Lit From Endor to Exegol - The State of the Galaxy Discussion Thread (Tagged Victory's Price Spoilers)

Makes sense. I'm still only 60 or 70-ish pages into Aftermath so this hasn't become clear yet. Not as bad as I figured, then.

 

I think it is stupid policy under any circumstances, because it takes a military to ensure security for any government, even during peace, especially on a galactic scale where a local navy can only do so much.

 

Well, she is not intending to get rid of the military immediately, nor the entire thing. 10% of the NR military is implied to still be a pretty significant force. Plus local planetary forces will pick up the slack. And this isn't something that will happen quickly. Even after the Battle of Jakku and the treaty Mon Mothma is keeping the military intact and on alert, well aware that fighting could begin again. She won't begin her military reduction plan until peace is 100% assured.

 

It seems ridiculous, but I guess if you're training these individual planetary militaries, then when some galactic-scale thing comes up the local navies can all unify together and become a single New Republic navy again. Or...maybe not, considering that doesn't appear what happens in TFA. But maybe those small resistances are what are needed. After all, it wasn't a mighty war machine that defeated the Empire, but a Rebel Alliance.

 

EDIT: Let's keep the discussion around the period defined in the thread title. Let's leave as little TFA speculation out of this as possible.

--Adm. Nick

 

I think it's a sensible move to try and avoid a repeat of history - which is one reason why I'm a bit concerned that it may be a setup for things to go wrong in the future. I'm not sure I like the message that would send, particularly since Aftermath's portrayal of the NR is otherwise taking major steps away from the incompetent/evil governments the old EU was afflicted with during its final years.

 

My response to that is, Si vis pacem, para bellum or "If you want peace, prepare for war."

 

As others have noted, this isn't some hippie peace movement idea. Mon Mothma is proposing to reduce the forces controlled directly by the Chancellor and Senate (ie, the New Republic Starfleet) and devote that funding & training towards building up the militaries of the New Republic's own members. There is still a massive military at the disposal of the New Republic, but one that isn't exclusively controlled by the Chancellor or Senate.

The whole point is to give up the emergency powers that Palpatine was granted.

--Adm. Nick

 

Also you know the war is over and all reducing your wartime military to a more normal level after a war is perfectly normal.

 

It sounds good on paper, but it also sounds like something goes horribly wrong.

 

IIRC, wasn't one of the issues that eventually led to the Clone Wars the lack of local militaries to deal with issues like pirates and illegal activities by organizations like the Trade Federation? A lot of worlds joined the Confederacy so they could create their own defenses against threats that the Republic would not defend them from. I remember Orn Free Taa proposing the creation of local militias as a solution to those problems in Darth Plagueis, which met with widespread approval in the senate but got shut down quickly by Sith manipulations. If that problem is still canon, this is a good move on the part of Mon Mothma to prevent one of the issues that plagued the Old Republic.

 

It was that plus the lack of a Republic Navy. Mon Mothma's proposal remedies both of those oversights. There is a dedicated New Republic Starfleet for peacekeeping, patrol, and defense plus member navies for added protection on the local level. Plus, presumably they could be rallied together in the event of a new foe emerging.

--Adm. Nick

 

Sorry, all I see is the too rapid victory of the Alliance and the convenient ineffectiveness of the New Republic to ensure the EU never happens, while also allowing for an OT style conflict in the future.

 

Yeah, I kinda agree with Zeta here.

The story group is doing this for new fans. Cause it's new fans, this. New fans, that.

I'm still stoked for this movie, but aside from Battlefront, the NEU doesn't sound very interesting to me.

 

That's not why they did this. They don't have to. It's already ensured that the EU never happens because it was made Legends. They're doing this because that's what the eventual story of the new movie dictates. But let's not get into that.

I guess it does make sense that Mothma's plan would remedy both problems existing at the time of the Clone Wars: no Republic-controlled military and also no real planetary defense forces of any substance. Her plan allows for both, and they can join together if necessary when a greater threat rises up.

 

But... there is nothing ineffective about what Mon Mothma is proposing. And the war is not over, even after the Battle of Jakku. Aftermath and Lost Stars make it pretty clear that significant things have yet to happen, and that the Empire is still around. Plus, we don't know enough about the state of the galaxy in the ST yet to determine what kind / the scale of the conflict is in the ST.

 

Spoiler

Having read Aftermath, I really didn't get the impression that Ravager was the last SSD. Sure, Sloane said it was, but she later tells the Pandion he assumed wrong. She definitely was lying about the "fleet admiral" being dead and the Ravager under her command.

Unfortunately I don't have the hardcover, just the Kindle edition, so I can't give the page numbers, but that's from Ch. 37.

 

For a second there, I thought you were going to engage in rational, arguable debate about a specific in universe issue.

Newsflash: the EU "never happens." As we have known for years now, the post-ROTJ story is going in a different direction.

 

Spoiler

Agreed. And given the fact that it was Grand Moff Rand in command of the Battle of Jakku, presumably from a SSD, and not the fleet admiral from Aftermath, I would be stunned if there was not another SSD besides the Ravager out there.

 

If you have an equal amount of local forces and a federal military, then it brings up a lot of issues. What if the federal government and the local governments don't see eye to eye? Sure, it's usually the feds that go tyrannical, but what if a couple of local worlds banded together to make a neo-CIS and fight off the Republic again? You get something like the Second Galactic Civil War (GA vs Confederation) only worse because the Confederation didn't have a ready, modernised military, they had to make do with small defecting patrol ships and old era ships like Imperial classes etc.

And yeah, it does seem like they're going a complete opposite route to the old EU/Legends. Granted, I don't like the route, but I do like that they're going for originality. Much better than taking names of the EU and putting them in a blender, resulting in something that has the appearance of the EU, but doesn't have the heart of it. Sure, this doesn't have the heart of it either but at least they're not ripping things off and calling them their own like TCW did.

 

Yeah, I am complaining that peace doesn't come to the galaxy, which is what happened in the EU.

 

About the NR victory; i think it is very reasonable. Basically if you combine the effects of infighting, rapid dessertions, thousands of revolts across the galaxy, a powerful NR, and two major defeats along with many medium sized ones it is very plausible for the Empire to fall in a year. Empires often fall from less. A defeat in a year is very realistic. Yes the Empire is much larger than any real world empire, but all of the problems post Endor are proportionally larger. I can see a year; there's no way for the Empire to survive after Endor. In the EU, there weren't many major battles outside of Thrawn and the reborn Emperor. The latter had the majority of the Imperial Fleet and they lost in a year at the most. After that, fighting pretty much stopped. Imperial forces just pledged themselves to any dark jedi that needed troops and/or hid in the deep core. The EU was never 15 years of all out war. It was a bunch of small campaigns and the occasional war lord coming out of hiding. Zsinj controled 1/3 of the galaxy and all of the battles against him were relatively small. Then we have Isard who controled the Empire, but had a small fleet and gave the Coruscant to the NR. In the NEU we have a year of fighting that's more intense than most of what the EU had.

 

Assuming that you're referencing the

Spoiler

proposed massive cutdown to the NR military

, it's not without precedent. After the War of American Independence, the United States army had a total strength of less than 700 people, most of which were stationed at West Point to guard the leftover artillery (and trophies taken in battle) stockpiled there. It was thought that the states could maintain order by themselves with some direction from the Congress, and that larger forces could be raised from the state militias in times of crisis. This system had some limited successes: after Native Americans wiped out some settlements in the Old Northwest, Congress commissioned General Anthony Wayne to raise a legion of mixed troops and bring the Indians to heel, which he did.

 

Zeta1127

This is a discussion thread, NOT a complaining thread. If you do nothing but complain and add nothing to the discussion you will be asked to exit the thread. Your views and dislikes are WELL known, so no need to clutter the thread repeating them.

This is my first & last comment on this matter. If the complaining continues I will take further action.

--Adm. Nick

 

MOVING ON past Zeta and his usual issues: anyone else a bit bugged by the lack of details so far on the NR navy? So far we're just getting a lot of vague references to "frigates" and "star cruisers" and the like. Though the Carrack-class being used as a scout ship in Aftermath was neat.