation to cultural property have been steadily
eroded so that almost all taking of property would nowadays be regarded as
looting or plunder, and hence illegal, unless this was as war reparations
or compensation under the terms of either an agreed settlement (e.g. in a
peace treaty) or externally imposed (e.g. by resolution of the Security
Council of the UN).

The one exception that still seems to survive this marked evolution of the
international laws and customs of war  is in respect of specifically
military property, such as weapons, delivery platforms (ships, aircraft,
tanks etc.), military equipment, ammunition and other war "materiel"
including symbols, flags, insignia etc.  Here it still seems to be
accepted that this can be taken legitimately as war booty by the military
forces capturing it.

However, it is much more doubtful whether an individual soldier etc. can
take such captured property for his/her personal use, unless explicitly
authorised from a high military level.  (In August 1945 my father, and all
the first 100 British troops who led the liberation of Thailand was given
a captured Japanese officer's sword by the British Commander in Bangkok,
so presumably that was officially sanctioned.) However, I would suggest
that such an action (or even a forced "purchase" - whether from captured
enemy personnel or otherwise) without proper military command authority
should be regarded as theft and be subject to normal military law and
sanctions.

On your second point, I had a similar experience when I bought for ma
private collector for my then museum a former Royal Air Force nuclear
bomber, only to find that it was stuffed with top secret avionics and
weapons systems (though thankfully no "H" bombs!) which had mysteriously
found their way back into the aircraft despite it being stripped of such
items before its original sale.  (No doubt this stuff has been
"liberated" and supplied to the aircraft's previous owner- I believe free
of charge - by sympathetic technical and military personnel.



Patrick J. Boylan
(Professor of Heritage Policy and Management)

City University, London,
Department of Arts Policy and Management
Frobisher Crescent, Barbican, London EC2Y 8HB, UK;
phone: +44-20-7477.8750, fax:+44-20-7477.8887;
Home: 38 Kingsmead Road, Leicester LE2 3YB, UK
phone & fax: +44-(0)116-288.5186
E-mail: [log in to unmask];  Web site: http://www.city.ac.uk/artspol/

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