Transcription
Only a few days ago, we discussed Ukraine's point system. It awards credits for various military successes, which units can then redeem for better equipment. With my apologies to all of you, apparently I glossed over perhaps the most interesting facet of the system. And because of your comments, I realized that there is a clever feature of the system that helps prevent very dark outcomes indeed. War crimes. So, on that happy note, it is time to pick up the phone and learn a lesson or two on how not to commit war crimes on today's edition of the Geopolitics Helpline. I noticed that there was a massive difference in the points awarded for capturing an enemy soldier alive versus killing them instead. Can you explain why there is such a large premium for taking prisoners?
Yeah, this one is on me. I was more focused on describing the perverse incentives that the point system creates and why Ukraine uses it anyway. As a result, I did not go into depth on the scoring system itself. And that inadvertently led me to overlook a key positive aspect of the system. So, let me first explain why Ukraine's Ministry of Defense would want to place such a large premium on captured soldiers. It is actually 10 times as many points, 120 versus 12. And then I will pivot to how the private point system helps resolve a compliance problem among the rank and file Ukrainian soldiers.
The main theme of the first half of the video is that capturing POWs creates positive externalities, a value that others benefit from despite those individuals not having taken part in the original interaction. More explicitly, single soldiers or units are responsible for handling enemy POWs, but their actions affect every other Ukrainian soldier and unit. Do it right and everyone benefits. Do it wrong and everyone suffers.
The clearest benefit from capturing enemy soldiers is that you can interrogate them. It turns out, and I only recently learned this, dead bodies are not very good at answering questions. What an interrogator might learn is a crapshoot, ranging from absolutely nothing to critical information about the current line of attack or even theater level operations. The other straightforward benefit is that you cannot exchange a corpse for your own POWs that Russia holds. Peace negotiations have been almost entirely devoid of any meaning. But POW exchanges have been the one place where there has been some consensus. Ukrainian POWs coming back from Russian camps tend not to look so good. Thus, if you want to get your guys back while there is still something to get back, it helps to have something to trade.
Then there are a couple of less tangible points that still matter. Undoubtedly, not every war crime comes to light, but some do, and it is a bit easier for them to be exposed when surveillance drones are constantly flying over the battle space. Every revelation of a Ukrainian war crime is a propaganda victory for the Kremlin. This might matter little for each individual Ukrainian soldier, including the one who committed the crime, but it represents a major problem for the Ukrainian command overall. This goes double because Ukraine relies on Western support and those silly Western governments care about this thing called human rights.
One final bit. It is easier to capture future enemy soldiers if there is a collective belief among those under siege that they will receive humane treatment. You do not want them to fight to the last man because they are afraid that they will be tortured or killed anyway if they surrender. Any evidence that those fates are inevitable makes the jobs of all of your fellow units that much more difficult. Obviously, this is subject to manipulation on the propaganda front, but you do not want to just hand out free incriminating evidence to your opponent. So, this on the surface is why the Ukrainian point system awards such high marks for capturing enemy soldiers alive. A prisoner of war is in fact substantially more valuable than a dead opponent. And as will be critical in a moment, those benefits are spread to everyone on your side, not just to you or your unit.
Now, for the second half of the video, there is a hidden upshot of the point system given what I just described. I have no idea whether there was any intent to do this with the system's original design, but these are natural consequences, and I would be shocked if no one in the Ukrainian government has recognized the benefit after the fact. It is great that taking prisoners generates positive externalities, but for you to get that far, you actually need someone willing to take the actions to reach that step. And this creates a tension between private risks and public benefits.
On the tactical side, there are a whole bunch of problems that come with taking POWs. The further you are up on the front line, the more impractical the entire process is. Clearly, you cannot hold prisoners of war right next to the line of contact. But you also cannot let them freely roam around inside of your lines. Thus, at least someone, and maybe more than just someone, must escort them back to a holding area. I am not sure who has the worst job in that case: those staying near the line of contact with one or more fewer bodies to cover the position or the person or people heading back now with perhaps multiple POWs and likely sticking out if an enemy drone is monitoring the area. POWs also consume food and water in the meantime if you are short on rations and the exchange of custody might take a while that will cut into your own consumption. Plus, there is the risk of perfidy here: the act of feigning surrender to set up an ambush. And even if a surrendering soldier has no immediate intention to deceive, the battle may evolve to the point where the POW sees an opportunity to free himself, potentially with lethal consequences for the captor.
To be clear, none of this is an excuse for refusing to take prisoners. No quarter policies are in fact war crimes under the Geneva Conventions. And to layer further Geneva commitments, so too is perfidy. But international laws do not change the fact that taking prisoners is a risky activity. On the more personalistic side of things, war is not exactly good for one's mental health. After fighting for days or weeks at a time, being at peak stress levels for extended periods, never getting enough sleep, and watching your friends die, you can understand why a soldier might be tempted to kill an enemy combatant rather than take him prisoner. This is still not an excuse, of course, and denying a surrender is still a war crime. But there is a difference between supporting war crimes and understanding why they happen.
And despite all of those incentives, Ukraine has a fairly good track record during the war. I will leave it to you to read the United Nations reports on the treatment of Russian POWs. I will also leave it to you to decide how to interpret Russia's 5700 inquiries about various war crimes from a year ago. But the consensus is that culpability among Ukrainians is scant and not systematic. I also do not want to suggest that the point system is single-handedly resolving all problems on this topic. In fact, the system did not fully launch until last August. So, you cannot attribute previous compliance to international law based on that. And we should all be further intrigued that Ukraine has done this without having as professionalized of an army as most of its European counterparts. Nonetheless, you can see how awarding points realigns the incentives in a positive way.
The general problem with prisoner capture is that the benefits are widespread, but the risks are concentrated to those actually involved. The way to fix this problem is to offer private benefits to the party doing the capturing. Sure, you could just kill the enemy and that would be in violation of maybe a half-dozen international laws and maybe in the moment you do not care about any of that. But your kill will score 108 fewer points. And that could correspond to a loss of as many as 54 drones for the unit. It might actually be better for your long-term safety to secure the POW. And you may also feel some social pressure from your unit to do so. Your carelessness will deprive them of those drones as well, which puts their safety at risk, too. Now, that does not erase the rest of the perverse incentives that we discussed the last time of the point system, but this certainly is another point for the point system.
Meanwhile, I have another 30-some points wrapped up in the Geopolitics Helpline archive. Check them out here. And if you enjoyed today's video, then please like, share, and subscribe. And I will see you tomorrow. Take care.