We may only be a few days into the new year, but Star Wars has already gifted fans with fresh content, as Bad Batch returned for its sophomore season on January 4th. Star Wars legal geeks didn’t have to wait long for some prime galactic legal issues to surface–one was teed up right in the title of Episode 1: Spoils of War.
After narrowly surviving the Empire’s destruction of all cloning facilities on Kamino, the Bad Batch quickly found themselves back in action with a new mission from Cid–one that promised to bring in more riches than all their prior jobs combined. The mission: Infiltrate Serenno and steal some of the late Count Dooku’s vast fortune while the Empire was busy attempting to seize it for its own use.
The clones arrive on Serenno to find the ultimate estate sale in action, as the newly minted Galactic Empire was rapidly readying Dooku’s valuables to be taken off world. The scale of the seizure is massive, as multiple huge Class Four Container Transports were loaded for bear with mountains of shipping containers filled to the brim with money, jewels, and other treasures from Dooku’s palace.
Count Dooku, having recently had his head detached from his shoulders via lightsaber, wasn’t in any position to protest. However with the clone wars over, what does international law have to say about this sort of apparently brazen pilfering?
Even though wars end, the laws governing them don’t suddenly cease to exist. The practice of battlefield theft and seizures have endured as long as humans have waged war, from pillaging Vikings to the Nazis’ rampant theft of cultural treasures. The notion of one side taking an enemy’s during or after a war might seem a little unfair, but the law doesn’t treat all wartime takings equally. Although theft is generally outlawed during conflict, there are many circumstances where one side is legally able to take spoils of war from an opponent after a conflict.
When it comes to taking property, International Humanitarian Law (IHL), also known as the law of armed conflict, draws a distinction between private and government property. On one hand, the forcible seizure of private property for personal use, also known as pillaging, is generally outlawed. On the other hand, taking enemy property is generally lawful–a concept known as “spoils of war.” This practice is condoned in IHL treaty law, as the Hague Regulations of 1907 allow an occupying army to take possession of a wide variety of movable property belonging to the occupied State. The legal ability to seize war booty is also recognized under Customary International Law, which is a subset of IHL stemming from long standing accepted international practices and carry the same binding legal effects as treaty law (e.g. Geneva Conventions).
Given Serenno’s key role in the Clone Wars, the Empire’s mission to seize property there had a solid basis in law. Serenno was a key opponent of the Galactic Republic (and by extension the Empire) during the Clone Wars. Having been a core member of the Confederacy of Independent Systems (CIS) at the very heart of the war effort against the Republic, Serenno was a reasonable place for the Empire to look to seize war booty.
But Serenno’s status as a defeated Republic enemy doesn’t automatically mean the Empire could sweep in and take whatever it wanted after the war. The private property of Serennian citizens would be protected from pillage under IHL–a prohibition that would seemingly protect Count Dooku’s fortune. After all, the mere act of participating in a war doesn’t give the enemy a free pass to seize all your personal property outside of the battlefield.
However, Count Dooku was no ordinary citizen–his unique status and role in the war are key to how his property is classified. As the head of House Serenno, Dooku was the political ruler and head of state for the planet–a status that fueled his departure from the Jedi Order. Although Serenno had a planetary council and Galactic Senator, Dooku acted as ruling head of state, serving as the planetary emissary and acting as the planet’s decision-maker in all key areas, including its cessation from the Republic. He was also one of the military leaders of the Separatist war effort, taking a frequent direct role in hostilities. Castle Serenno was the seat of Dooku’s power on the planet and was the location from which he ran planetary affairs (including war efforts). This meant that Dooku’s fortress wasn’t simply a private residence. Based on the circumstances, the castle was effectively government property and thus was fair game for the Empire to search for war booty.
Even if Dooku is considered a private citizen, his deep participation in the war effort still renders at least some of his property as war booty. Under IHL, private property that has been used for hostile purposes can also be seized as spoils of war. Dooku was at the heart of the Separatist war effort, using his heavily fortified castle on Serenno as his base of operations. By intertwining his private property with his war involvement, his actions therefore exposed much of his own private property to seizure.
The Empire was also acting lawfully when it specifically targeted Dooku’s riches for seizure. While war booty is often thought of as items such as weapons or military vehicles, the term encompasses a far greater range of property, including non-military property like money. Under U.S. law, “spoils of war” are defined as “enemy movable property lawfully captured, seized, confiscated, or found…” This is a broad spanning definition that includes a wide range of items, including money. The Hague Regulations provide that an occupying army “…can only take possession of cash, funds, and realizable securities which are strictly the property of the State, depots of arms, means of transport, stores and supplies, and, generally, all movable property belonging to the State which may be used for military operations.” Additionally, under Customary International Law, a party to an armed conflict can seize moveable state property as war booty, including military equipment and even cash.
On Serenno, we see the Empire carrying out a wholesale seizure of Count Dooku’s fortune–piles of credits, jewels, artifacts, and more can be seen inside Imperial shipping containers. These items, particularly the currency, fall squarely within the IHL definition of spoils of war. This wealth was no doubt intertwined with Dooku’s governance of Serenno, including directly funding the Separatist war effort, which effectively rendered it state property eligible for seizure.
While the Empire’s seizure of Dooku’s booty was generally lawful, it would only be entitled to property that actually belonged to Dooku/Serenno. In the episode, we learn from a Serennian citizen named Romar that Dooku stole untold amounts of his fortune from the Serennian people. How much and what was stolen isn’t known, but stolen property is doubtlessly amongst the items being seized. The Empire has no legal claim to that stolen property, but then again Emperor Palpatine isn’t known for his strict adherence to the rule of law.
As a group of rogue clones unaffiliated with the Empire, the Bad Batch on the other hand had no legal basis to take any of Dooku’s booty. The right to seize spoils of war rests with a party to the armed conflict, not individual citizens or even individual soldiers taking part in the war. In either case, the real lesson is that if you find yourself inheriting a vast galactic fortune, think twice before you leave the Jedi Order and start up a massive war you’re destined to lose–otherwise you might lose a lot more than you bargained for (including your head).
