Lit Why didn't the Old Republic simply "let go" of systems which wanted independence?

Why didn't the Old Republic simply "let go" of systems which wanted independence?

The New Republic had no issue doing this.

And in the leadup to the Clone Wars, many planets felt their membership in the Republic was no longer working out for them - many systems wanted to become independent. The Republic didn't want to allow this, so those systems who were declaring independence and separate decided to band together in a loose alliance: the confederacy of independent systems, and began looking to who could quickly supply a defense force that would be able to find for their freedom, if needed...

Why was it so unthinkable at the time for the Republic to simply let them go? Yes, Sidious wanted this to spark a civil war, but taking away the malicious intent, why does this not seem to have been considered, even by the Jedi?

 

Id assume it's because of the massive secret droid armies they were keeping secret by executing people trying to bring a murderer to trial, do remember that the separatist crisis had been going on for two years before episode 2 without war being declared.

Large secret armies and active hostile actions tend to lead to war.

There were also large scale terrorist attacks including stone mites and various types of hive viruses including the disappearance of the Katana fleet, many of which were blamed on the separatists and many of which were separatist in origin. Also the trihexalon virus attacks in the Jedi Starfighter game which started shortly before geonosis.

 

"All who gain power are afraid to lose it."

I think the idea is that if the Republic allows worlds to secede, more and more worlds will join them, and the Republic will lose their grip on galactic hegemony. And to be fair, the post-Ruusan Republic has known peace under it's democratic rule for 1000 years. Worlds leaving en masse would change all that. The fear is probably that it would usher in an era of chaos with the factions of a splintered galaxy warring with each other. Whether they were right or wrong to not allow worlds to secede is, I think, left ambiguous.

 

Correllia and Satine's group both effectively seceded without being lumped in with the people creating massive secret armies, which is half the plot of episode 2 that and the secret meeting they were having about creating an army greater than any in the galaxy.

 

The droid armies were part of a secret deal Dooku made with the corporations... and the political justification was because the Republic wouldn't let them go, so they needed to have a defense force so their independence would be recognized.

Anyhow, forget AOTC, because as you said the Separatist crisis was already doing on for years without there being war. Why not just let them go? Then there would be no crisis.

 

They did let them go? The biggest conflict we know of during that time was when a bunch of radical separatists bombed a bunch of buildings on Antar 4.

We know of multiple sectors that straight up went to the separatists and we know that a "thousand systems" already joined them by episode 2. The separatists existed as a political institution for two years already.

The most logical interpretation is that palpatine and dooku secretly funded, backed, and empowered radical groups... Like Zeta Magnus, and these radical acts were good for propaganda on both sides.

It was a years long terror campaign to prepare the galaxy for war. Notably it's only after geonosis that palpatine was ever given those emergency powers, they were a highly controversial bit of legislation, with the implication being that without the reveal of this large secret droid army the Senate very well could have not given him those powers, and the Republic would not have a standing military.

 

Id also like to point out that the movie starts with an act of terrorism killing Padme's decoy... Which we later learn dooku funded, with the backing of Gunray, which winds up implying it was standard practice on his end, and the movie is about the War on Terror.

Dooku was never "just trying to secede".

 

Well, first off, since when has any government just let parts of itself go if they didn't have to?

Additionally, on a bigger level, it is as simple as "well, they wanted to leave, so we should let them" because planets are not hiveminds (well, except maybe Geonosis) and people were divided on this. This is something that shows up in a lot of stories - for instance, the rather brutal civil war on Jabiim, or the conflict on Calamari. Heck, a big part of what made the Separatist crisis a crisis was that it caused a refugee crisis as millions upon millions of beings left their homes to either stay in or leave the republic. Ando got highlighted as a major case of this in the old holonet news site.

In particular, there are a lot of instances where the government of a planet wanted to secede but the people were overwhelmingly pro-republic - most famously Onderon in TCW (also interesting because the Republic technically couldn't interfere directly, which between that and the whole League of Neutral systems implies the Republic won't invade worlds that leave but aren't themselves contributing to the CIS armies invading and pillaging other worlds) but definitely a few other places - on Amaltanna for instance, we had apparently the entire populating dying trying to stop the Baron there from turning the world and its resources over to the CIS - which seems a bit extreme but really shows their commitment. Heck, even before the Clone Wars, back in SWTOR one of the flashpoints is about a local governor who "declares independence against republic tyranny" primarily to avoid corruption charges and does very much against the will of his people, relying on mercenaries and a personal guard made of up of sepratists from a different conflict to try to terrorize the populace into line.

Of course, there were cases where things were the other way around, Ishi Tiib and Brental 4 in the dark horse comics for instance. But still, that proves my point - this was a messy conflict, not ones with cleanly drawn lines. It wasn't one civil war, it was thousands of civil wars - and sometimes the whole separatist thing was just an excuse to settle old grudges, like on Haruun Kal. There was always some group you could support and set yourself up as a liberator, and the opposition could always be dismissed as traitors, brainwashed dupes, greedy, or any combination of the above.

Oh, and it is worth noting that there worlds that wanted to leave so that they could more freely harm others, like Zygerria and wanting to bring back slavery. Who would let them go and build up their forces unchecked?

 

Even the geonosian hivemind was not absolute as the Golbah Hive had a full blown drone revolt that the aristocracy nuked, and the Gehenbar Hive was in direct conflict with the hive that created the droid armies with an adventure seed in the Geonosis and the Outer Worlds Sourcebook where either Rebel or Republic PCs joined forces with them.

One of WotC's topnotch sourcebooks.

 

The New Republic

 

They weren't really only trying to leave. In the case of both the CIS and Confederation, which are both more like, stand-ins for third world countries opposing American domination, rather than an analogue for the Confederate States, they were actively looking to weaken the Republic by bombing key infrastructure. Some of the groups were directly involved with wanting to dominate their neighbors. The trade conglomerate wanted to impose a sort of corporate feudalism in their regions, with a chunk of the CIS not really being willing secessionists, but occupied territories under the Trade Federation, Techno Union, Commerce Guild and Corporate Alliance. It isn't quite as simple as a broad group of secession worlds that simply want to leave the Republic.

Basically, look to the early-mid 00s, the War on Terror, the Axis of Evil and the fear of Japanese economic domination (lol how that went out the window). That's your actual analogue for the Separatist Crisis and the Clone Wars. Iran and North Korea weren't just trying to 'leave' the American sphere, they were seeking to secure that independence by building nukes, which was the initial argument of why US forces went into Iraq. Considering things like the Malevolence, the Blue Shadow Virus, the Republic wasn't dealing with things all that differently from the USA/NATO.

 

Its the age old question... "just let them go" usually ends with them coming back to free more systems of your grip, first through propaganda, then actively through financed third party terrorism and next through full scale war.

"Just keep them in" though ends like a fast track to skip these steps and jump right to the war to break off anyway.

Neither adresses the problems that started the wish to separate, nor resolves them. For that they would need to talk and be willing to both change and find common ground, within the existing body or as separate parts in coexistance. But given that usually is off the table before separation even comes up... BOOM.

 

Because, despite the rhetoric about "sovereign systems" and whatnot, the Old Republic wasn't a confederation of independent states in a loose league of friendship. It had a federal system. It's member states were not conquered. They were invited in and joined willingly, if they did not ask for membership first. If any subdivision of a country in a federation or a unitary state can just up and walk out if they disagree with the decision of the central government, then the government has no authority. And if a government has no authority then it is pointless.

Then take into consideration that many of the worlds that seceded were economically very important. You had the breadbasket of the Albion sector, the industrial worlds like Metalorn and economic strongholds like Muunilinst. If they're allowed to go that it is going to have a very sharp impact on people's lives. Ripping up a deeply integrated economic system would cause mass chaos. Unemployment would skyrocket as tariffs against now foreign companies and locales were put into place where free trade had once taken place. A bad economic depression would have hit the Republic if the Separatists had been allowed to walk off. Perhaps even an economic collapse, considering the Republic is consistently referred to as being deeply in debt by the time of the Clone Wars.

The Old Republic, for all its failings, was still a free society before the Clone Wars. Senators like Padme, Bail, Onaconda Farr and Mon Mothma are proof enough that the system could have theoretically been reformed had enough people made an effort to fix it. The political situation was not hopeless, like it was during the time of the Empire. Yes, men like Dooku claimed the Republic was beyond saving, but that reflects more on their lack of patience, in my opinion, than anything else.

The Separatists like Mina Bonteri, in my honest opinion, come off less as principled idealists and more as a bunch of impatient blowhards who lost faith with the democratic process and walked out. Reform is hard. Change is hard. Shaking people out of complacency is hard. The reformers like Bail and Padme were in the minority and had a huge challenge to face them.

But it wasn't impossible. That's the tragedy of the prequels. As Queen Jamilla once said "The day we stop believing in democracy is the day we lose it."

The Separatists lost faith.

Walking out and screwing over everyone you left behind in the process isn't principled. It's selfish. It diminishes the state and people you leave behind.

Comparing the Republic and the Separatists to the Empire and the Rebels is a false equivalence.

There was no potential for reform in the Empire with Palpatine, Vader, and the Moffs running the show. Mon Mothma and Bail Organa exhausted every option they had by trying to work through the Imperial Senate. And it got them absolutely nowhere. Many thousands of systems were forcibly conquered by the Empire as well. Many populations were held in Imperial control at gunpoint.

There is a MASSIVE difference between rebelling against a totalitarian state and a democratic state that has become corrupt. One can't be reasoned with, another can.

 

I didn't really think Bail and Padme were reformers. They were status quo champions, they enjoyed the Republic as it was, they didn't even take a major stance against the megacorporations. Palpatine, Tarkin? Those were the reformers, just not in a good way.

 

"I will not let this Republic which has stood for a thousand years, be split in two." - Palpatine

The Dooku'Gunray/Sith conspiracy is another thing. For the planets just wanting independence, they just wanted independence. It was the Sith/corporations (who were only secretly involved, like with the Republic) that were wanting a war.

Where were the hundreds/thousands of seceding systems acting to approve and implement the bombing of Republic infrastructure?

And yes, I know the analogy, as I was a teenager in the 2000s. Though your interpretation is offf... Iran and North Korea were never part of the US (or even an alliance with us) and we never went to war with them anyways. They were always independent, for decades. Iraq is also nothing like a war of independence. And yes, the Republic was dealing with things like 2000s-NATO/US... which was wrong. Most Americans now believe that, and it was also the Lucas and EU commentary back in that decade too. "Triad of evil," "you're with me or you're my enemy," "emergency powers," etc.

For the first paragraph... you can still have a federal system and allow member-states to leave. And it can still be a strong government.

I also wasn't under the impression that the independent states would stop all trade. More like they wanted trade without as much taxation/tariffs as one reason.

Walking out is principled, it's not (necessarily) selfish. I wouldn't say that's the case for the 13 American colonies, or India leaving the British, or the independence of Latin American countries from Spain and other European nations, or the independence of Ukraine and the Baltics (among others) from the USSR. Sometimes it's for the best for all involved. And there was a point that, even if Palpatine were to drop dead, the Republic had become so bloated and corrupted. There should be reformers, but those wanting independence aren't wrong.

They were reformers, they just hadn't yet become radical reformers.

 

said planets that "just wanted independence" sided with said corporations who themselves were never planning to have peace. The war literally only started after the droid army conspiracy was blown wide open.

Again the separatists had a "thousand systems"(which in the movies is treated as a lot, like the 100,000 clones) and existed for two years before episode 2 while the Republic did not have a standing army, that they knew of and clearly the Senate wasn't voting all in favor of making said army.

 

Would you say that the New Republic is more open to secession because technically they conquered those territories from the Empire beforehand? I think this is one aspect that makes the NR's situation much different than the Old from a logistical standpoint, the NR functioned a lot like what it's original name said, an Alliance of Free Planets, only in the Galactic Alliance days did they adopt a more Federalist type of goverment like the original Republic (which is ironic given the name change).

This is the key point i think, it was economically unviable for the Republic to simply allow these key players to secede and form their own state, this entire situation is only possible thanks to Darth Sidious, who orchestated the big corporations to gain such political sway in the first place during Valorum's term in order to make himself out to be the "savior" of the Republic when he protects it's stability, if Sidious wasn't in charge of both sides, i bet the Separatists wouldn't be so radicalized, and the Republic would have been far more open to negotiations so that economic stability isn't at peril with the secession, but with Sidious and Tyranus playing each side it was bound to reach a breaking point.

This, however, i disagree, from the perspective of someone who tried to change the Republic for the better and only saw it go further into militarization and oppression of the outer rim in favor of the core, it would make sense to fight against the Republic during the clone wars as part of one of the worlds that simply wanted better treatment than what they were getting lately, for example Thustra or Jabiim, even if they are not hegemonic, that is not enough argument to discredit their grievances with how the Republic is treating them, by the time the Clone Wars started, the Republic functioned like an Empire in many ways, it even adopted the Moff system midway through the war, by the time of ROTS it was an Empire in everything but name, that the Separatists are equally corrupt (because they are both born of the same evil AKA the Sith's influence over greedy mortals) is irrelevant, such as the fact that it is "democratic", for one Palpatine won the initial elections by buying many senators as well as comitting varying methods of fraud, by ROTS it was well known by the opposition that many senators were corrupt and were bought into Palpatine's side, even before seeing his true face, it was clear that democracy was all but an illusion ever since 32 BBY, not unlike many real world countries throughout history and in the policial landscape today, democracy was merely nominal, and i bet the only reason Palpatine kept the pretense for so long was because of the Jedi's presence, the Republic was beyond "reasoning with" it could only be changed through forcefully deposing the ones in power, which is why the Jedi attempt to do just that, the only reason Padme and her friends don't do so by the time of ROTS i think is simply due to fear, they are way too into it, and speaking treason within the Republic Senate could get them killed, but we see in the deleted scenes that even during the movie Bail is laying the groundwork for the alliance.

One good thing that came from the Clone Wars moving forward was the elimination of the big corporations' power, this is another thing that makes the New Republic's situation much different than the old, the Empire established a monopoly of the galaxy's legitimate businesses (with hands into the Hutt business and Corporate Sector as well), eliminating the Trade Federation, Banking Clan, Techno Union, etc. from the political equation and thus made things easier to handle for the New Republic after the end of the Civil War, now there wasn't any major economic powers that could make a quarter of the galaxy lose their job if they so wished.

I recently found a video of this one guy named Corey who speaks of these issues in what he calls "The Long Clone Wars", tying the issues explored during the Clone Wars all the way back to the Alsakan Conflicts (17.000 BBY - 3.017 BBY) and i think it illustrates why exactly Sidious was able to exploit the corporations' relationship with the Republic in such an efficient way to further the transformation of the Republic into the Empire, it's also a good excuse for me to send somethign tangentially related to Eric Hobsbawm, one of my favorite historians, as the video applies concepts from his work into it's Star Wars analysis:

 

I don't really have proof from the text itself to justify my position, so I confess you have me at a disadvantage there, but despite the Confederacy's desire for free trade as an official cause for secession, I doubt the Republic would allow seceded systems that successfully broke away to engage in free trade with loyalist systems. It just makes sense to me that, if the Confederacy did break away successfully, that the Republic would do all it could to hamper them right out of the gate by slapping tariffs on goods from Confederate worlds.

I don't want to drag real world politics into this, so I hope you'll forgive me for not fully engaging with you on your second point, but I feel that there was still a lot of difference between the Republic and the Separatists and the real life situations you referenced. In most of the cases you referenced, the entities seeking independence were subordinate colonial units, officially and unofficially, that had little real representation in their "empire's" central government. In the case of the American colonies, there had been a series of attempts to reconcile with the crown prior to the Declaration of Independence, such as the Olive Branch Petition, that were rejected.

The seceding worlds were, de jure, equal to any other world in the Republic. Yes there were representational issues, and yes there were certainly cultural attitudes and biases that ensured this prevailing Core-Rim divide, but the worlds that formed the Confederacy, while neglected, were not some oppressed underclass whose suffering was so great that it warranted secession.

The fact that the Republic and the Separatists were still engaged in negotiations prior to Geonosis indicates that even at that late hour the Republic was still willing to address their issues.

Definitely, the New Republic was a reaction (some might argue an overreaction) to the Empire's overly centralized authority. In Legends it spent most of its existence, as you say, as an Alliance of Free Planets. It's size swells and contracts with events. And that is, as you say, largely a response to the fact that it did conquer the territories held by the Empire. What likely happened was that, after a planet was liberated, they were offered the chance to join up or go their own way. I'm sure the NR did all it could to entice as many planets as it could to join, but we know in both Canon and Legends that a lot of worlds went their own way, no harm no foul.

And that did engender a lot of sympathy to the NR with the rest of the galaxy. They weren't the Empire with a new coat of paint. They were a concerted effort to learn and improve on the past.

The problem was they wound up going too far in the opposite direction.

I do respectfully disagree with you that democracy was all but an illusion after 32 BBY. Ignoring Palpatine controlling both sides for a minute, there are small moments here and there even during the Clone Wars where Palpatine's plans are slowed down, even for a bit. Scenes such as in the Clone Wars episode Pursuit of Peace where Padme's speech does momentarily slow down Palpatine's planned bill. Obviously things go ahead as planned in the end, but Palpatine's rulership over the Republic was not as ironclad as it might have appeared to be. Yes, the Republic was clearly transforming into a dictatorship, and by 19 BBY was certainly an Empire in all but name. But I think, at least until the last year of the Clone Wars, there was still a chance, however small, that they could have been brought back from the brink. But that's less fact and more feeling. So everyone here is entitled to disagree.

 

I believe Thrawn actually asks Padme this in one of the Thrawn novels and it actually stumps her for a second.
But I would defer to Palpatine's statement in Episode II: "I will not let this Republic that has stood for a thousand years be split in two!"
On one end it sounds like a matter of pride, but it wouldn't surprise me if there was some debate on whether the systems could even legally succeed in a question not unsimilar to the Unions position in the US Civil War.

 

The Clone War happened because Palpatine wanted it to happen. Even if most Republic senators had acquiesced to the Separatists leaving, all Sidious has to do is tell Dooku to "liberate" a few Republic systems and *bam* war.

How much was the Republic responsible for the Separatist crisis? Exactly as much as the writer of the story says it was. So I guess if we really want to find out, we'll have to ask George Lucas, otherwise we're just grasping at straws.

 

Well naturally, there is the "official" reason that people every day would have thought and the "unofficial" reason that it suited Palpatine's plans.

 

I mean, I disagree that there's a functional Core-Rim divide in regards to the Confederacy vs. Republic. Cato Neimodia, Skako, these were mainline Separatist worlds, more relevant to their cause than even Raxus Secundus, I'd imagine, and they were right in the Core Worlds. The "Outer Rim Sieges" are a bit wrongly named, because Cato Neimoidia was a Core World. So was Foerest, so were other CIS worlds that lasted until the tail-end of the war.

Meanwhile you had worlds out on the rim like Eriadu that were staunchly loyal Republic planets. So there's no clear Rim-Core divide when it comes to the Clone Wars.

We know the official reason, though. To the Republic, the Separatists kidnapped and tried to execute a Republic Senator and two Jedi in a Gladiatorial arena because they found out about their secret military build-up. To the Separatists, it was because the Republic was invading the Separatist world of Geonosis. Its no great mystery, we literally see the Clone Wars kick off on-screen at the end of Episode 2.

 

The conflict of episode 1 is predicated on the Senate not having much authority, centralized or otherwise.

The conflict of episode 2 is about whether the Senate will even make an army which they didn't have for centuries instead relying on local defense forces.

The conflict of cloak of deception is about whether valorum could even wrestle back any modicum of control back from the megacorporations and cause them to *gasp* pay taxes.

Frankly I don't think that the Ruusan Reformation really had as much impact as you are giving it credit for here, it's like blaming the declaration of rebellion for the NR's collapse decades later. The issue is that Megacorps founded within the last few centuries were allowed to accumulate so much wealth and power that they could have obstructionist senators disrupting conversation while they economically intimidate a planet into submission, and even after getting caught escaping any consequences through influence over the judicial system, and with a propaganda machine so powerful that a large portion of the Galaxy thinks of them as heroes regardless.

Afterall: