In total , the crimes of the Wehrmacht , of the Waffen-SS and of the SD had claimed 218 civilian victims in Tulle . " Somehow , the SS General had achieved his goal : the discrimination of the Resistance and the terror of the population . " The public proclamations and explanations given by the Germans to the French authorities reliably refer to the potential for the murder of unarmed German soldiers . According to the German argument , reprisals conformed with international military law , under the Armistice of 22 June 1940 and under the second Hague Convention . Following the trial conducted in Belgium on the execution of hostages by German troops and one conducted in Italy for the Ardeatine massacre , one can conclude that the Tulle massacre violated the law of armed conflict. , notably of articles 40 , 41 , 46 and 50 of the annexation regulation to the 4th Hague convention of 1907 concerning the laws and customs of war on land as well as the " Martens Clause " of the preamble of that convention . Meanwhile , Bruno Kertheuser contests the use of the term " reprisals " in the Tulle case : " the death and deportation of hundreds of inhabitants of Tulle on the 9th and 10th of June are very clearly a war crime . Any other name , like that of reprisals , is a white-washing , an absolving measure , belonging to the jargon of perpetrators of these crimes and participants in their logic with them . " The massacre at Tulle was carried out in order to punish a capital of the Resistance , in order to terrorize other regions , in accordance with the established practices of the Wehrmacht and the Waffen-SS on the Eastern Front ; it resulted " from the action and the inaction of many people " , be they members of the Wehrmacht , the Waffen-SS or the SD
Ardeatine massacre
Ardeatine massacre
Tulle massacre