Beloved military first-person shooter “Call of Duty” has pushed the envelope with its gameplay for years, from the nuke scene in “Modern Warfare” to the notorious 2009 'No Russian' mission. Now, the latest installment of the franchise includes a new feature sure to draw criticism from outside observers: the ability to straight up commit war crimes.
Activision Blizzard subsidiary Treyarch Studios confirmed on August 28 that “Call of Duty: Black Ops 6,” which drops on October 25, will allow users in multiplayer to turn their adversaries into human shields during firefights – and, if they have proximity voice chat enabled, trash talk each other in the middle of that war crime.
I’m honestly a little excited about this and all the shenanigans that will surely ensue. As anyone who has ever played a “Call of Duty” game in multiplayer can tell you, no one is going to be whispering gentle gameplay suggestions to their captive enemy.
For anyone who hasn’t been in a Law of Armed Conflict briefing in a few years, any former combatant that you have full physical control of is your prisoner under Article 4 of the Third Geneva Convention, which means they are covered by all the protections of the Geneva Conventions. The International Humanitarian Law Databases summary of “Rule 97. The use of human shields is prohibited” includes a quick rundown of recent war tribunals related to Article 4:
- In 1995, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia upheld indictments in the Karadžić and Mladić case against combatants in the Yugoslav Wars accused of using UN peacekeepers as human shields to protect potential North Atlantic Treaty Organization targets.
- In 1990 and 1991, member states, including the U.S., protested Iraqi use of prisoners of war and civilians and the U.S. declared it a war crime.
- The U.S. Military Tribunal at Nuremberg in the Von Leeb (The High Command Trial) case in 1948 included four counts of misconduct against German generals, the second of which was for mistreating prisoners of war, including their use as human shields.
- In 1946, the U.K. Military Court at Lüneberg prosecuted Luftwaffe General Karl Student for the death of six British prisoners of war forced to act as human shields for a German advance in May 1941.
I just can’t wait to see what the next judge advocate general character in “Call of Duty” has to say about all this.
Of course, the biggest potential problem with the new human shield mechanics isn’t the violation of the laws of war. After all, we’re talking about a video game here. It’s not like “Call of Duty” is where any players go to learn real military tactics, techniques or procedures, let alone military law. Sure, the franchise has had some controversial moments, but nobody’s confusing it for a full-blown reflection of U.S. military doctrine.
The bigger problem here – if you can call it a problem – is the all-but-guaranteed griefing and trolling that will naturally occur. “Call of Duty” has an AI moderator that listens in on all voice chat interactions, so maybe it will prevent some of the worst possible scenarios. But this is either a tantalizing feature for anyone who wants to run with it or a good reason to turn off proximity voice chat for anyone who doesn’t want to hear a creepy whisper while getting dragged around the battlefield.
Personally, I think I could have fun with this. Some of my favorite jokes in video games come from injecting unexpected dialogue via text chat or voice during gameplay. Spouting romantic song lyrics while tanking dungeons in “World of Warcraft,” delivering “Caddyshack” Carl Spackler lines while dropping in on “Titanfall,” or dropping unrelated trivia in every turn of “Civilization VI” – sometimes some unexpected color commentary can make all the difference. Just ask Leeroy Jenkins.
For the new “Call of Duty,” there’s really only one thing to do: take human shields in the game just to recite the relevant Law of Armed Conflict to my new, probably confused, victim. Just don’t tell CID.
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