The 1929 Geneva Convention on Prisoners of War, that Germany (broadly) adhered to in its treatment of Western Allied prisoners, was specific about punishments, including for escape attempts. Article 50 stated: "Escaped prisoners of war who are re-captured before they have been able to rejoin their own armed forces or to leave the territory occupied by the armed forces which captured them shall be liable only to disciplinary punishment. Prisoners who, after succeeding in rejoining their armed forces or in leaving the territory occupied by the armed forces which captured them, are again taken prisoner shall not be liable to any punishment for their previous escape."

Shooting prisoners attempting to escape was not specifically covered in the 1929 Convention, unlike the 1949 Convention (Article 42: "The use of weapons against prisoners of war, especially against those who are escaping or attempting to escape, shall constitute an extreme measure, which shall always be preceded by warnings appropriate to the circumstances") but the same principle held in the Second World War, weapons were used against those attempting to escape (generally after warning shots or shouts), but once recaptured prisoners could expect reasonable treatment.

Though 50 deaths seem barely relevant in the appalling carnage of the war they were seen as shocking at the time. German statements that the prisoners had been shot while resisting arrest or attempting further escape after recapture were patently false, the event provoked shock and outrage amongst other prisoners and back in the UK. Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden made two statements to the House of Commons, the [second](https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/1944-06-23/debates/de4477fe-3f74-4def-a4f8-675ded79c53e/OfficerPrisonersOfWarGermany(Shooting)) concluded: "His Majesty's Government must, therefore, record their solemn protest against these cold-blooded acts of butchery. They will never cease in their efforts to collect the evidence to identify all those responsible. They are firmly resolved that these foul criminals shall be tracked down to the last man wherever they may take refuge. When the war is over they will be brought to exemplary justice."

S. P. MacKenzie puts the executions in the context of Germany's deteriorating position in "The Treatment of Prisoners of War in World War II", The Journal of Modern History, Vol. 66, No. 3. There were previous breaches of the Geneva Convention, most notably Hitler's "Commando Order" of 1942, which specified that Commandos were to be killed regardless of circumstances, but as Germany's situation worsened, large scale escape attempts tied down resources in tracking down the escapees, and the Allied bombing campaign increased in intensity, Germany showed greater willingness to take punitive actions. Shortly after the Great Escape executions Goebbels wrote an article encouraging the lynching of Allied aircrew, and suggested mass executions of POWs after the Dresden raid of 1945. According to Mackenzie the military high command (OKW) generally engaged in "delaying tactics", concerned over possible retaliation against German POWs held by the Allies, and concerned how the perpetrators would be treated as it became increasingly obvious that the war was lost, to some extent preventing more widespread killings. The Great Escape prisoners were executed by the Gestapo under Himmler and his deputy, Ernst Kaltenbrunner, but in March 1945 even Kaltenbrunner refrained from fulfilling Hitler's order to summarily execute all downed airmen. There was still concern in the final weeks of the war that POWs might be executed en masse, leading to a Joint Statement from the Allied Leaders Warning Against Mistreatment of Prisoners in Germany, but fortunately it did not come to pass.