Rogue One The Moral Choices/Dilemmas of Rogue One

Bacbacca I don't know what you expect from an insurgency with the goal of overthrowing a regime so murderously oppressive that they will commit industrialised genocide at the drop of a hat. Politeness? Good manners?

 

The Empire's a boogeyman? By that I assume you mean a false, as opposed to a real, monster?

If so, did you miss the part where the Empire callously nuked a city as a mere "test fire" for their planet-killing device?

 

Wow, this seems so obtuse as to feel like trolling. Of course they aren't the same thing. There is no evidence... zero... NONE in this film that anyone is being forced to do things they don't want to. it is the opression of the Empire that compels them to do things they normally wouldn't.

So what "rules" has the Rebellion violated? From what I can see, their methods seems fairly conventional. The only "iffy" thing is the intelligence operative. Guess what? Far worse than that happens in the real world. Like I said, wars are nasty and brutish. Innocent people get hurt. That's why people say "war is hell." Harsh language rarely convinces anyone of anything. Once one feels compelled to engage in armed conflict, some nasty stuff is going to happen. I certainly didn't see ANYTHING in R1 that would constitute a "war crime" in the contemporary sense.

Manipulate them how? I still haven't seen you present any evidence of that.

 

Seriously, feeling compelled to act and do things in war that you might not otherwise do as a civilian, in order to defeat an enemy who will do much, much worse if not stopped, is not the moral equivalent of fighting for that enemy. That does not mean that your actions will not stay with you.

Let me put it another way: morally justifiable actions can still have long-lasting effects on those committing the acts. Life is not black and white.

 

No, the movie gave us the impression that the rebels were fighting a war and trying to win. Not sure where they became "as bad as the empire." I don't see that it is incongruent with ANH, more expanding on it and focusing on apsects we didn't see.

Wars have a way of getting ugly, right? History has ever seen a squeaky clean one fought by ANY army, nor will it ever. Those circumstances have a way of doing things to people, they don't say "war is hell" for no reason. WW2 had LOTS of nasty things done by both sides, but I don't think anyone will say in the end that the Allies were just as bad as the Nazi's.

 

I agree with your general point 100%, but Stalin is a bit of an exception.

 

Exactly. And I don't see where the Rebels in this film come close to the brutality of the Empire. Saw's partisans are extreme, but clearly separated out from the Alliance. And yes, Cassian murders a man in cold blood, but he knows it corrupts him to do so, and if he doesn't then millions will die because the DS will never be stopped. The whole point is what victory costs at times - other that cost is moral or in terms of life (i.e. the Rebels' sacrifices on Scarif).

 

Stalin vs Hitler is an interesting comparison- but remember, Stalin had a reason to brutally kill millions- he knew Hitler was coming before long when Russia was a farm based country, and rapidly industrialized by pulling people off their farms at gunpoint and forcing them into factories, therefore industrializing Russia and making it capable of fielding a modern (at the time) army to save the world from tyranny, which it basically did- we would NOT have won without them holding their side of the fight, and they would not have held their side without industrialization. So was Stalin horrific? Yes. Was he as bad as Hitler? No. He actually had a reason to do what he did, which is significantly different than killing 6 million Jews; there was NO reason for that. It sort of comes down to just how grey life really is. Degrees do matter, even WAY down at the dark end of the path. Hard as it may be to wrap one's head around, the world would be something like The Man in the High Castle without Stalin, regardless of how monstrous of a man he was.

 

Yeah, no. That's white-washing Stalin. He didn't know that "Hitler was coming" and thus pulled out people from their life and into the factories. As a matter of fact, he was completely shocked when the Nazis attacked and wasn't seen for days. Stalin did the things he did because it gave him an advantage, not because he wanted to save the world from tyranny or because he thought he would be attacked any moment now. He was an opportunist who would take every chance to increase his power and take territory from other countries, while getting rid of anyone who possibly could stand against him (or just dared to not do what Stalin wnated) in the worst ways possible. Stalin did his fair share of things that were on a Nazi-like level. He may fall a bit short from Hitler to some degree, but the only reason why there is anything positive to say about him is because the Nazis attacked the Soviet Union. His treatment of people was inhumane, millions of people died because of his actions and orders (not counting the war!) that were as unwarranted as the ones from Hitler, and he happily split eastern Europe with the Nazis. The only reason he doesn't sit on top of the list of "worst dictators ever" is because Hitler happened to be tiny bit worse, but that's like choosing betwen pest and cholera.

That being said, Allies usually refers to the western Allies, not the Soviet Union. And that comparison is quite apt. The Allies had their fair share of war crimes, some rather extreme ones at that, yet no one doubts that they weren't in any way, shape or form even close to as bad as the Nazis were.

 

My college history text said otherwise in terms of industrialization being because of Hitler, and the belief that he was coming (I don't think it is a coincidence that he did that when Hitler rose to power), but that is really beside the point. I in no way meant that Stalin DID IT with the INTENTION of saving the world, I was saying that was the end result of it, and that it DID have a purpose, which killing Jews didn't. Anyone thinking WW2 could have been won WITHOUT Russia having industrialized and being able to hold off the Nazis does not understand history. You could call that whitewashing, or you could call the reality of the matter. Another bit from history- 3 out of 5 Nazi soldiers killed during the war were killed by Russians, and more Russians were killed during the war than all other allied nations combined. There were obviously other factors to the Nazis losing WW2, but it would not have happened without Russia's war machine being capable of what it did, and Stalin was responsible for that.
In addition, Stalin will clearly never be as bad because he didn't invade and attempt to take over the world.
People find it really hard to swallow that this is true about Stalin, because it doesn't fit the black and white world where the saviors are all good guys, and everyone else is bad, but the world is really full of bizarre ironies and harsh truths. And that IS related to this thread topic. Yes, he was a monster to his own people, but we would live in a VERY different world without him.

 

A case could be made that, no matter what Stalin did, Japan was always going to declare war on the US eventually, with Hitler's support of them bringing the US to war with him.

Without Hitler attacking Stalin, it's possible that Great Britain would have fallen to him first - but somewhat doubtful.

As for the hypothesis that the German Empire would have been unbeatable had Russia been weaker - it's an interesting idea, but I think a little doubtful again.

 

The vast majority of historians would say that if Moscow had fallen, Germany would have won. One who watched a lot of John Wayne movies and was Western-centric would think otherwise, but historical experts wouldn't. Very few credible sources that are in the know feel otherwise.
https://www.quora.com/Did-Russia-really-win-WWII
http://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/battle-of-stalingrad
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...the-soviet-union-saved-the-world-from-hitler/

The US totaled 400,000 deaths, Russia 26 million. 3/4 of Nazi soldiers killed were by the Red Army.

 

The point being that these kind of counterfactuals are based on problematic assumptions.

Suppose a less malevolent ruler than Stalin had taken charge of Soviet Russia right after Lenin's death - sure, Russia might not have industrialised as much, but it might not have struck the "Iron Pact" with Germany in the first place - and the war would have been somewhat different if it happened at all.

"Russia won the war for the Allies" does not mean "Without the existence of Stalin, Hitler would have conquered the whole world"

 

To be realistic, the idea Russia saved the world is bull. No nation besides the US had atomic weapons or the truly long-range bombers to deliver them at the time (much of the Soviet program was built on information gathered by spies in the US). The fall of the USSR would simply have meant we would have dropped the bomb on Germany too. Germany couldn't have even taken England - there weren't enough or the right type of landing craft and the Royal Navy was still a major threat.

 

OTOH, the RN would have been in serious trouble if Germany had been able to allocate more resources to Doenitz's U-boat fleet and build up the Luftwaffe with better long-range aircraft. The war could have easily gone either way. As Churchill would say, "It was a damn close-run thing."

 

I'm still so surprised at this discussion, because I assumed that any study of world history and conflict would teach you to expect more or less exactly what we saw in Rogue One. I mean, has there ever been a war where some soldiers didn't feel guilt over their actions, or resentment at their ill-use?

So the Rebellion bullied some people into working for them and were occasionally ruthless. The Empire destroyed three (there's no way Jedha and Scarif were not catastrophically damaged) planets. In WWII the US nuked two civilian cities, killing about a quarter of a million non-combatants, which is objectively horrific. It still doesn't mean that an Axis victory would have been preferable to an Allied one.

 

I don't know, the Rebels never blew up a planet and destroyed two cities. So to me the Empire are still the bad guys easily. The Rebels may of done some shady stuff but overall they are easily the good guys to me.

 

When it comes right down to it, the likes of Cassian felt all sorts of guilt about what he ended up having to do. Tarkin on the other hand blew up a city, an Imperial base and an ENTIRE PLANET and would have done so again without the slightest hint of remorse. That tells you the respective mindsets of both sides pretty well I think - the closest any Rebel got to 'ends justify means' was Saw, who was booted out for exactly that reason.

 

The industrialization programme began in 1928, when Hitler was just one of many radical figures, with not that much backing - a long way from becoming Chancellor (which was in 1933).

Sometimes "history texts" conflict with events as recorded. The "Stalin foresaw Hitler and only industrialized Russia to counter him" hypothesis lacks rigorousness.

The Star Wars (EU) equivalent of this would be "Palpatine only decided to start moving toward becoming Senator (with the intention of eventually being Emperor), because of the Vong invasion" when this would in fact be several years before the first noticable signs of their scouts.

 

MrElculver2424 wrote

It's undeniable that the Empire did some terrible, heartless things. But it got far closer to establishing order, security, and comfort in the areas to which it reached. And it advanced science and technology more in just 2 decades than the Republic did in the thousand years prior.

It's undeniable that any totalitarian system in history has provided order and security, but the debatable part is "comfort" (think North Korea). According to the deleted Anchorhead scene in ANH Biggs told Luke that the Empire started to "nationalize" commerce in the inner systems and it would be just a matter of time before Luke's uncle would be a "slave" working for the "greater glory of the Empire". I think something like the Pax Romana - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Romana - isn't really applicable to describe the Empire of Star Wars.

I like democracy, but having too many people involved is bad. In every society there are leaders and followers. A lot of people are best off just going along with a strong central government to provide security and order rather than live in "freedom" which leads to chaos and violence and separation and poverty...it's just the truth.

I believe it's more complicated. Robert D. Kaplan speculated in his book The Coming Anarchy that for democracy to work any society has to have a strong middle class which (unfortunately) isn't yet applicable for many countries in our world, thus democracy is not the optimal answer for any society per se.

When we look at the Middle East and in particular Iraq (after Saddam Hussein) or especially Libya (after Muammar Gaddafi) the removal of these dictators has left a vacuum, and these countries suffer from an ongoing civil war. I think there is little doubt that the majority of citizens of these countries wouldn't mind having their old dictators back.

But neither do these examples suggest that dictatorships are an optimal answer either, as the atrocities against minorities and the disregard for individual, human life are usually considered unacceptable by our Western standards.

 

I won't respond to all of your points, or continue to argue history because it is too off topic, and it would take too much typing (my hypothesis doesn't lack rigorousness BTW, I just am not going to type for an hour, which is why I provided links). But I will say that Stalin DID exist, and (per the thread topic) the brutal things he DID do resulted the way things happened, and Russia's sacrifices were a necessary ingredient in the Allies winning. I will also make the point that the vast majority of credible historians agree with what I am saying; while that doesn't make it 100% likely to be true, it is far more likely to be true than your speculation given these historians have far more expertise than you do. I don't have a degree in history, but have taken a number of courses and studied this quite a bit; funny how Americans/Westerners always want to deny this (those who aren't experts anyway). Anyway, back on topic.

 

I should have been more clear that I was mostly just referring to the fantasy galaxy of Star Wars. But yeah, I totally agree that a strong middle class is necessary for a democracy to work well. Perhaps the problems with our democratic system (particularly in Congress right now) results from the relative weakening of the middle class over the last 40 years...

And I, too, think that many Middle Eastern citizens would trade the current situation for their old dictators. Living under a dictatorship isn't optimal, but I had to do a project a few years ago about citizens from Iraq and the challenges they went through post-Iraq War. With Saddam Hussein, yeah, he was brutal, and if you did things wrong or spoke against the regime, you were severely punished. But people lived their lives in safety. The garbage was picked up by government service on a regular schedule. After he was toppled, the government services stopped and people lived horrible daily lives. And then the rise of ISIS, etc. made things 10 times worse.

 

In a space-fantasy i didnt expect the good guys to use methods that you would see the bad guys using. I mean, did we didnt event see this in Band of Brothers, right? There was one guy that was probably crazy and that was the Saw spot but the rest werent doing stuff on that level.There were stupid officers but nothing like we saw here.

No, boogeyman as in something dangled in front as a way to ignore any discussion.

 

Rogue One deliberately went beyond the "space fantasy" genre. It's far more of a historical allegory, I'd argue. Judge it on its own merits, and you'll enjoy it more.