Books Journey to TFA: Lost Stars by Claudia Gray (finally coming to paperback Aug 1!)

Quite frankly, I don't know if the New Republic remanants have the infrastructure, bureacracy, and especially the kind of philosophy that would lead to rounding up of all ex-Imperial navy officers. From a material and personnel standpoint, the NR was far smaller than the Galactic Empire, which was a true police state that even still apparently struggled with desertions, defections, disappearances and deaths after Alderaan and Death Star I, so there's no way that a smaller government that's just been decapitated is going to be able to snap up a force that even at the end of Jakku was probably larger than what the ISB had to put up with when they commissioned Cienna to find Thane. If anything, it's probable that experienced naval personnel of all kinds would likely be recruited by the NR's rallying military forces, even ex-Imperials, some of whom I frankly expect to see integrated into the Resistance after 20 years of seeing the Galaxy without Palpatine's Great Lie of Order Requires Tyranny.

Beyond that, Cienna's a Naval Officer. There's literally millions of such officers throughout the Galaxy, and, rather importantly, while there is such a thing as "fleet politics," the navy itself is not a political organization in the same sense as COMPNOR. They're a secular force politically, not party hardliners*. Top brass can and will be held accountable for their nation's crimes, but of we're going to try and argue Cienna's Captaincy makes her a "top officer" at Jakku, it bears mentioning she seems to have only held the rank and command for ONE SINGLE BATTLE. Military service, even to an enemy, is something to be left on a record and used for investigations into an individual, but it's not an equivalent to "suspected terrorist" or even "convicted felon." Civilians may give you the side eye, but there's not going to be jackbooted NR Agents bursting in on all ex-Imperial Officers after SKB. Again, if anything, they'll probably be offering commissions to anyone who an NR/Rebel Alliance/Resistance member will vouch for.

Which leaves us with Cienna's fate depending on how the investigation into her goes...

*The asterisks will payoff in my second response.

My re-read reminded me of even more pertinent facts that would make Ree's dossier suspicious; not only is she personally commisioned by Grand Moff Randd under Councilor Rax's authority, not only has she served under Vader's two flagships, not only did she co-pilot the rescue ship for Vader at Yavin...

...Vader personally assigned her to the Executor. That's quite possibly considered damning circumstantial evidence. And I noticed other possibilities; they're not explicit in the text, but it's not hard to read them. Tarkin later recalls Cienna's recruitment and notes Cienna's service to the Empire. He might have made a personal note of it, or his secretary, etc, which would again add unsightly names to her service record. And the Rees being abandoned when Mama Ree is put on trial may not just be Imperial disfavor; the first mentioning of the "stand by your friend" tradition notes that the Rees are backing an Imperial-leaning family against their neighbors. Is it possible that Cienna's family has a bad name as collaborators on Jelucan, further painting her in a bad light?

Okay, now to use that earlier *asterisk...

There's one more HUGE logical development that might explain why the NR is arresting all officers at Jakku on suspicion of war crimes: Operation Cinder. Hear me out: a lot of us have discussed how Operation Cinder seems to be the ultimate counter-productive Imperial counter-attack to Endor; heavy desertions, fratricidal warfare and defections almost certainly occurred when the Imperial war machine was turned on its own populace across the board. Each separate O:C action probably caused hundred of Imperials to quit, if not switch sides. Add in what we know about the infighting and Rax's machinations against other, competent leaders, and it's quite likely the vast bulk of Imperial forces at Jakku are the ones who carried out O:C and survived. Jakku may very well be a battle where all commanding officers are viewed as party hard-liners, which fits with the survivors forming the FO, and may require a standing order to imprison and interrogate all officers.

Oh, and my head canon goes with my argument by saying that Grand General Kenner Lorring and his forces are Imperial Loyalists who ignored the orders of-- and maybe even fought against-- Operation: Cinder assaults. Quite frankly, it feels like a natural schism point upon which to divide the Imperial military, and OT plays into my head canon that Lorring might be a Joe Johnston type commander who gets talked into surrendering after the siege against him is tightened.

 

When I read the book again last week, the first instance of the "stand by the innocent" ceremony seemed to imply that the charges brought against the family Ciena is standing by were brought by *other* first wavers; taking into account both that and the simple fact that sci-fi worlds are notorious for having ambiguously sized populations for, you know, *planets*, and it's arguable we're maybe dealing with a limited view of a huge population from the point of view of children who only briefly return home twice as adults, or a world far smaller than "planet" would denote, and therefore beg the question why Tarkin would bother personally annexing a world smaller than a single nation.

In either case, the suggestion that the first wavers were having political squabbles with one party supporting the Empire unequivocally and the other expressing doubts about their techniques is important. We know that by Thane and Ciena's second return home/ceremonial display of support/unplanned bootycall, most of the social divides between the first and second wavers have been effectively destroyed by the Empire's incompetent and inefficient idea of industrialization. The Rees and Kyrells seem to have maintained their cultural trappings, but that's because both have clear loyalty to the Empire and financial ties to it. And considering the overall Galactic turn against the Empire right after Endor and the implication most of the populace turns against the Empire once the fear of force is removed, chances are there's at least significant numbers of Jelucan 1st and 2nd wavers who don't follow the Rees' view of their honor, or the Kyrell's more sycophantic pragmatism.

 

I regard the Empire's treatment of Jelucan as inefficient and incompetent for industrialization because it's seems to be less "industrialization" and more "strip mining without regard for long term advancement of the planet itself". Turning the atmosphere into a total health hazard within only a few years shows a sloppy sense of progress; health hazards (and visibility hazards as well as possible machinery problems depending on what's in the pollution) are both things that could almost certainly be avoided with a bit more restraint or by using compensating technology. Also, as a simple example of how fascism is inefficient, condemning Mama Ree to hard labor that could easily be done quicker and more productively with droids as punishment for a crime shows horrible business sense, not to mention fails even harder in stopping the embezzlement that they're allowing someone else to get away with.

Industrialization also generally strikes me as moving a region from a primary (raw material dependent) economy to a secondary (manufacturing using raw materials) or even tertiary economy (trade in knowledge/data). Near as we can tell, the mining is the only real business going on and seems to be largely a business of off-worlders while the native populace is left totally destitute even far beyond where they were before. It also seems to be treated more as a logistical element for the Death Star II (at least that's the implication in some of the text) and in general the Empire seems more concerned with the comparative wealth of Palpatine; it doesn't really matter whether the Galaxy or even the Emperor's personal wealth increases objectively, it matter that he's got more than anyone else. That's my head canon explanation for why GCW technology and culture seems so much more destitute than the Prequel era, my explanation for why Jeluca was probably better off economically before the a Empire, even as "backwards" as they may have seemed.

I do love the fact that the 1st wavers are pretty much impoverished patricians taken to the -nth degree; they're formal loyalists to a royal heir denied his throne, and come complete with family banners and a pseudo-chivalric code with heavy feudal-overtones. I do keep feeling like there were likely 1st wavers who would have refused to stand with the Rees not out of over-riding loyalty to the Empire, but out of a feeling of karmic justice for collaborators bearing the punishment of an amoral occupation. Those 1st wavers may be the totally destitute guys indistinguishable from the destitute 2nd wavers, but they'd still probably glare at the Rees. I'm torn in the interpretation I've come up with, though; a culture formed by stubborn loyalists willing to flee a planet might genuinely be that homogeneous in a warped honor code. It just clashes with my knowledge that the reason most medieval legends about Knights emphasized chivalry! honor, and loyalty was because those were actually in short supply or at least in enough contention and debate to need reinforcement.

And a thought for potential sequels regarding Thane and Cienna: you'd pretty much require some kind of conflict to drive them back towards each other. The growing conflict between them defined the last book, and you'd need something to act as a reversal of that in another book. Probably still needs some rocky elements of they get back together.