PT "We're keepers of the peace. Not soldiers."

My interpretation now is that part of Palpatine's ingenious plan to use the Clone Wars to serve as a central catalyst to take control of everything, was by putting the Jedi in the position there they were forced to begin to compromise little by little their core beliefs and ideals of peace, which would unknowingly lead to them accelerating their own destruction, all the while believing they were doing what was just. Brilliant.

 

The Clone Wars as a corruptor in its own right? An interesting idea.

 

deleted. wrong thread

 

That the Jedi were the only/best choice to become generals is a bit strange to me.

1) They are not soldiers, they even admit that. So they don't have a lot of training/experience in strategy and tactics. Both of which are crucial for a General.
To add to this, on Geonosis the Jedi display a total lack of sensible tactics in the arena.

2) They have superpowers so they would certainly be useful in the army. But not as Generals.
Ask yourself this, would Spiderman make a great General? Would the Hulk? The Hulk is no doubt useful in a fight but I wouldn't make him a General.

3) They are great fighters but would you look for Generals inside a karate Dojo? Would someone that has a black belt make a great general?

4) They have experience in diplomacy and negotiations, which is also useful in a war but not for the generals.

5) To command armies in a war will sometimes require hard choices, brutal acts and maybe even some ruthlessness.
That sounds a bit at odds with the overall Jedi philosophy. Yes I am aware that Palpatine no doubt wanted the Jedi to be Generals just to make them do these things. But didn't anyone else consider this?

6) About the army bill and it being meant to "assist" the Jedi. That doesn't have to imply that the Jedi would command such an army. Instead that army can take over certain tasks that the Jedi are unable to perform. Say that Jedi have been called in to deal with actual fights, border wars and minors skirmishes. If the army deals with those things instead and the Jedi can focus on diplomacy, negotiations and things that don't require an armed response.
Ex. say that the Senate in TPM actually believed Padme and demanded that the TF withdraw their forces but the Tf refused. Say that the Senate then decide to liberate Naboo by force. That would be a job for armed forces and not necessarily for Jedi.

Lastly, were there no other choices for Generals? The Republic doesn't have an army but if the individual planets have some military of their own, wouldn't they have some higher officers that could fill that role?
It is possible that there are no armies at all in the Republic or it's member worlds. But that too sounds odd with several private armies around.

Bye for now.
The Guarding Dark

 

Seems to me the idea of putting the Jedi in charge - generals and all - is Palps way of getting the Jedi in the line of war, get them to be the face of war (civilian populace unhappiness with the lack of a quick resolution gets them anti-Jedi so they'll eventually supports Palps "I had to wipe out the Jedi traitors") and, to some extent, trapped between their ideals and the pragmatism of war.

IMHO it really wasn't the Jedi who wanted to be front line commanders/etc. but Palps who persuaded them they were the best to lead the "fight to protect the Republic."

A Jedi trap, in other words.

 

It wasn't meant as a personal attack, but, it doesn't mean it's not true either. Just because someone specializes in one thing doesn't automatically disqualify them from something else.

Jedi are a lot more than just policemen. Policemen aren't warriors, which we can infer from what Obi Wan says, that the Jedi are warriors. Obi Wan calls Anakin a cunning warrior. Not an honorable policeman. Warriors engage in war when they have too.

How were the Jedi not good Generals? Pretty much from what I have seen in the Movies, and what little I have seen so far in the TCW series, the Jedi led Clone Army is winning far more than it is losing. That doesn't mean they aren't suffering losses, making mistakes, or having setbacks, but they are still doing better than not.

You can, but, someone still has to over see them. Who is going to do that? Once again, the Republic had virtually nothing in the way of a Military Command Structure. You can grow as many Clones as you want, the biggest group that had actual military experience and was loyal to the Republic was the Jedi. From what little we know of the history of the Jedi , we know they have done everything from settle disputes with negotiations, to fight in flat out wars.

If I had to pick between a General that has actual experience on the battlefield, over one that just learned it in a classroom, well than I pick the one with experience every time.

You're assuming the Jedi aren't trained in Strategy. Also, again, you believe that someone that only has classroom experience in strategy is better than someone that has actual experience in it? You have no proof that the Jedi have no experience in strategy. That's something you're just throwing on them because you want too. Where as if you look at the actual movies (and TCW), you see that the Jedi are leading, and winning more times than not. If the Jedi were just policemen in over their heads, well then we would see a lot more in the way of major losses than what we have seen. Again, that doesn't mean that the Jedi wouldn't make mistakes as leaders, or that they wouldn't suffer losses. You can look across our own worlds history and find some of the greatest Generals made some bad mistakes at times.

I just don't see the whole angle that the Jedi needed to be replaced. Not when everything we see points to them being pretty successful for the most part.

 

1) They are not soldiers from the standpoint of how many Jedi they are. Again, the quote from the movie just can't be taken by itself, there is a whole context to it before hand. Mace says:

They are keepers of the peace only from the standpoint that they just don't have enough Jedi to make a realistic army to fight another army that has hundreds of thousands if not millions of troops. The Jedi are limited to the numbers they have because of the Force, not because some government mandate says that they can't have hundreds of thousands of Jedi. It has nothing to do with their ability on the battlefield or ability to lead. As I said in an earlier post, it seems to me the Jedi are doing a pretty decent job. Especially when you have to remember that they are being betrayed by Palpatine who feeds Dooku a lot of information to try and keep the War dragging along.

It was always my opinion that the Jedi fell into a trap on Geonosis. That they weren't expecting thousands of battle droids to come pouring into the arena. Unless you really think Dooku had those thousands of Battle Droids hanging out in the hallways of the arena for a big dance party after the execution was over?

2) Bad examples with Spiderman and Hulk. Neither of them belonged to an Order that was thousands of years old, that fought in wars in the past. None of them were directly in charge of protecting a Republic. Spiderman is a regular Joe who is a vigilante. Hulk is just a brute. The Jedi are actually in charge of protecting the Republic, have fought wars, have fought on the battlefield for the Republic. The Jedi were more than just supermen waving lightsabers around. They were Knights, and just like Knights in our feudal times, they were capable of leading armies.

3) one word answer... Samurai...

4) Actually you might want to read up on your WW2 history. Generals were very much involved in matters of diplomacy and negotiations especially in regards to the end of the war...

5) So do you have an example of where in the war this was a problem? Furthermore, I see Jedi killing Geonosians in AOTC. Geonosians, while they are insect-like are still living sentient beings... Cutting them in half while fighting is pretty brutal. Mace cuts Fetts head off, that's pretty brutal. Cutting Maul in half was pretty brutal. Cutting your best freinds arm and legs off is pretty brutal. There's a difference between being brutal, and unnecessarily brutal. However, again if you have a specific example where the Jedi's lack of "brutality" had a negative impact, I am all ears.

6) Obviously the Republic felt different than you. I still think you down play what the role of the Jedi actually is even before the Clone Wars. Obviously in TPM, the Trade Federation cronies aren't worried about the Jedi showing up at the beginning of the movie because of the Jedi's awesome negotiating skills. The Trade Federation doesn't tell Sidious that the whole thing is over because they are worried the Jedi will give them the diplomatic evil eye... Obviously the Jedi were more than just negotiators...

 

Why didn't the Republic form its own military organization on its own. Why rely upon a religious order to serve as its military leaders?

 

They were far more than just a religious order... That is downplaying their role within the Republic. You're making it sound like the Republic picked a bunch of Jehovah Witnesses as it's military leaders. That isn't a slight against JW's at all either. Just pointing out that the Jedi were more than just some Religious Order that prayed, went to church and were passive civilians.

 

Why rely on (setting up) a military leadership when you can slap the Jedi into place and watch the fireworks? Palps wanted the Jedi to be the generals, the top brass. You don't need an OOU reason when there's a perfectly good IU reason.

 

In my view it was an overly-sharp rebuke. There were many other ways of making your point without stepping into the realm of personal criticism.

As to the substance of your point, I could easily turn that around. For instance: you could say that it's short sighted to assume that Jedi will automatically make good Generals just because they are good warriors in the field and have a connection to the force.

One Obi-Wan quote hardly substantiates an argument sufficiently. Anyway you're missing the point. I was never arguing that Jedi were not good fighters. I was arguing that Jedi would not necessarily make good Generals and that clones specifically bred for the purpose would perform better.

Yes there were a lot of Republic victories. But this does not necessarily reflect on the strategic prowess of the Jedi. Poorly commanded armies can often win battles and even wars. For instance: the British command in the Crimean war or the Boer war can be described as shambolic at best but ultimately victory was achieved in both. Likewise, the Somme offensive in WW1 was ostensibly a success - despite the prohibitively high casualty rate, the British army achieved all of their strategic objectives. So does this mean that Field Marshall Haig was a good commander? Absolutely not! The battle was mainly won by virtue of the fact that there were more British soldiers in play then German ones due to the Germans being tied up at Verdun.

To be clear here, am I saying that the Jedi were poor commanders? Not necessarily. I'm just pointing out that you cannot point at Republic victories as proof of the competence of Jedi command.

And do we see that much Jedi strategic brilliance on-screen? I don't think so. Geonosis, Kashyyyk and Utapao looked like enormous slugfests to me, two armies meeting each other head head on. For all we know, a different commander could have come up with something far more innovative. And as for the Battle of Coruscant, well, Generals Kenobi and Skywalker weren't overseeing the battle at all. They were fighting in the field - and you know what, that's precisely what I suggested the Jedi should be doing in my previous post. As for TWC, I haven't seen enough of it to judge fairly.

Why would they need to be overseen? I'm suggesting that you could have clone Generals and a clone high command. They would be the ones overseeing everybody else.

The Jango Fett clones learned their skills in the classroom as well. They didn't appear to be inadequate soldiers to me.

I absolutely am.

There was no galactic army before this time, hence the military creation act. Therefore, the Jedi at the time of the Clone Wars couldn't have had practical experience in commanding armies as there were no armies to command! Likewise, having practical experience at resolving border disputes or being a warrior or a diplomat or whatever else they did does not equate to having practical experience of commanding armies. The Jedi were as green when it came to commanding armies as any clone would have been.

That's not something I'm throwing at anything. It's a logical conclusion drawn from what I know of the GFFA at this point in time. Until the emergence of the CIS, there hadn't been an external military threat to the Republic for a very long time, possibly thousands of years. Therefore it makes no sense that they would be taught how to command armies or run a war.

The Jedi are needed for the Sith Grand Plan to be sure. But I'm suggesting that, in principle, the Jedi might not be the best choice to command the GAR.

 

[quote="Lord Chazza, post: 51680332, member: 1377012"
There was no galactic army before this time, hence the military creation act. Therefore, the Jedi at the time of the Clone Wars couldn't have had practical experience in commanding armies as there were no armies to command! Likewise, having practical experience at resolving border disputes or being a warrior or a diplomat or whatever else they did does not equate to having practical experience of commanding armies. [/quote]

Except maybe whoever was in the task force at the Battle of Malastare Narrows - a few years before AOTC. Still - fleet command may be very different from ground command.

 

I don't agree, Mace has already brought up the numbers issue when he said that there aren't enough Jedi. The second sentence has to do with the jedi not being soldiers.
So what Mace says is essentially that if the seps attack, the Jedi will not be able to stand against them because they are too few and they are not soldiers.
If the second sentence is just an issue of numbers then it is redundant as Mace has already said that.
As for numbers of Jedi, since the numbers of midis is the deciding factor and if we assume that the parents are given a choice in the matter. Then the number of jedi depend both on how common a high enough midi number is and how many parents agree to give up their children and never see them again.
So Mace admits freely that the Jedi are not soldiers.

Still doesn't excuse the plain idiotic strategy the jedi use.
a) Obi-Wan was caught when sending a transmission and so the Geonosians would be on their guard and the Jedi should be aware of that.
b) Unless the Geonosians have crap sensors, they will detect the Jedi's ships when they arrive.
So from these two things, the Jedi should have expect that the Geonosians would be on alert If the Republic tries anything and they would most likely face resistance.
c) The Jedi knew about there being a big droid army on Geonosis so their presence should not have been a surprise. And said droid army would now be on full alert.
d) In the arena, the Jedi have two main goals, save Padme and co and take down Dooku, Nute and the other seps in the box. So it is idiotic to send just Mace up there. Have 3-4 other master with him and have 5-6 knight guard the corridor. If Dooku or Jango tries anything, they are dead. If Dooku sends out droids, the knight can hold them off long enough for Mace to put his saber to Dooku's throat and say "call them off or die." If Dooku doesn't comply, he is dead. And speaking about Mace, didn't he notice all the droid back in the corridor? They came from the same corridor where he came from.
Instead the Jedi spread out and then they all jump down into the arena and charge the much larger droid army. This is stupid, plain and simple.

You mentioned that the Jedi have superpowers as the reason why they should be generals. So how about Superman, Green Lantern, Wolverine? Would they make great generals? Wolverine actually has a lot of military experience but I still would not make him a general.
Back when I read DC and Marvel comics, there were times when the heroes had to form an "army" of sorts. And in those cases the ones that were called to lead were those with actual military experience. Like Captain America, Captain Atom etc.

As for fighting wars, have any active Jedi done this? There have not been a full scale war for 1000 years at least. The Jedi serve the republic and the republic hasn't been at war for a very long time, so their actually battlefield experience might be nil. At least as far as the movies show. The republic have no army so who would the Jedi have been leading?
As for feudal knights, they often lorded over some land and had their own soldiers and men-at-arms under their command. And when the King called, they and their armies came. So in addition to being warriors in their own right, they were also trained to lead men in battle. The Jedi are not Lord's over anything nor do they have soldiers under their command.

A Samurai had other training than just karate, they had military training as well. Trained to obey orders and give them.

The countries also had a diplomatic corps during the WW2.

I was thinking more on the line of giving the order to bomb an enemy's military position despite knowing that there will be a lot of civilian casualties as well. Or faced with the situation when two planets will be attacked and you can only defend one. So you have to decide which planet gets invaded by the seps and who knows how many would die.
Would a Jedi have agreed to drop the A-bomb on Hiroshima in WW2?

[/QUOTE]

In TPM, the two Jedi are on their ship and make short work of the normal battle droids. But I haven't called into question whether or not a Jedi can fight. They certainly can. But as has been said, being a great fighter doesn't have to make you a great general. A general needs strategy, tactics, experience in commanding and deploying troops.
And lets look at the tactics used, on Geonosis the two armies run towards each other, shooting wildly.
That is WW1 type tactics and they were already a bad idea back then. The same kind of tactics are used in the land battle in RotS. Not a sign of great generals I fear. But to be fair, the seps use equally bad tactics so the fact that the republic is doing well could be mostly due them having better soldiers. As we are told in AotC, Clones are immensely superior to droids.

When the Jedi fight in the arena, they are 100 individual fighters, there is little if any coordination between them, they don't try to break out of the trap they have put themselves in. They have no apparent tactic or strategy.
It is a shame that the Jedi raid on the droid control ship was never completed because that would have shown that the Jedi did have some kind of plan. In short, the Jedi don't function like an army, they don't display any strategy or tactics and based on what AotC showed, they don't seem like good general material.

Bye for now.
Old Stoneface

 

If the Jedi Order was originally organized to allow its members to observe and believe in the Force, why does it have to be regarded more than just a religious order? Why should the "passive state" be regarded in a negative way? What is wrong with that?

 

Ya see here, them thar 'Ttack o' tha Clones presentates to us watchers an exempulary exampler to what them cityfolk call the "dra-ma-tic i-ro-ny".

 

I saw it like this:

It's like if a special agent went to the heart of Nazi-occupied France to extract an informant. The agent can protect the informant and shoot at whoever is shooting at them, but the agent can't win the whole war by himself. He can render aid in any way he can, but he's not part of a military. That's what Mace was basically saying. Of course, that said, the Jedi are supposed to be the protectors of the peace, so they're obviously expected to do something should war break out.

It must also be remembered that the war they were really planning for was a war with the Sith should they ever return. Well, the Sith were found to be working with the Separatists, so that was more than enough for the Jedi to really intervene.

 

I never said it was a negative thing. I never even implied it. What I said and shall repeat is that trying to portray the Jedi Order as simply a religious order is largely downplaying what their role within the Republic was. What the Jedi Order was setup as thousands of years ago is irrelevant compared to what the current Jedi Order is as we see it in the movies.

 

What is your proof that Clones would be better? You have none. That is the problem with your whole idea here. You aren't going by anything seen in the movies. There is nothing in the movies that suggests that the Jedi were bad leaders, or incompetent leaders. In fact there is proof that the Jedi were good leaders. They win more than they loose, without doubt. That after years of war between AOTC and ROTS that the Jedi are still in charge. There is nothing in the movies that represents a large popular movement to remove the Jedi from leadership because of incompetence. During the war briefing scene in ROTS we find out that the outer rim sieges are going "very well".

WW2 was a border dispute, the Nazi's and Imperial Japan didn't think other countries borders meant anything to them. In fact most wars have a basis in Border Disputes (among other things obviously). How was the border dispute of WW2 resolved? By negotiations?

Not saying that the specific mission that Obi Wan and Anakin were coming back from in AOTC was a complete planetary war, but, assuming border disputes are simply diplomacy and negotiation missions would be incorrect. At some point it is feasible to assume that the Jedi would have to take sides in a "border dispute" where one side is being an obvious aggressor and committing atrocities and the Jedi would help the other side. It is also feasible to believe that the Jedi at some point would have helped by leading armies against the more aggressive side. While there may not have been a galaxy wide war, it is completely feasible to believe that the Jedi were involved in many planetary wars where their services were needed, thus aggressive negotiations! Which was Anakins way of saying they had to fight! Thus they would need to be up to date in strategy, tactics etc etc. I would bet the Jedi were better experienced in war than that Kaminoians (spelling?) were sitting in their Cloning Centers!

I do agree that the Jedi need to be front and center as needed by Palpatines Plan, but the fact that they are there with no signs of incompetence, and no signs of a calling for their removal from a large movement shows to me that there was a basis for them to be there.

So again, were is your proof first of all that the Jedi needed to be replaced, where is your proof that they weren't good leaders or were incompetent as leaders, where is your proof that the clones would be better than the Jedi? Where?

It basically boils down to the same problem as with the Palpatines plans to lead Obi Wan to Kamino discussion and why I won't get into it with you about that. You aren't using anything from the movies to back up your point. What you are basically doing is saying that because you think it sounds better, then it is better, and you're not using anything from the movies to back your points up. I'm not going to go back and forth with someone that is not using anything from the movies to back their points up, but, is rather just saying that it sounds better in their head.

If you really think the Jedi weren't capable leaders, show me where in the movies that backs this up. If you think the clones would have made better leaders, show me in the movies where you get this from. You're idea that just because the Clones would be bred to be generals, that they would automatically be better than the Jedi lacks merit, because the Clones were bred to be fighters, and the Jedi are much better fighters than the clones. Being bred for a specific purpose doesn't automatically make you better than everyone else. Furthermore there is nothing in the movies that shows the Jedi are incompetent as leaders and needed to be replaced. That's not saying that mistakes won't be made, or battles won't be lost, but, as a whole from what we are shown, the Jedi are doing a fine job.

Unless you actually have something from the movies that can be discussed as to why you think the Jedi should have been replaced, other than what sounds better in your head as a story, than at this point as far as I am concerned it's an agree to disagree.

 

The first thing is, this is a discussion about choosing who leads the war, right? It's about the in-universe choice, when (and why) the choice was made in-universe? This choice comes before all results afterward, you cannot use what comes afterward as in-universe reasoning for the choice in the moment the choice was made. The argument made for the choice is a speculative argument, not one based on knowing future results.

Yeah, YOU could say "but the Jedi won!", but they couldn't say that. The entire discussion is based on the hypothetical arguments that can be made in-universe before the choice was made.

He has no proof the clones would be better? No ****, the clones were never given a chance to prove it. We're talking about a hypothetical here.

How is someone supposed to provide PROOF of something that cannot be tested?

The Jedi are doing a fine job, they're winning more than they lose? So? Maybe the clones would do even better? OH WAIT, nobody is even allowed to suggest this, because the clones weren't given command of the military and didn't have a chance to do better than the Jedi.

Seriously, you're asking him not to speculate on an entirely speculative question.

I agree with Chazza on this and could add my own analysis of the situation (including what I believe to be proof from the movies that the Jedi are bad generals, but mikeximus would just dismiss this as a mistake), but I'm not going to bother because I'm not allowed to speculate, I have to stick to some absurd idea of burden of proof even though I'm discussing an entirely speculative situation.

I can use the same tactics to suggest everyone in command of the Empire in the OT were bad choices for commanders, because hey, the Empire lost. Don't even ask about who the replacements would be, BECAUSE THEY'RE NOT IN THE MOVIES.

Maybe the Empire would have been better off under someone else's command....or maybe what we saw was the best they had, and anyone else would have done worse. But no, were not even allowed to talk about this because it's not on screen.

Way to shut down the discussion.

 

Samuel Vimes

It's not redundant, it's reinforcing...The Jedi are not soldiers because they can't be used in the capacity to be deployed by the hundreds of thousands to millions all over the Galaxy like an army of soldiers (clones) can be. Keepers of the peace? Well what does the U.N. call the armies that they send into areas that are under dispute? Peace Keepers...

As for the number of Jedi, that is exactly my point. If the Jedi could have millions of members in the Order, don't you think they would? The number of Jedi is not dictated by a government mandate that says they are only a Police Force thus can't be a standing army. Their numbers are dictated by outside circumstances that they have no control over, thus they can't have a standing army of Jedi to be all over the galaxy during a war like an army of soldiers could be. Thus they are not soldiers, but, notice he doesn't say they aren't leaders, he doesn't say they aren't generals, he says they aren't soldiers. Soldiers are basically the lowest but largest group in any army. His statement doesn't disqualify the Jedi from being Generals or leaders.

A) and thus why Yoda does show up with Clones. The Jedi goal was to save Obi Wan, and realizing the potential danger he was in, they got there as fast as they could. Even Mace in the movie doubt's Dooku when he says they are impossibly outnumbered. Mace says something along the lines of I don't think so. Again it was a trap.

B)They must have crap sensors because no one is alerted to the Jedi presence. The Jedi are able to move into position within the arena without being stopped. So the Geonosians must have had crap sensors.... Or they were allowed to move into position, because it was a trap. Just like in ROTJ when the Rebel Fleet is allowed to move into position under the assumption they are undetected, just to... Oh wait... "It's a TRAP!" Lucas repeating story line's throughout the movies... That's ludicrous thinking isn't it?

C) It was said that they were creating a Droid Army, not that one is present. Now Yes they would have to suspect there would be a significant number of droids, and that is why Mace empties out the Jedi Temple to go to Geonosis, but, again, Mace even doesn't expect the numbers of Droids that they had. Why? because it was a trap.. With the intentions of starting a war.

D) The Jedi had one goal, and that was to save Obi Wan, everything else you said is secondary upon their arrival. The Jedi didn't know Dooku or the others were at the Arena until after they arrived. The Jedi didn't know that Padme and Anakin were there til after they arrived. Dooku had the thousands of Droids in the arena (not in the foundries) because he knew that the Jedi would come, and he was even possibly tipped off by Palpatine (speculation on my part though on that). Again Mace obviously doesn't see the droids because he tells Dooku he doesn't believe they are impossibly outnumbered. It was a trap plan and simple. The Jedi were not expecting what happened. You can chalk that up to incompetence, I chalk it up to planning by DOoku and Palpatine that they knew the Jedi were coming, and it would be the perfect catalyst for the much needed war.

Again, you are comparing individuals to a Order of Warriors, that are likened to Samurai or Warrior Monks. That are in charge of protecting an entire galaxy. All the Marvel characters you are referring too have never had that kind of responsibility. Furthermore though, didn't many of those characters become leaders within organizations? Wolverine eventually becomes one of the leaders of the X-Men, Super-Man of the Justice League etc I do have a very limited knowledge of those characters though.

Everything we see in the movies points to the Jedi being far more than a group of vigilantes. They are the protectors of peace in the Republic. While there hasn't been a galaxy wide war in however long, it is very feasible to believe that the Jedi over the course of those thousand years have been drawn into many many planetary wars where they needed to pick a side that was more just. Unless you really believe that over the course of thousands of years, and tens of thousands of planets that there was never planetary conflicts where the Jedi helped lead armies against smaller Hitler types on a planetary scale.

The Jedi also had other training as well. The Jedi are a military force. They have weapons, they have training, they are in charge of protecting a galaxy.

The Jedi aren't trained to obey orders? They aren't trained to give orders? So when the Jedi Council gives orders to Jedi, they really aren't? So when the Jedi obeys the orders given to them by the council they really aren't obeying? The Jedi have a command structure that is very militaristic in it's construction. Younglings = Cadets, Padawans = Privates, Knights = Officers, Masters = Higher Command Structure or Generals if you will. What stops the Jedi from being a full fledged army? Outside circumstances that are not under their control. First and Foremost how many Force Sensitives are created by the Force.

And it was the Generals that were at the table during negotiations of the articles of surrender, and it was Generals that signed those articles...

And that decision would have fallen under the command of Palpatine, not the Jedi. Just like in WW2, it was the President that decided to drop the bomb, not Patton, or MacArthur. While the Jedi would obviously make their opinion known, they were still just Generals, not President's or Chancellors!

I do get your point, and I think that the Jedi probably do everything to avoid civilians casualties, and does it show to be hurting them in the movies? Again the movies, and from what I have seen in TCW so far, the Jedi lead Clone Army are winning more than they are loosing, but quite a bit. Again not saying there they don't have losses here or there, or that they don't make mistakes. But any moral choices they struggle with haven't been shown to be a problem.

From TCW and what we see in ROTS, tells me otherwise...

 

You can speculate all you want, doesn't mean I have to reply to speculation that is based only on what sounds better in your head with nothing to back it up. Usually a hypothetical is followed by something called proof to back up it up. To say, it sounds better because well because it's what sounds better to me with nothing to back it up, doesn't make for a good discussion for me. If that was the case, and we are arguing hypotheticals with no proof, well I can say that the Republic should have come back here to Earth and Cloned Patton and MacArthur to lead their Armies. Forget trying to actually keep in mind the movies. I can just pick something out off the top of my head that sounds better to me and just run with it with nothing to back it up other than it sounds better to me...

The simple fact that the Jedi were put in charge with no push back from the Senate or anyone else tells me that they were considered more than adequate by the Republic to lead the Clone Armies.

As for this...

I am not shutting anything down. He is free to reply, and continue the discussion. I just don't like having discussions where people use the stance because it sounds better and don't offer anything in the form of proof. One of the best discussions I have had on this forums involves the blockade of the Trade Federation, where me and Darth Sinister went back and forth, both giving evidence of our opposite positions. I openly admitted to him that my stance my be incorrect, however, I wasn't prepared to change my mind because of discrepancies seen in the movie. However, that is the discussions I like to have. Actual proof of why someone thinks something other than just a i'm suppose to accept it discuss it because it pops in your head...

 

Yeah, it's nothing but "what sounds better in his head". There hasn't been a few pages talking about the Jedi Order, their experience commanding an army or lack thereof, the qualities of the Jedi, the beliefs of the Jedi, the qualities of the clones, the beliefs of the clones or lack thereof in comparison to the Jedi, etc all based on extrapolation from the movies. Oh, and when terrible tactics in AOTC are brought up, they are summarily thrown out by you as "just mistakes."

You don't have to reply to anything, but if you're going to reply to speculation (which you have, repeatedly), you might want to accept that it's only speculation and not try to place your own rules upon it well after the fact in an attempt to dismiss the entire discussion.

Speculation is forming a theory without firm evidence, because in this situation there is not firm evidence nor could there ever be.

Um, not quite. Usually a hypothesis is tested to determine if it is true or not. That test cannot be carried out and you knew it. Yet you decided to join the discussion anyway, participate for pages, and then tried to act superior when the discussion came to the inevitable conclusion, that it's a hypothesis that can't be tested.

 

Ugghhh, this is what always happens. Certain posters jump into a discussion, ignore all of the in-universe arguments and then criticise everybody else for not toeing the party line vis-a-vis the filmmakers' intentions. I'm surprised Lucas quotes haven't been deployed yet - I guess it's only a matter of time...

Regarding not backing my points up, my points were based on logical conclusions that I had drawn, e.g. it is logical to assume that somebody who has spent a lifetime learning strategy will make a better general than some who has only studied strategy a little bit or hasn't even studied it at all. If you don't want to argue logic then there's no point in talking to me. Logic is what I do.

Now just like in the last thread, I have no intention of typing up yet more arguments, only to have them all ignored and, for good measure, to be insulted too so it's goodbye to this thread from me.

PS. For the record, I didn't even post in the Obi-Wan & Kamino thread so you may want to read threads a bit more carefully...

 

Did you actually go back and read what I wrote, or are you just assuming in your rush to demonize me?

1) My first two posts were in response to the original topic of this thread, which had nothing to do with whether the Jedi were good or bad leaders.

2) By the time of my third post the topic had changed to why the Jedi were in control of the Clone Army. My third post said nothing about whether I thought they were or weren't good leaders. My third post was addressing the why's of the Jedi being in charge at first, and also addressing that it was my belief that the Jedi probably were in favor of the Military Creation act... I included actual information from the movies to support my my opinions.

3) It was Lord Chazza, that initiated the conversation with me about officers, not the other way around. Chazza did so with a one sentence response to something I had said.. and that was:

Now excuse me if I am not as smart as you, but, I couldn't determine from that one sentence initiated by Chazza that they were going the route of a hypothetical, what if, situation where his stance would be that Clone Generals would be better at leading the armies than the Jedi Generals based on only that he thinks they would have gotten better schooling. I proceeded with the conversation to see if Chazza would expand on this initial statement to me. I wanted to see if there were actual instances in the movies that I was missing that led him/her to the conclusion that Clone Generals would be better. I gave them the chance to explain, and when it became clear that they were merely engaging in a discussion of what if, based only on hypotheticals, it became clear to me that it was not a conversation I want to engage in. Especially when Chazza says he/she couldn't even say that the Jedi were "poor commanders" just that he/she felt the Clone Leaders would be better..

If you and chazza and everyone else wants to engage in hypothetical conversations then go ahead and knock yourselves out. I am not saying no one should engage in those type of conversations, I have said that I do not want to engage in those conversations. I am not on these forums to discuss what if Luke turned to the Dark Side, what if the Empire won, etc etc. I am here to discuss the actual story, to learn more than I already know. Not to engage in what other people think would have made a better story or what people think would have happened if something went different. That is why you will rarely see me in those type of threads. I just can't understand why is it I have to be obligated to continue a what if, hypothetical discussion if I don't want too, once I realized that is the direction it was going?

Maybe I should have you screen all responses to my posts so as to make sure that I don't get into another what if discussion, because obviously I missed this one when Chazza says "They could have created a bunch of officer clones...". Obviously I made a mistake in engaging in the discussion with them, that they started with me, to see if they would elaborate further on their statement... Obviously I am a complete moron if it was so.. well.. obvious that Chazza was going the route of a hypothetical discussion when they posted "They could have created a bunch of officer clones..."

So when I have a difference of opinion, and I give actual examples from the movie, including dialogue and scenes from the movie, I am just summarily throwing it out? Chazza disagrees with me and states that Clone Generals would be better than Jedi generals, to which you have said is a 100% hyptothetical statement, and that's OK. But there is something wrong with me disagreeing with someone else's view of something in AOTC and I give examples of why I disagree, examples that are actually seen in the movie, but I am somehow an *******?

Just to make sure to clarify, I have nothing against Chazza posting hypotheticals for the purpose of discussion, I am sure there are plenty of people that would love to engage in that discussion. I am just not one of them.

 

I jumped into the discussion? You initiated the conversation with me. I was active in this thread before you. You had one post previous to your initiation of the conversation with me, I had 4 posts previous to that... and I am the one that jumped into the conversation?

Ignoring in-universe? I hope you aren't referring to me. I am all about in-universe.

Logic huh? OK fine lets go that route... is it logical to even assume that the cloners even had a program that was capable of training General type clones? No, it is not logical to assume that because there is nothing "in-universe" ie in the movies, that suggests that the cloners even had that capability, just like there is nothing to suggest they didn't have that capability. At best it's a wash and your premise that the cloners could even train General types starts off with an assumption based not on anything seen in the movies, but just a assumption that you think they could do it. Doesn't sound very logically derived to me.

As for Lucas Quotes. If you don't care what Lucas thinks, than that is fine. There are those of us that do, why should I not post a quote from Lucas supporting my side? Only because it means you're wrong? That's the problem? If you don't care what Lucas thinks that's your prerogative, and I won't try to change your mind. I do care, and I will continue to post them as I see fit, unless for some reason it becomes against the rules to post them. If I post something from Lucas and you don't care than at that point simply ignore my post, and continue the conversation with someone else.

As for the P.S., my apologies if I got my info crossed....