5. War

In response to Slaughterhouse Five Chapter 5 (page 42-63)
Quote and response
(Billy Pilgrim's perspective; time traveling between prison camp at war, after war in a mental hospital, Tralfamadore, home writing letters to the news, etc)

"An American had muttered something which a guard did not like. The guard knew English, and he hauled the American out of ranks, knocked him down. The American was astonished. He stood up shakily, spitting blood. He’d had two teeth knocked out. He had meant no harm by what he’d said, evidently, had no idea that the guard would hear and understand. 'Why me?' he asked the guard. The guard shoved him back into ranks. 'Vy you? Vy anybody?' he said" (Vonnegut, 43-44).
This piece of text is able to show the incredible amount of horror within the war and for soldiers who were captured. The American was a soldier that had been caught by the Germans, and this had taken place in a prison camp. The Germans were able to treat the prisoners with absolutely zero respect and abuse them for no reason. This connects with the theme of danger and cruelty in war. The war zone mindset has to be dominate or be dominated and kill or be killed which is terrifying to think about. When the soldier asks, "Why me?" and the guard responds with "[Why] you? [Why] anybody?" it puts the domination into effect. The German guard believes has to do this or he could be overpowered, which is true for any of the German people, or in war in general. It is interesting to think about the aspect of how both of these people were/are fighting for their country and what they believe is right, and one is able to just completely dehumanize the other and treat them like they are nothing.

"Rosewater was twice as smart as Billy, but he and Billy were dealing with similar crises in similar ways. They had both found life meaningless, partly because of what they had seen in war. Rosewater, for instance, had shot a fourteen-year-old fireman, mistaking him for a German soldier. So it goes. And Billy had seen the greatest massacre in European history, which was the fire-bombing of Dresden. So it goes" (Vonnegut, 48).
The after effects of war can be horrifying, and that is able to be seen through this passage. Billy had checked himself into a mental hospital some years after the war ended, and Rosewater was the patient next to him, dealing with a similar situation. Billy had many people believing that he was crazy, even himself. While not many doctors had believed it was because of war, there is not a truly logical explanation besides war that had made him go crazy. There is not a detailed amount of information Rosewater and why he is there, but in this bit of text, both of them are in this hospital because of what they had seen in war. Both Rosewater and Billy seem to be quite different people, but they have similar problems that are drawn from the same source, War. Both had very traumatic experiences whether they knew it or not, and the fact that they had to go to a mental hospital because they were going insane is very sad, and it able to show the effects of war.