Armistice

An armistice is a situation in a war where the warring parties agree to stop fighting. It is not necessarily the end of a war, since it might be just a cessation of hostilities while an attempt is made to negotiate a lasting peace. It is derived from the Latin arma, meaning weapons and statium, meaning a stopping.

A truce or ceasefire usually refers to a temporary cessation of hostilities for an agreed limited time or within a limited area. A truce may be needed in order to negotiate an armistice. An armistice is a modus vivendi and is not the same as a peace treaty, which may take months or even years to agree on. The 1953 Korean War Armistice Agreement is a major example of an armistice which has not been followed by a peace treaty.

The United Nations Security Council often imposes or tries to impose cease-fire resolutions on parties in modern conflicts. Armistices are always negotiated between the parties themselves and are thus generally seen as more binding than non-mandatory UN cease-fire resolutions in modern international law.

The key aspect in an armistice is the fact that fighting ends with no one surrendering.

International Law regarding armistices
Under International Law an armistice is a legal agreement (often in a document) which ends fighting between the "belligerent parties" of a war or conflict. The Hague II (1899) Treaty, says "If [the armistice's] duration is not fixed," the parties can resume fighting (Article 36) as they choose, but with proper notifications. This is in comparison to a "fixed duration" armistice, where the parties can renew fighting only at the end of the particular fixed duration. When the belligerent parties say (in effect), "this armistice completely ends the fighting" without any end date for the armistice, then duration of the armistice is fixed in the sense that no resumption of the fighting is allowed at any time. For example, the Korean Armistice Agreement calls for a "ceasefire and armistice" and has the "objective of establishing an armistice which will ensure a complete cessation of hostilities and of all acts of armed force in Korea until a final peaceful settlement is achieved..."

Armistice Day
Armistice Day (which coincides with Remembrance Day and Veterans Day, public holidays) is commemorated every year on 11 November to mark the armistice signed between the Allies of World War I and Germany at Compiègne, France, for the cessation of hostilities on the Western Front of World War I, which took effect at eleven o'clock in the morning—the "eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month" of 1918. Most countries changed the name of the holiday after World War II, to honor veterans of that and subsequent conflicts. Most member states of the Commonwealth of Nations adopted the name Remembrance Day, while the United States chose All Veterans Day.

Armistices in early modern history

 * Armistice of Copenhagen of 1537 ended the Danish war known as the Count's Feud
 * Armistice of Stuhmsdorf of 1635 between the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Sweden
 * Peace of Westphalia of 1648 that ended the Thirty Years' War and Eighty Years' War

Armistices of the 20th century

 * World War I[[File:The announcing of the armistice on November 11, 1918, was the occasion for a monster celebration in Philadelphia... - NARA - 533478.tif|thumb|right|The announcing of the armistice on November 11, 1918, was the occasion for large celebrations in the allied nations.]]
 * Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, armistice between Russia and the Central Powers, March 1918
 * Armistice with Bulgaria, also known as the Armistice of Solun, September 1918
 * Armistice of Mudros Between the Ottoman Empire and the Allies, October 1918
 * Austrian-Italian Armistice of Villa Giusti ended the war on the Italian front in early November 1918
 * Armistice with Germany (Compiègne), ended World War I, November 11, 1918
 * Armistice of Mudanya between Turkey, Italy, France and Britain and later Greece, 1922
 * World War II
 * Armistice with France (Second Compiègne), 1940
 * Armistice of Saint Jean d'Acre between British forces in the Middle East and Vichy France forces in Syria, 1941
 * Armistice with Italy, 1943
 * Moscow Armistice, signed by Finland and the Soviet Union on 19 September 1944 ending the Continuation War
 * 1949 Armistice Agreements between Israel and its neighbors Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria
 * Korean War Armistice Agreement, July 1953
 * Geneva Agreements signed by France and the Viet Minh on 20 July 1954 ending the First Indochina War
 * 1962 armistice in Algeria attempted to end the Algerian War