A passport is a written permission given by the belligerent government or by its authorized agent to the subject of the enemy state to travel generally in belligerent territory.
A safe-conduct is a pass given to an enemy subject or to an enemy vessel, allowing passage between defined points. Safe-conducts are granted either by the government or by the officer in command of the region within which it is effective.[370]
A safeguard is a protection granted by a commanding officer either to person or property within his command. "Sometimes they are delivered to the parties whose persons or property are to be protected; at others they are posted upon the property itself, as upon a church, museum, library, public office, or private dwelling."[371] When the protection is enforced by a detail of men, this guard must use extreme measures, if necessary to fulfill their trust, and are themselves exempt from attack or capture by the enemy.
(d) A license to trade is a permission given by competent authority to the subject of that authority or to another to carry on trade even though there is a state of war. These licenses may be general or special. A general license grants to all the subjects of the enemy state or to all its own subjects the right to trade in specified places or in specified articles. A special license grants to a certain person the right to trade in the manner specified in his license. Neutrals may receive a license to trade in lines which otherwise would not be open to them.
A general license is granted by the head of the state. A special license may be granted by a subordinate, valid in the region which he commands so far as his subordinates are concerned. His superior officers are not necessarily bound by his act, however.[372]
It is held that a license must receive a reasonable construction. In general, fraud vitiates a license; it is not negotiable unless expressly made so; a fair compliance in regard to the terms as to goods is sufficient; a deviation from the prescribed course invalidates the license unless caused by stress of weather or by accident; and a delay in completing a voyage within the specified time invalidates the license unless caused by enemy or the elements.[373] When a license becomes void, the vessel is liable to the penalties which would fall upon it if it had committed the act without license.
(e) The cessation of hostilities for a time is sometimes brought about by agreement between the parties to the conflict. When this cessation is for a temporary or military end, and for a short time or within a limited area, it is usually termed a suspension of hostilities. When the cessation is quite general, for a considerable time, or for a political end, it is usually termed a truce or armistice.
Acts of hostility done in ignorance of the existence of the cessation of hostilities are not violations of the agreement unless there has been negligence in conveying the information to the subordinates. Prisoners and property captured after the cessation in a given region must be restored. During the period of the truce, the commercial and personal intercourse between the opposing parties is under the same restrictions as during the active hostilities, unless there is provision to the contrary in the agreement. The relative position of the parties is supposed to be the same at the end of the truce as at the beginning.
Hall says, "The effect of truces and like agreements is therefore not only to put a stop to all directly offensive acts, but to interdict all acts tending to strengthen a belligerent which his enemy, apart from the agreement, would have been in a position to hinder."[374] Acts which the enemy would not have been in a position to hinder, even in the absence of a truce, are not necessarily interrupted by the agreement.[375]
The provisioning of a besieged place during a truce has been the subject of some difference of opinion. If the conditions of the truce are to be fair to the besieged party, that party must be allowed to bring in a supply of provisions equal to the consumption during the continuance of the truce.[376] At the present time this matter is usually provided for in the terms of the truce.