At least in the movie they quite literally fought for Gondor. In the books, they just kill some corsairs far away from Minas Tirth.
They don’t even kill them, they just scare them off their boats using ‘fear as a weapon’.
This
The corsairs of umbar flee the boats, the party & rangers take the ships. The whole point of the fleet was to cut off the Dol Amroth reinforcements, which can then join the battle
At Pellenor, they just scare the enemy forces. Once they’ve fulfilled their oath, they are free.
Idle thought, not fully staffed: kinda turns the whole “you cannot use the tools of the Enemy, as they are evil in and of themselves and will bring even the most noble low” vibe of the books on its head.
Or, at least, I seem to recall passages to the effect of fear being one of Sauron’s chief weapons. Could probably find a lit crit essay on this subject if I went digging.
Well if I remember correctly these corsairs were attacking the strategically important harbour that also housed all non combatants from Minas Tirth. The Harbour had a low garrison because they went to support Minas Tirith, so by scaring them off Aragon got access to their ships and saved the rearguard. Both strategically important in the context of the war
edit: grammar and fatfingered
Oh yeah, the books handle the greater war much more, but that would make for some confusion cinematography. It made a lot of sense, but it’s it’s also much less… Well, cinematic
In the books, I don’t believe they kill anyone - or can. They basically just scare off the corsairs so the rest of gondors army can join the main battle. So ops point is kinda moot
E: I guess it’s a little ambiguous
Pale swords were drawn; but I know not whether their blades would still bite, for the Dead needed no longer any weapon but fear."
I don’t think that’s too ambiguous. I read it exactly the way you put it.
Basically “idk if their weapons work but it doesn’t matter they don’t need them” so if they don’t need the swords one would assume no-one is fighting them and just running like you said.
So I’m just here to second you.