In a battlefield, what would have to happen for two enemy soldiers to become friends?

In a battlefield, what would have to happen for two enemy soldiers to become friends?In a battlefield, what would have to happen for two enemy soldiers to become friends?
Happens all the time during our civil war both side would make trades for things they needed During ww1 story goes Xmas eve the brits and the Germans sang to each other
one has to die first.In a battlefield, what would have to happen for two enemy soldiers to become friends?
This has happen, in almost all the wars. My own father took part in the Argonne, at Christmas they called it a miracle.

The Germans stopped firing, so the Americans did too. They could hear the Germans singing, in German, "Silent Night"

Soon, both sides were on the field singing together, Christmas songs, one group even started a game of soccer.



It also happen during the Civil War. On a little know creek, the men, getting water on one Christmas night, met the men of the other side. They both put down their arms due to the vicious battle during the day and, a need for water for the wounded. They both conceded and met each other, discussed each others families.



During WW1 the same thing happen to the war weary soldiers in the trenches. They met on "no mans land" and sang Christmas songs.



Maybe Christmas had something to do with it. My father said they had gone more then 82 days under fire "The Siegfried Line" it was vicious fire and, no food, they were eating the horses left by the Germans, and very few supplies. They were tired.
It's happened throughout history, along with the other side of the coin, seeing the enemy as vile and not really human.



There are wars so "dirty" that any thought of the other side being decent human beings is difficult to imagine.

There have been some "civilized" wars even though the thought might seem odd, in modern times.



In WW2 the desert war was possibly considered the latter.

Rommel got to be so admired by the British troops that orders had to be given to try and quash this.



And then, from the same campaign, there's Von Luck's account (see below)



As so often, Kipling had observed this...

From the Boer war:

"So, barrin鈥?all that foreign lot

Which only joined for spite,

Myself, I鈥檇 just as soon as not

Respect the man I fight. "



And to cap it, I've cartoons from both world wars which suggest that front-line soldiers sometimes felt that had more in common with each other than their own higher commands.In a battlefield, what would have to happen for two enemy soldiers to become friends?
It's a bit difficult for two opposing soldiers fighting in a battle to become "friends", but there have always been fraternizing between battles. When left on their own,soldiers on both sides, if they are not actually involved in battle, have always fraternized.



In the Roman Civil War, the two armies of Pompey and Julius Caesar knew each other well, had often fought side by side against Rome's enemies,so there was a lot of unofficial fraternizing between the lines.That didn't stop them from fighting hard and killing each other once the battle started.



That same tendency was seen in the American Civil War as well. Of course it's easier to see your "enemy" as a friend if he speaks your language and is part of your culture. But the fact is, while they could be "friendly", soldiers on different sides of a war or battle could never really be "friends" until all the battles had been fought and the war was over.