If nothing is stipulated the intercourse remains suspended as during actual hostilities.
An armistice is not a partial or a temporary peace; it is only the suspension of attack or actual injury.
§ 91. When an armistice is concluded between a fortified place and the army besieging it, it is agreed by all the authorities on this subject, that the besieger must cease all extension, perfection, or advance of his attacking works as much so as from the attacks by main force.
But there is a difference of opinion among the martial jurists, whether the besieged have the right to repair breaches or to erect new works of defence within the place during an armistice.
[It is therefore declared by the United States, that they neither claim for themselves, nor allow to their enemies, the right of the besieged to repair breeches or to erect new works of defence during an armistice, unless the contrary be distinctly stipulated in the agreement concluding the armistice.]
The United States expect every American officer to stipulate distinctly for the one or the other, in an armistice which he may conclude with the enemy.
§ 92. So soon as a capitulation is signed, the capitulator has no right to demolish, destroy, or injure the works, arms, stores, or ammunition, in his possession, during the time which elapses between the signing and the execution of the capitulation, unless otherwise stipulated in the same.
§ 93. So soon as an armistice is broken, hostilities recommence in all their vigor on all points, without previous notice.
The injured belligerent government must seek redress.
[Prisoners captured during a breach of the armistice, are nevertheless prisoners of war, whether they are officers or privates.]