Rebel Alliance-Terrorists?

Stick with me on this.

Here we have the Death Star. it's the size of a moon, and holds a planet sized destroyer. Manning it is a group consisting of thousands of the galaxy's most able men. Some of them, such as Motti, want to use the Death Star for power, but i'm sure that many of those men were just regular joes who were trying to better themselves. heck, some of them could have had families back home.

Then comes along the RB and Luke Skywalker. Largely through the efforts of Luke, the DS is destroyed, taking with it a high percentage of the empire's senior officers, and also hordes of officers, trops, and others.

The point i'm trying to make, isn't that essentially terrorism, killing all those men like that?

I'm probably reading too much into this though.

 

No, it's a military target.

 

Clerks talks about this.

Terrorism itself is all about terror. It's in the name. The Rebel Alliance wasn't going to destory the Death Star to scare or terrorize the Empire. It was a military target. The "avearge joes" knew full well what was going on and the risks.

 

Yeah, it's terrorism.

And the Empire is a bunch of Space Fascists.

Is it wrong to terrorize Space Fascists?

Or is murdering 5 billion+ Pacifists not good enough anymore to qualify for evil?

 

terrorism = the deliberate killing of innocent civilians in an attempt to make someone capitulate. I don't remember the rebels doing this...

 

From an Imperial point of veiw I'm sure the rebels were considered terrorists, of course I think those who lived on Alderean would probably feel it was the other way around. What was happening was a civil war, so yes the Death Star was a Military target. Men like Motti who had a part in blowing up innocent planets really shouldn't be living in "glass" Death Stars.

Terrorist is a popular term in todays world but you can't always simply trust the goverments opinion of what is a terrorist. Too many of today's goverments use that word way to loosely. The term Terrorist State as it refers to Iraq, Iran or North Korea is the quickest example of this I can think of. I personally don't believe the word terrorist has anything to do with those countries, just as the word terrorist has nothing to do with the Rebel Alliance. Rebellion is the term for the Alliance, not Terrorism. A terrorist act would be attacking innocent citizens not military assets.

 

But wouldn't that make the RA a bunch of hypocrites?

 

It would be a valid argument, If the death star was just an extra large space station crewed by ordinary scientists, researchers, support personel. But that wasn't the case. The Death Star was a military instalation first and foremost. Moreover, it was a military instalation with a weapon of mass destruction built into it, a weapon of mass destruction that had just recently been used on a peaceful planet with no weapons populated by billions of civilians. Some of the people on Alderaan may have supported the rebel alliance, but that did not mean all of them did. You are right about one thing though, there probably were many people on the death star that did not deserve to die, but there were many more on alderaan that also did not deserve to die. If the Death Star hadn't been destroyed, how many more innocent people would have died?

ter·ror·ism
1. the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, esp. for political purposes.
2. the state of fear and submission produced by terrorism or terrorization.
3. a terroristic method of governing or of resisting a government.

Acording to those definitions the Death Star was proof of Imperial Terrorism. Tarkin states it. "Fear will keep the systems in line, fear of this battle station." The purpose of the Death Star was to control the Empire through fear.

No, It makes the empire hypocrites.

 

As Clerks has argued, pretty much anyone there who could be seen as an innocent was aware what they were getting themselves into and were there because of their personal politics. If they didn't want to be associated with the war or the Empire, they would not have been there. This is of corse with the exception of the prisoners, onboard, but that is a relatively small number. Acceptable casualties, and most of them were probably rebels anyway.

The Death Stars were true military targets, and therefore, it was true military action, not terrorism.



Now that's not to say that the RA may not have used terrorist tactics at other points in the war. Especially if you took the Imperial perspective I'm sure other incidents can be seen as terrorism.

But the Death Star? No way.

 

I havn't seen Clerks, Is it good?

sorry to get off topic

 

But that was probably the only way somebody could make it in the galaxy. Not saying there were other ways for someone to work, but maybe the military was essentially the way to go for young men. Sure they might have known what they were getting into, but maybe they were forced to work on it or something.

 

Let's face it. The issue of "innocent civilian" in war time is going to be something that no government can fully avoid. The Death Star is something we'd like to view as populated entirely by scene chewing evil doers. However, while we can probably all agree there's nothing wrong with killing Grand Moff Tarkin and maybe the triggerman on Alderaan, there's the simple fact that Luke also killed God knows how many Janitors, Bartenders, and Imperial Conscripts.

It's equivalent in working in a nuclear missile silo. If someone drops the bomb on say, Canada, on an evil monster's orders then does George in the barracks deserve to die?

Probably not.

On the other hand, it's probably the height of hypocrisy to say that it's not a good idea to blow up said Missile Silo to prevent it again.

Edit: Here's the scene in question with an unfortunate mild soundtrack behind it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6lzEhoXads

 

Well, duh, they're terrorists.

 

The Alliance had every right to destroy the Death Star. It was an act of war not terrorism. The Death Star was a military target, it was not civillian. I'm sure the soliders on board had families but they knew the risks when they joined. If they were forced on they could have resisted and had a chance of living.

The Rebels destroying the Death Star was no different than the British sinking the Bismark.

 

We have to remember that the Rebel Alliance was a very fluid and disconnected organization. I am sure there were more than a couple cells that engaged in questionable behavior, and probably used the guise of "freedom fighter" to cover up criminal activities.

Destroying the Death Star wasn't terrorism, it was self-defense. As I remember, the Death Star was two seconds (or so) from blasting Yavin 4 into intergalactic space dust.

 

Considering "Terrorism" holds the definition the current government gives it, labelling a group "a terrorist organization" is foolish beyond reasoning.

 

The Death Star was a military target, but the Rebels Alliance cells have been portrayed of doing few little act of terrorism. One would except there realistically to be much more and so what? You can't fight against evil, oppressive government without getting your hands dirty. The Rebels killed and did intend to kill far less people than the Empire. And the side who kills less is the one who is more right and whose victory is the better choice, even if there would be civilian victims left dead beside their road to victory.

 

i'm going to reiterate what someone has already said here....

so any time the rebels attacked definite military targets = acts of war.

anytime they attacked noncombatant civilian targets = acts of terrorism.


grey area: attacking a noncombatant when intelligence reports claim they are combatants.

 

Rebel Alliance-Terrorists? i would say its Obi-wan Kenobi=true
meaning only "..from a certain point a view"..

Shadojoker

 

It was staffed by the military and had just blown up a planet of pacifists and was about to blow them up, if that doesn't make the Death Star a legitimate military target then what is.

 

The Rebel Alliance is a terrorist organization. Destroying the Death Star, however, is not a terrorist act.

Releasing convicted murderers, arsonists, and spice addicts onto Coruscant, slaughtering the entire staff of the Imperial palace, and inciting riots, in contrast, are. I also seem to recall Jello once mentioning how they fired on fleeing aristocrats and nobles from Ralltiir, but I can't substantiate that one.

 

This is the Death Star we're talking about. They're not going to post draftees. They're not going to post soldiers who didn't like the Empire but had no other viable option financially. This isn't some crappy patrol vessel, this is the ultimate power in the Universe which the Empire managed to keep quiet for almost 20 years. They're not going to be scraping from the bottom of the barrel for this, but rather taking the best and the brightest the Empire has to offer. You're going to have some of the most competent, not to mention pro-Imperial soldiers around. Remember how the 501st was stationed on the Death Star for a while? Well find equivalent groups from all branches of the Empire, and that is who I'd expect to see manning the Death Star. Extremely legitimate military targets. People who's loyalty would never be questioned.

As for the janitors, bartenders, etc. The vast majority of those jobs can be filled by droids, and if the even that they're not, you can be sure it isn't some out on his luck bartender making one last grab for a successful business. These civilians are going to have high up connections to have even heard of the Death Star, much less be given an offer to work on it. They will be very aware, and again, Personal Politics will come into play.

 

Wrong. The imperial Palace staff was collateral damage. The Imperial Palace itself is a military target, and any civilian who dies in an attack on a military target is simply collateral damage.

 

That's not what Death Star says.

 

Lord_Vivec: "Wrong. The imperial Palace staff was collateral damage. The Imperial Palace itself is a military target, and any civilian who dies in an attack on a military target is simply collateral damage."



Now that's just silly of you to say.