How do citizens evaluate state apologies issued during ongoing international crises? Existing research primarily focuses on apologies for historical injustices, leaving open how publics interpret apologies under conditions of immediate threat and uncertainty, when conciliatory gestures may simultaneously signal cooperation and vulnerability. We address this question via a survey experiment centered on a minor use-of-force incident, in which respondents adopt the perspective of the apologizing state, the injured state, or a third party, and observe leaders who refuse to apologize or issue verbal or costly apologies. We report three main findings. First, crisis apologies do not generate domestic backlash, even among groups previously shown to oppose apologies. Instead, they increase leader approval in both origin and recipient publics. Second, apologies produce a warmth-competence trade-off, enhancing international reputation while reducing perceived military capability and resolve. This trade-off emerges consistently across audiences, including allied and adversarial third parties. Third, although interpretations are directionally similar across audiences, domestic publics are more sensitive to vulnerability cues and more cautious in crediting reputational gains than foreign audiences. These results show that crisis apologies operate as multidimensional signals processed through threat-sensitive appraisal and identity-based reasoning.