According to Kurt Vonnegut himself, the climax of Slaughter House 5 was not when Dresden was firebombed, but when Edgar Derby is caught for looting a teapot from the ruins of Dresden. However inconsequential this crime seems to be, we must first take a look at the true bearing of this crime before making our judgement.
First of all, we must define the difference between booty and plunder. Although we may use these world interchangeably to describe the spoils of war, they are fundamentally different. According to the Annex to the Hague Convention of 1907: Booty is "cash, funds and realizable securities which are strictly the property of the state....all movable property belonging to the state which are usable for military operations." In other words, booty is something that is obtained by the victors which can be put to use. On the other hand, pillage, or plunder, is "the taking of property not necessary for the immediate prosecution of war effort, and is unlawful.
So according to the definitions above, what our friend Edgar Derby had obtained was not war booty, but plunder. From other sources, the punishment for committing pillage varies with the nature of the offense. The extreme penalty is death. The broad group of offenses ranges from petty theft and robbery to rape and murder. According to this, it is safe to say that Edgar Derby did not deserve his extreme punishment. But that doesn't prove that theft is a light crime. At the very least, he would have gotten lashes. So the next time you steal something, remember the story of our good friend Edgar Derby, and think twice.
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