Military Justice in Modern History: The Adjudication of War and Violence in a Globalising World 

Edited by Kelly Maddox, Tino Schölz and Urs Matthias Zachmann
2025, 386 pp. 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588 
eBook ISBN: 9783110989588 
Hardcover ISBN: 9783110999860 

Military justice has long played a central role in the adjudication of war and violence throughout the world. It is one of the principal mechanisms used to maintain soldierly discipline as well as to protect civilian populations. At the same time, military justice also has served as an instrument of power in occupied territories by adjudicating the crimes of local inhabitants and has been vital to upholding order among prisoners of war. 

This volume explores the adjudication of wartime violence through diverse case studies of military justice within modern history (c. 1850–1945). This was a formative period in which our contemporary international legal framework emerged against the backdrop of the internationalisation and standardisation of national, customary practices and the increasing totalisation and globalisation of modern warfare. By examining the evolving and dialectic functions of military justice within this dynamic context, the volume develops important historical perspectives on the enforcement of discipline in armed forces, the punishment of enemy combatants and the administration of law and justice over civilians in occupied areas. 

"Military Justice in Modern History" reflects on issues in the adjudication of war and violence that are still prevalent in the conflict zones of our world today. 

Table of Contents

Kelly Maddox and Tino Schölz 
Military Justice in Modern History: An Introductory Overview 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-001  

Daniel Marc Segesser 
National and International Means of (Military) Justice: Four Circles of a Legal Debate on the Punishment of Violations of the Laws of War in the Period Between the Franco-Prussian War and the Beginning of the Cold War (1864–1949) 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-002  

Gwenaël Guyon 
From Circumstantial Legislation to Civilianisation: A Century of Reforms in French Military Justice (1850–1928) 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-003  

Tino Schölz 
Enforcing Discipline: The Institutional Development of the Imperial Japanese Army’s Justice System (1868–1945) 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-004  

Elizabeth Shesko 
Arbitrary Justice: Military Tribunals in Early Twentieth-Century Bolivia 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-005  

Gerard Oram 
British Courts Martial in the Era of the First World War, 1914–1920 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-006  

Giovanni Focardi and Nicolò Da Lio 
Fascist Justice: Italian Military Magistrates in the Colonies and Occupied Territories (1922–1945) 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-007  

Franziska Exeler 
Assessing Soviet Military Justice: Military Tribunals and the Punishment of Red Army Soldiers During the Second World War 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-008    

Urs Matthias Zachmann 
Heart of Darkness: Japanese Military Justice on the Road to Nanjing, 1937 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-009   

Sarah Maya Vercruysse and Nina Janz 
The “Long Arm” of the Military Justice of the Wehrmacht: A Case Study on Luxembourgish Desertions 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-010  

Kelly Maddox 
Military Justice and its Potential for Violence towards Civilians Under Wartime Occupation: The Imperial Japanese Army in China, 1894–1941 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-011  

Maria Fritsche 
Wehrmacht Military Courts as Instruments of Occupation: The Case of German-Occupied Norway, 1940–1945 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-012  

Brian K. Feltman 
Justice Behind the Lines: Prisoners of War, Military Justice and Reprisals in the First World War 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-013  

Nicolas Stassar 
Japanese Military Justice Against Allied Soldiers During the Pacific War 1941–1945: An Assessment of the Trial Against Walter Anker and Four Others 
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110989588-014