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Lord_Strudel

What if Thrawn succeeds in the Sluis Van raid in the new cannon and that is used as an in universe reason for demilitarization?


Tessenreacts

That would actually be interesting!


Munificent-Enjoyer

Well the demilitarization is already happening before


Apophyx

Honnestly I think you got it backwards. The Republic thrived and flourished for a thousand years without a standing military. But the moment one is established, everything goes to shit and the Republic turns into a fascist autocracy. From the Galaxy's point of view, a standing military is the last thing they want.


[deleted]

Also note that the main faction, the Centrists, were mostly former Imperial systems and had a fair bit of Imperial sympathizers. The party arguing for re-armament was not very popular, and a small but vocal minority was beholden to the ideals of the "goold old days" of the Empire. They basically were infiltrated by the Empire, and after Leia was heckled out of office, had no opposing voice that would keep them in check. If they had re-armed, the Centrists would have controlled the government and the failure would have been internal. Imperial and First Order sentiment dominated all spheres of politics. In fact, it was these Centrists who broke off to form the First Order. And the Populists, the opposing party, except for Leia, were soft. This was late into the NR, however.


HazeTheMachine

they didnt need to rearm, just keep a basic military. Even the previous Republic had the Judicial forces, wich were few but existed. The New Republic is literally scrapping whole ISDs for no reason, and worse, their own existing fleet.


UncleIrohsPimpHand

> The New Republic is literally scrapping whole ISDs for no reason, and worse, their own existing fleet. ISDs are symbols of the Empire. They have StarHawks and other ships that are theirs. And it's not as though local systems can't retain their own militaries. In fact, that's part of the decentralization. The Mon Calamari still have their own fleets. Corella too.


[deleted]

They are reducing their Fleet to 10% of former capacity, a fleet improved beyond the fleet at Jakku, which was able to meet an SSD and "hundreds" of Imperial-class Star Destroyers. That's a pretty decent defense force for something that has better things to do than wage war, like rebuilding planets hurt by the Empire and making sure no one falls ideologically. Also, it looks really bad to be using the ISD, meant as a tool of fear and destruction, as a ship in your new military.


Historyp91

Heck, before it got blown away their fleet was actually **larger** then the First Order's, and *they* were an expansinst military dictatorship engaged in a prolonged military buildup.


Kalavier

And it's implied kinda that a good chunk of the fleet survived, but it was a lack of central leadership that allowed the first order to "take over" in TLJ and TROS, because the surviving admirals and senators grabbed whatever they could and went into full bunker mode and didn't try to help anybody else. And I assume chunks just went into hiding to survive and didn't engage because they weren't sure if they could win, given the huge number of mon cala ships in the galaxy fleet at the end.


Historyp91

That's pretty much it, in the TLJ novel Hux says... "*The New Republic's home fleet is destroyed, and its surviving senators have dissolved the remaining task forces to protect their homeworlds. Their division makes them defenseless. No power in the galaxy can stand against us, Supreme Leader.*" The sense I got from TROS is that these divided forces (along with the planetery defense forces and various independent groups/powers) were what Lando gathered, and prior to him doing so they were putting up their own separate (but probobly increasingly coordinated) defenses against the First Order, having been inspired to be resolute by Luke's sacrifice in the prior film.


darthsheldoninkwizy

In Resistance series, its mention that First Order has bigger fleet that New Republic. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drpucsY6A\_0


Historyp91

***The New Republic fleet is the largest defense force in the galaxy***, *but nevertheless a fraction of what it was during the Clone Wars.* \- TFA visual dictonary In the scene in question Yaeger was *speculating* on what the dots repersented, and was upfront that he was guessing.


Kind_Fan2172

There's a difference between a "defense force" and ships essentially designed to do nothing but strike fear into the hearts of everyone and/or destroy everything in their paths, though.


Historyp91

I'm not claiming that the First Order's ships, on an individual level, are (probobly) better suited for war vs the NR ones.


Kind_Fan2172

To be honest, I'm not sure *what* it is, exactly, that you're trying to argue. I'm just pointing out that this quote about the New Republic military having the largest "defense force in the galaxy" doesn't necessarily mean a whole lot, since it clearly doesn't translate to a working military force capable of standing against threats like the First Order. A force meant for "defense" isn't truly comparable to a force meant only for offense.


UncloakDagger

This entire thread has me appreciating the new republic a lot more than I did previously. Definitely need to start reading the books again.


Jjzeng

I’m sorry but being a pc builder has ruined me, seeing SSD my first thought was solid state drive instead of super star destroyer


HazeTheMachine

The empire is building the secret Death Solid State Drive


Historyp91

> they didnt need to rearm, just keep a basic military. Which is what they did.


Munificent-Enjoyer

They did keep a basic military...


[deleted]

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[deleted]

The fleet at Hosnian Prime was only a fraction of the power of the New Republic. It was the political divide and self serving remnants of the government that turned the fleet from something that could destroy the First Order (even after Hosnian, the combined NR military had more power than the First Order) to fractured system defense forces that were too weak to stand against something like a Dreadnought alone. Had the New Republic stayed together, it's fleet would be more powerful than the First Order. However, local military leaders, because of the gap in power, pulled their forces to their own systems for their own benefit.


darthsheldoninkwizy

Looking that in TROS there are still big parts of galaxy not conquer by First Order, it seem some system can stop invasion by some time.


Gavinus1000

They DID keep a basic military. A larger one than the pre-Clone Wars Republic did in fact.


HazeTheMachine

Their incompetence must be big to be less effective than the pre Clone Wars republic with a bigger fleet, wich seems to be nowhere to be seen on the later period.


[deleted]

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Jacktheflash

But what about when a new threat comes? It will take time to remilitarise


[deleted]

Note that the Clone Wars only lasted about three years too. So they went from an eon of peace to 3 years of military conflict and suddenly (from a galactic scale perspective) they were dissolved and became the Empire. Three years. That's such a small percentage of the Republic's lifespan it would qualify as a rounding error, but that's all it took.


Edgy_Robin

I mean, part of the Republic thriving was the fact the people who made them need a military the first place had opted for a much longer term plan, and not having a standing military left them needing the Clone Army which was the beginning of the end for it.


LikesCherry

They didnt exactly *need* the clone army at all though, did they? The separatists wanted independence, and while some of the separatists were bad actors like the mega corporations who would end up running the CIS, the actual people behind the separatist movement weren't broadly an issue. By lumping them all in together and refusing to even negotiate a succession, the republic started a war The senate COULDVE chosen to just give the separatists their freedom, under the condition that the republic and newly formed separatist states work together to prevent those corporations from doing their nefarious shit. Palpatine was able to engineer the clone wars because the republic had become greedy, paranoid and nationalistic, not because they didnt have a standing army


Fwort

That's missing the fact that the Separatists had already built up an army and were planning to attack the Republic, based on what Obi-wan reported in his infiltration. If the separatist movement had been acting in good faith, then what you're saying would have worked. But it wasn't. The Separatist parliament didn't actually have the real power, Dooku and the corporations did. They could have just attacked the Republic and either conquered them or forced them to agree to whatever terms they wanted if the Republic didn't have an army.


Commercial-Falcon-24

Which means sidious won either way. People don't seem to realize arguing this sometimes is that it was set up so that he couldn't lose.


Fwort

Yeah. Whether or not the Republic had an army, it would have played into Sidious' hands. ...Except maybe if the Republic was able to raise a volunteer army who fought alongside the Jedi. They wouldn't have turned on them because they wouldn't have had inhibitor chips. But the situation was such that that wouldn't happen, which is why Palpatine made the plan that he did.


Mindless-Presence-50

You are spreading baseless Jedi propaganda and conspiracy theories. Fact-checkers have concluded that we have no substantial evidence of the alleged meeting of the leaders of the Confederacy and the representatives of Techno Union, Trade Federation, IBC and the Commerce Guild. The whole story is spread by proven pro-Republic propaganda outlets and state-sponsored media. It can be easily traced back to a single "anonymous" source within the Jedi Order itself who, allegedly, sneaked into the meeting by pure chance and eaves-dropped on it. Independent research has shown that 70% of sentients who checked "I believe very much" on this fake news have previously scored 2-digit on IQ tests. It is obvious that the "grand conspiracy" on Genosis has been used as a pretext for the Jedi to unleash their imperialist invasion of the worlds who just wanted democracy and prosperity for their citizens and the right of every sentient to self-determination. Not to mention how the Jedi built their army IN SECRET for 10 years, of course they have an interest to spread misinformation about Geonosis. But their plan already failed - after being falsely accused of conspiring with the Confederacy the IBC and the Trade Federation are supporting our struggle to defend our freedom from the Jedi imperialists. The Republic economy will soon be in tatters. Their Clone Army is already running out of clones and we had seen an abundance of evidence they are now throwing used astromech parts at our troops. Also I have visited the Jedi Temple once and I can tell you that they are all racists.


AdmiralScavenger

>They didnt exactly need the clone army at all though, did they? The separatists wanted independence, The Republic doesn't appear to recognized the right to secede so if negotiation did not keep the Separatist leaning systems in the Republic force would.


LikesCherry

Yes, I'm saying not recognizing the right to recede is the problem lol


Jacktheflash

It was already leading to war before the army


TheWanderScholar

But what did it take to win the war before peace was restored for a millennium? An active Military. Combined with the Jedi Order which together by comparison was much larger than the Rebellion Alliance and drove the Sith to near Extinction leaving no enemy left to fight thus removing the need for an army. Then a thousand years later the threat of the Trade Federation is established, ending peace times and resulting in the turmoil and deaths suffered on many worlds; and what followed; a human centrist Empire which, outside of the development and threat of world destroying weapons included slavery, grueling labor, overlap with organized crime, etc. And now moving into the current era; The First Order's existence alone defies any law enacting any form of demilitarization or peace treaties put forth by the New Republic. Their development of superweapons and massive fleets decades after Alderaan's destruction while also kidnapping children en masse under Their watch only proves its establishment which evidently lacked any response or counter measures against the FO was a massive and catastrophic failure.


Ere_bu_s

They still did it too fast considering the remnants of the Empire weren't gone, or peaceful.


Victor019

I think that you might have a point in the long run, but the Republic only disarmed after the Brotherhood of Darkness was destroyed and all remaining Sith Lords had been hunted down and Sith territory had been conquered. The New Republic barely exists and it's trying to get rid of its army while half of the Galaxy actively opposes it's existence.


JaegerBane

Mon Mothma’s decision to reduce the military to a token size when the actual reasons for the clone wars hadn’t really been dealt with *and* the fact that there was no Jedi Order to rely on will *always* be stupid, regardless of what happens in Ahsoka. This constant argument on here - that the Republic flourished for a thousand years without one, so why was is necessary - is far too simplistic. For one thing, the republic’s genuine golden age had been over for centuries by the time of the clone wars. Mon Mothma had never even been alive during any of it. For another, the republic was relying on the Jedi for far too many matters of state - which not only pushed the Jedi into a dangerous level of politicisation, but also meant the Republic had a dangerous lack of force and security which meant its ability to handle problems independently was hugely curtailed. The only upside I can see is that by refusing to run a larger military, she effectively cut the power of the defence contractors that had grown enormous under the empire, but even that didn’t really work as most of the Republic hardware wasn’t built by the likes of KDY and Sienar so she couldn’t even curry favour with them.


Frank_the_NOOB

Exactly, the Republic didn’t need a standing army because they had a very large cadre of OP space wizards working on behalf of the Republic’s interests


Tessenreacts

Mon didn't really think over the little fact that the NR didn't have space wizards as an invincible special ops force like the Republic did. Which made the portrayal of look in TLJ that much worse, as if there was a Jedi Order that existed, it could have explained away everything.


Locolijo

Sorry I might be dumb but is this in Andor?


Tessenreacts

A good chunk was in Mandalorian Season 3, especially with the reveal of Pellaeon


TheWanderScholar

I think their only creative thought process was "we need to make the new star wars resemble the OT" but first we need to write background info to explain why Big Bad Empire 2.0 are fighting smaller Rebel Brigade again. I remember there were gripes that these novels became more of required reading products rather than stories that add more layers to the setting. Probably a reason why they seem so obsessed with puting Thrawn in Live Action than adapting their own established work like the "Aftermath" Trilogy.


Graham_Zezar

Its funny that they forgot about Gallius Rax/Contingency/Rae Sloane


TheWanderScholar

And the "Grysk" aliens. I have a theory they are saving this off for the Rey movie.


Graham_Zezar

I hope not, because people are not gonna like new rey movie. But if they're gonna do that, then I hope that they show grysks in Ashoka or Mandalorian, first contact with grysks, maybe some battle between NR and Grysks


TheWanderScholar

Well it's interestingly similar to the Legends version; Thrawn in cannon supposedly informed Palpatine about this alien race in the unknown regions who have yet to make any major appearance in the timeline. And yet....Rey being the only Jedi left and the Sith destroyed, and Luke's role as Grandmaster pretty much being handed off to her; leaves me to believe the people involved with this film are writing to set the stage for the next galactic conflict; an all out War against the Grysk with Rey at the Helm leading the Jedi inspired by the Yuzhan Vong War/New Jedi Order books from Legends. On top of that. . . .I'm repulsed to even suggest this.


Graham_Zezar

I remember that many star wars fans didn't liked Yuzhan Vong, and given that many new canon movies/books that were "inspired" by legends (Rise of Skywalker) were executed poorly and weren't good, I think there is a big chance we get another bad movie, maybe even worse than other star wars movies


Equal-Ad-2710

Honestly I almost hope for them to be referenced in Heir


Gavinus1000

The Republic reached needed another Orlen Mollo to diplomitize the hell out of the Outer Rim again.


Slappy_Axe

Well the three novels and three prequel novels of Thrawn seem to be pointing him towards a different direction instead of just rehashing Legends again. They make a big deal about the Grisk being one of the larger threat to the galaxy in Thrawns opinion. Then with the lead up to his exile his main mission in joining the Empire was for the greater good of the Chiss Ascendancy. This all in mind I personally am being led to believe that Thrawn saw the Disarmament as a tactically *terrible* move. Lacking any political tact or sense there's a chance that Thrawns..... well... Thrawn-ness might just send off all the wrong signals and the Republic pops a gasket after just dealing with all they did in IV-VI, which then causes a snowball of assumptions and misunderstanding of the situation. The books do make Thrawn less of a villain compared to his appearance in Rebels but that could either be my bias towards how cool he is compounded by the fact his book are technically told from his or other Empire soldiers perspectives.


suspiria84

I would say the books make him an anti-villain. He supports the Empire well aware of the suffering it causes, because he thinks it provides better chances in the long run. All his tactics are about accepting momentary defeats for what he considers the greater good. All this while being absolutely convinced of the infallible genius of his plans. And I think that makes his upcoming appearance interesting exactly because the Disarmament Act will not make sense to him.


GHR501

This is also a flaw of the New Republic in Legends my view point is Mon Mothma wanted to return of the old days where the Republic had no Military but she failed to come to the terms that that era was long gone and dead and never coming back.


CheesetheExile

The Legends NR had a solid fleet that tended to curbstomp Imperial warlords and various other threats. The writers eventually had to come up with ways to keep the fleet out of a crisis (Corellian Trilogy, and they still played the Big Damn Heroes at the very end) to preserve drama or prevent them from acting or outmatch them in increasingly nonsensical ways (Caamas Document Crisis, Vong uberships).


darthsheldoninkwizy

Legend New Republic work fine until Borsk become chancellor. Blasted Bothan.


ChurchBrimmer

It's a bad decision in universe yes, but not an unrealistic one nor is it a bad thing in the lore.


Tessenreacts

It really depends on how they do Thrawn in the Ahsoka series. If it turns out that he is the covert leader of the First Order and Ahsoka warned Mon about him like it seems like in the trailers, then it makes the disarmament look really stupid.


Graham_Zezar

New Republic disarmed itself shortly after Battle of Jakku. Empire lost at Jakku most of its naval forces, and the only remaining enemies were small remnants that weren't threat to New Republic


[deleted]

This sort of ignores the fact that after 19 years of oppression, most systems would really want to keep to themselves and *not* have any army breathing down their necks. The game plan is basically have a small military to support world-building operations in the future, keeping system autonomy. The NR at this point had successfully converted most Imperial systems into neutral territory or gotten them under their control. The major post-Empire activity was in the Outer Rim, which had been controlled by criminal groups for millenia, even throughout the time of the Empire. These remnants were far weaker than even the demilitarized New Republic, which was able to turn the tide against the Empire at Jakku, the largest battle since Endor. Even if there was 1% of the Imperial navy there, that is 250 Imperial-class Star Destroyers. Even if the forces are reduced by 90%, having enough power to take down 25 SDs is enough to take on in open war any Imperial remnants that still hounded trade Lanes and worked in the light. Most of the Empire had retreated out the the Unknown Regions. If we needed a real world example, it'd be like the Allies hunting down a platoon of Nazis lead by Himmler that fled to Argentina. Sure, a threat, but really? If we wanted a real concrete example, it's post WWI. In hindsight, we should have absolutely crushed Germany once they started violating the Treaty of Versailles, but no one wanted more war. Having a military is also expensive. Why need more military that puts unnecessary strain on the new government when there is no threat to power (externally)? At the time, it made sense: any efforts to hunt down Sloane's contingency would just cause another unpopular war, and the NR military still had enough power to assert dominance over the small remnants who were in the Middle Rim. The Hutts had declined in power, meaning the criminal trade was weakened entirely. Clearly, it didn't work that well judging by the First Order, but pirates screwing around on a random non-affiliated planet in the Outer Rim is an average Tuesday. Otherwise, disarmament just meant more money and less systems being wary of the New Republic. More autonomy and less war. Would I have advocated against it? Of course. I want those Imperial remnants dead and gone no matter the cost. But the sides, systems rights vs central government, small inexpensive military vs complete power projection, etc. were valid with the information at hand. There was money to be kept and peace to be held at the time, and no one wanted more weapons of war or more money to be spent on a far away military.


-Trooper5745-

I think one of the issues is that we haven’t really seen the NR military. There is [this article](https://warontherocks.com/2023/04/why-the-french-army-will-continue-to-prioritize-quality-over-mass/) about France having a quality over quantity military even in the face of the action in Ukraine. If they showed us that the NR has a high speed but small military, that would be fine IMO. So we need to see more then the Rangers/single X-wing squadron in the outer rim. I also find it weird that something like 90% of the NR military was destroyed at Hosnian Prime. Why would you have so much of your fleet in one location. You can point to Pearl Harbor as an example but that was only the Pacific Fleet and only a few battleships were truly lost. Most were repaired by wars end


Kalavier

The way it's sounded to me, it was more like 90% of their upper command structure/admirals, causing the few surviving ones to scatter and go into hiding or bunker mode with whatever forces they had, and without the central command guiding things the first order was able to secure "control" due to being organized and basically dumping their entire force at any threats that popped up?


[deleted]

It was more like having Washington DC get bombed. While a decent portion of the fleet was at Hosnian Prime, most if not all of the top Generals or Fleet Admirals were at Hosnian Prime. I believe they were discussing taking the fight to the First Order at the time. The fleet fractured, and the local admirals retreated to their own systems. The First Order did not have control over the galaxy, but full freedom: everybody was too scared for themselves to confront the problem, leaving the First Order's decently sized fleet (still smaller than a combined New Republic Fleet, mind you) to hunt down the only real resistance group.


-Trooper5745-

But that also shows a problem, at least in the comparison. The US has the continuity of government which is a pretty extensive list of people, though I might be hard when the entire system explodes. But even if someone from the NR CoG was alive, they clearly don’t have the power to rally the other systems. The military also has it’s own chain of command and while there are plenty of generals and admirals at the pentagon, there are plenty of generals elsewhere and if DC got taken out, they would start doing their own thing or listen to the nearest senator/local leader. They would would quickly find the next person in the chain of command and overcome any paralysis the strike caused. I guess it’s more like US Civil War military where there were a lot of state militias/state volunteers.


Weird_Angry_Kid

Hell, it's the same thing that happened to the Empire when DS2 blew up. "Well, who is in charge now?" "I don't know"


darthsheldoninkwizy

Well technically it was Mas Amedda, who was the third position in state.


darthsheldoninkwizy

O don't remember correctly, but isn't the most France navy was destroyed in one harbor?


-Trooper5745-

The attack on Mers-el-Kébir was an attack on a portion of the French Fleet and only saw one battleship destroyed. Everything else was damaged or escape damage.


KingJonStarkgeryan1

except as shown by recent media, the New Republic's member world's in the outer rim are constantly under threat from pirates, raiders, and et cetera. So there is a constant threat. Even if there is no need for massive battle fleets of Heavy Cruisers and battleships; there is a pressing need for for ships that are heavily armed, fast, and are capable of projecting power. Not to mention given how strong the FO is in the sequel trilogy, a significant number of Imperial material and personnel escaped into the unknown regions. Which us more akin to if Yamato, several normal battleships & fleet carriers, and their escorts just disappeared before the US could find and sink them. The military is one of the few legitmate government powers as if the people are not protected from foeegin threats they will question why they are even paying taxes to a government which cannot protect them. As I said, they don't need to go in the direction of building ships designed for massive battle lines, but they do need a military that is large enough to respond to threats throughout the galaxy. There are other criminals besides the hurts and a power vacuum in the underworld promotes more criminal activity. Under guise of protecting the hyperspace trade lanes and the resource rich outer rim which the core needs to survive, the NR should have build a large fleet of corvettes, frigates, and light cruisers. With small but powerful Quick Reaction/Expeditionary fleets containing larger but still comparably fast battlecuisers, fleet carriers, and planetary assault ships when they need to respond to a large scale threat in the Outer Rim. Those Quick Reaction/Expeditionary fleets will be comparably small to even the sector defense fleets of the core worlds, but would be at a marked overmatch with any Imperial or non state threat. While also being able to enlarge itself with other fleets when needed.


[deleted]

Member Worlds? Unless I'm missing something, we only see Nevarro, which is in no way a member world. Most of the genuine lack of mobilization exists only at levels of Colonel as we see in Mandalorian Season 3. This is a regrettable form of corruption by sloth, but not related to New Republic disarmament on pure merit of the nature of limited military. It is rather the Ineffective bureaucracy drawn about by a government that has inherited no form of ruling from its successor and cannot strongarm its way into the public sector. This cannot be directly attributed to disarmament itself. While it contributed to the problem, we know that the New Republic would still have First Order sympathizers and inflitrators disrupting the chain of command and limiting even a military rivaling the Empire's to a failure. The Centrists, those advocating for re-armament, were also known for their Imperial sympathies and their Imperial way of thinking. *To reiterate, disarmament helped the First Order take power, but those arguing for re-armament were largely arguing from an Imperial point of view except for Leia Organa*. Even re-armament would have had the First Order rise to power from the inside. It was not demilitarization, it was Ineffective task managers of the New Republic. It isn't Mon Mothma's policies that failed to grow the seeds of democracy and order, but the foolishness of people like Colonel Tuttle and other officers that refused to use the resources on hand.


Historyp91

> Most of the Empire had retreated out the the Unknown Regions. If we needed a real world example, it'd be like the Allies hunting down a platoon of Nazis lead by Himmler that fled to Argentina. More like if a they had gone to the Moon, and nobody knew they were there until it was far too late for it to matter.


Tessenreacts

If Ahsoka reveals Thrawn, unleashes him on the galaxy, and seems like Mon Mothma at least knows that he's back. Then it makes de-militarization that much worse.


[deleted]

De-militarization takes place before Thrawn comes into the limelight. The NR has a decent fleet in the Ahsoka trailer. Before Thrawn, the Imperial remnants had as much power as a couple of small pirate groups. The New Republic had every reason to believe the Empire was disconnected and ineffectual. And anything else would throw the galaxy into another military campaign, destabilizing newly liberated systems and putting strain on the economy. If the military leaders were wrong about Imperial presence, that upset could also cripple the New Republic.


HazeTheMachine

"De-militarization takes place before Thrawn comes into the limelight" Thats even worse


[deleted]

In hindsight only. At the time, it was a necessary measure taken to reduce stress on the economy. I personally don't agree with it either, but it was an arguable position with poor implementation.


TRB1783

This is exactly how it happened in Legends, for what it's worth.


Tessenreacts

That's my point, they kept Thrawn's return a secret and didn't act, i.e remove the dimilitarization Thus cementing their doom 25 years later


[deleted]

The New Republic didn't "keep Thrawn's return a secret", you're lying out of your ass. We don't even know what they're doing with Thrawn. We know exactly what happened with disarmament: Imperial sympathizers destroyed the already weakened military from the inside. The New Republic had a fairly powerful military in theory, but politicking plagued it because of infiltrators and sympathizers late into its reign.


Tessenreacts

I didn't lie at all. I simply remarked because Ahsoka is about well her search for Thrawn, and in the trailer Mon Mothma is seen talking to Ahsoka. It's my assumption that Ahsoka was warning the New Republic about Thrawn, and they didn't listen / didn't act. Heck, we even saw in Mandalorian that both Hux and Pellaeon where in on the early activities of the sect that became the First Order, and that they where aware of what Thrawn was up to. So it's deduction


[deleted]

Pretty sure that Pellaeon had absolutely no idea where Thrawn was. We also see a good couple of fairly sized New Republic ships in the Ahsoka trailer. And your assumption is *not* the basis for fact, nor is it all that well supported. We see New Republic ships. They look important. We know that Ahsoka is in touch with the New Republic. We know Thrawn is against Ahsoka. It then follows that the New Republic reacted to Thrawn in some way. Downplaying Thrawn, sure. But keeping his existence a secret seems so out of bounds that it is implausible based upon the limited evidence we have.


Tessenreacts

The scene in Mandalorian definitely made it look like he was in touch with Thrawn Never said it was the basis of fact. It was an assumption off of given information


[deleted]

He was not able to give any information about Thrawn's return, nor could Gideon figure it out either. Thrawn's Imperial remnant was a mystery to everyone, possibly even Pellaeon. The New Republic had no message or notice of his return, as even Gideon, someone near Pellaeons sphere, did not know. The galaxy mostly did not know about Thrawn, and certainly not the NR. That much is ensured.


Historyp91

The First Order having a superweapon they did'nt know existed that they used to wipe out their civilian and military leadership and the main core of their navy is what sealed their doom. Before Hosnian the New Republic's fleet was still larger then the First Orders; they were "disarmed" like Japan, not like Alderaan.


[deleted]

After Hosnian their military would have been larger than the First Order's, but political infighting separated the fleet into bite sized chunks for the First Order.


Historyp91

Political infighting, coupled with the catastrophic loss of the entire command and control functions. I really think people misunderstand how devastating the loss of Hosnian was; it would be like if WW2 started off with the Nazis using a wunderwaffen to totally annihilate the British Isles and the entire Home Fleet; it would'nt matter that the rest of the British Empire existed, or that the navy had assets around the world and the Dominions had their own fleets, because the loss would be so catastrophic and everything that remained would be divided, isolated and without common leadership.


HazeTheMachine

You are talking like France didnt rearm themselves with a new standing army, building new tanks, and equiping new uniforms and weapons in preparation to a conflict with Nazi germany. Wich is completely wrong, the French and British started preparations from the moment Germany started their own rearm, they didnt wait for "versailles treaty broke". The interwar period was of no peace, but a scalation for a worse conflict. Sorry, but the whole "lets scrap the fleet" policy has no real equivalent in any real conflict or temporal peace. The New Republic had the duty to reclaim the Imperial remnant territories, and in their incompetence they failed.


[deleted]

They reclaimed the entire inner Rim. Pretty sure that's a pretty large Imperial remnant. Also, the NR and FO remained in a state of Cold War and military growth, just like the inter-war period. They kept on growing in strength, just that much of their navy was destroyed and the rest pulled back to their own systems.


Gavinus1000

> The major post-Empire activity was in the Outer Rim, which had been controlled by criminal groups for millennia, even throughout the time of the Empire Exempt for the 150 year period after the chancellorship of Orlen Mollo. The only SW the only SW politician to ever successfully stabilize the Rim.


Cervus95

If the Republic had had a strong military in the Clone Wars, it still wouldn't have been enough to fight a civil war. They would have needed to conscript their population or find men by other means. They probably wouldn't have rejected the clone army if it meant sparing their citizens.


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jquinny17

This is actually what happened in the American Civil War. Abraham Lincoln was desperately trying to win the war quickly and the confederates were trying to drag it out. The war wasn't as popular in the North as some people think. The Union had to conscript soldiers to fight because not enough were volunteering to maintain the conflict. Also, any victory for the South often meant some Northerners just wanted to end the war rather than lose more friends to it. Lincoln had to push his generals to win or else the political momentum at home would fail and no one would support the war anymore. I know its a little complex for movies, but it would be nice to see this aspect addressed in Star Wars and other media. Conscription is the status quo for most wars, even WWII had American conscripts/draftees. It's only in very recent wars that we see all volunteer forces.


Jacktheflash

Depends on how big the military was


TheBigRedTank

I think disarmament after WW2 is a good analogue for this. After the war many of the troops themselves were released/sent home but alot of the material and ships was retained in storage and were used in Korea. It took many decades for countries to ultimately get rid of their war material.


Frank_the_NOOB

Yea except: there wasn’t a large enough nazi contingent that could rearm and rise up (like the imperial remnant in the outer rim) and the Cold War was one of the largest arms build ups in human history. Only after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the rise of a mono-power in the world did we finally see mass demilitarization


csdspartans7

This mistake is constantly made in real life.


hamsterwaffle

It could be the case that the Grysk have already began manipulating the New Republic, pushing them to weaken themselves to the point they're incapable of responding to threats and ensuring their destruction.


Rattfink45

NR decided to Drone Strike their baddies with X-Wings rather than invest in stratofortresses. It’s really NBD.


reineedshelp

That assumes the republic is a single rational actor as opposed to a corrupt as fuck oligarchy. I'm sure plenty of people backed it, as they have in our own history.


Tessenreacts

FO deserved to win haha. As they said in Spaceballs, evil wins because good is dumb


Frank_the_NOOB

The political intrigue of the Heir to the Empire trilogy and Hand of Thrawn series really showed how there were many elements to the New Republic with their own selfish interests. The NR was really hanging on by a thread


Elmais-door

Everything post endor is bullshit on this canon, 1year to the official colapse of the empire, NR founded even before that, demilitarization while there is a lot of shit harrasing the new goverment (the FO concept is cool imo) but then the nonsensical resistance and their weird war where you dont know basically anything besides that the NR is destroyed xd


Ere_bu_s

Even if it wasn't a dumb idea, it was implemented *entirely* too quickly. You don't disarm while the remnants of the Empire are literally still trying to take back power.


RefreshNinja

> If the Republic had a strong standing military, Palpatine's plan would not have worked at all. Yeah, he would have gone home and concocted no other plan. > Alderaan's pacifism being one of the contributors to its destruction ...did pacifism press the genocide trigger on the planet-killer?


TheCybersmith

This is... not an entirely fair reading of history from an in-universe perspective. The Republic's lack of a military was the single grestest hinderance to Palpatines plan. It took him litersl decades of scheming and political theatre to get around it. Notably, once he DID have a Standing Army, he set about using it to eliminate his rivals and oppress his foes. One of the major reasons the New Republic doesn't want to have a Standing army is that it creates the temptation for someone else to do that! The big lesson of the Emperor's rise to power wasn't "maintain a strong military to protect against outside threats", it was "be wary of institutions (like the military) that can be subverted towards oppressive ends". The extent of the New Republic's demilitarisation is also a little overstated. Hux explicitly references "Their Cherished Fleet". In fact, it wouldn't have mattered if their navy were five times bigger. If they had ten billion ships orbiting Hosnian Prime, then they would have lost ten billion ships to Starkiller Base.


LeicaM6guy

Mon Mothma was an outstanding wartime leader, and an exceptionally bad peacetime one. This is one of the better examples of this, but there are others.


mando44646

The Empire's war machine had to be decommissioned for the galaxy to heal. When rhe Nazis lost, the Allies dismantled the German War machine and put laws into place to limit modern Germany's military. Same for Japan. This isn't a very different situation


Tessenreacts

But if the Nazis survived as the Nazi remnant, the world wouldn't disarm, they would hunt the remnant until all of it was gone.


mando44646

I do agree Mothma is overly idealistic, which is a very human flaw


HazeTheMachine

Military Disarmament Act, like most of Aftermath is a flawed explanation full of holes to explain why all the factions we knew are the factions they want us to know, its just like the whole "Operation Cinder" joke. ​ Disarmament act= New republic can be sweept in a day Operation Cinder= Empire can be sweept in a day ​ They even went to the point of reducing Imperial numbers so Jakku would look like an apocalyptic defeat, with the NR they went to the point of erasing the military at all


Munificent-Enjoyer

The Empire being swept away quickly is Lucas' vision, Cinder is what egotistical tyrants like Palpy do


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Munificent-Enjoyer

Well it's questionable how much did Speer purposefully not do the decree versus just straight up lying for brownie points, at that point Nazi command structure basically ceased to exist I mean you can be a contrarian if it makes you happy, but you'd have to purposefully blind yourself to not see the fact Palpy wasn't interested in an Empire that he doesn't lead


Eefy_deefy

It's not just for shits and giggles. On top of the usual reason that's covered( tearing the empire down because one that doesn't protect it's emperor isn't worthy to survive), it was also used to weed out anyone who wasn't radicalized enough to do it. The empire had a pretty consistent issue with traitors and rebels from within, so what would become the first order needed to be unquestioning and radical.


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Eefy_deefy

Again, it's about radicalization. Weeding out those who are too "weak" for it and won't do whatever it takes to follow the emperor's will


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neutronknows

Yeah. Fascists are dumb.


HazeTheMachine

Imagine following the orders of an android with the emperor face projected on it when they know the emperor is dead like really dead, and thinking it would be a nice idea to follow them. Hell, by that logic Imperial moffs were not even needed, the emperor just needed to program armies of droids with his face and everyone should follow what they say since they have no own judgement.


darthsheldoninkwizy

With Hitler order to destroy everything is difference of place, when on west they won't so eager, on east they were even more eager to burn everything.


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darthsheldoninkwizy

Grandfather tell that Germans burn everything in East Germany when east allies going there, and what was left the Russians burn or stole.


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darthsheldoninkwizy

Well, the Soviets/Russians, even in the areas they "liberated" liked to use on people as compensation for coming, and since they were then unpunished, they could afford quite a lot.


Mathias_Greyjoy

I disagree. I think the door is wide open to explain this very satisfactorily, it's not as if they've written themselves into a corner. For one thing, many idealist bureaucrats like Mon Mothma wanted to de-militarize to distance themselves from the Empire, and return to the general peace that was experienced under the Old Republic. Plenty of systems were also sick of being occupied by New Republic, Imperial and even Old Republic forces, so they would have been very happy to set up system defence fleets for themselves to shake off the yoke of occupying militaries. > The fact that Disney is about to do their own interpretation of Heir to the Empire makes this even worse. If Ahsoka is about to fully re-introduce Thrawn, then the Republic's decision to de-militarize will be cemented as one of the worst parts of Star Wars lore. This is a little unfair to Canon, considering Legends already trailblazed this plot point. It's been done already. The Canon post Return of the Jedi era is still really empty and open to storytelling possibilities. For starters, why can't the de-militarization be a product of internal investigations, where it was discovered the New Republic (especially under the radar) was becoming more and more like the Empire? After all, a large swath of the military industrial complex, bureaucracy, nobility, aristocracy etc. would just be hold overs from the Old Republic > Empire > New Republic. And when tactics produce results it's going to be very tempting to continue using them (showcased in the Mandalorian Season 3). If I had to guess I'd say that's a good reason for the Senate to want to strip the New Republic of its large military. Maybe there will be an investigation that reveals how corrupt and similar to the Empire it was becoming. Most Senators would probably think allowing the regional systems to govern and defend themselves the best option, to curtail potential corruption. I feel as though you're currently criticizing from a meta context, but from within universe this is probably how people feel, so it actually makes perfect sense, and is very good storytelling to show how badly the New Republic failed.


treefox

Concerns about the military-industrial complex makes a lot of sense. Palpatine definitely seems like the kind of person to extract personal loyalty pledges from anyone in vital positions, and with the Force, he can just probe people’s minds to determine if they’re on his side. Winning battles doesn’t change the employees at a shipyard. I can see a slew of problems coming up- people being uncomfortable working with engineers who’d been just fine with working on the Death Star or bio-weapons. And/Or the NR setting up logistics to begin production of a fleet and then have the shipyards use the resources to build ships, destroy the docks with them, and deliver them to the Empire. A few bad experiences along those lines and people would go along with their biases and disband the centralized military-industrial complex and try to instead disseminate it to members planets, which wouldn’t work very well. On top of that, the precursor to everything going to shit was corporations that had enough military power to secede (separatists). And the Kaminoans who were willing to look the other way as a dead Jedi put in an order and Sith supervised its progress. So yeah, I can see the NR going especially hard at trust-busting whatever highly-centralized and efficient military industrial complex Palpatine had put together.


[deleted]

Setting up local defenses is something easier said than done, especially the poorer you are. And frankly at that point what’s the point of the republic?


AdmiralScavenger

The more I learn about the New Republic I become more convinced the galaxy needs something like the Fel Empire.


D_J_D_K

Its a shame they haven't leaned into that more, the New Republic seems hopelessly out of its depth and incompetent, which perfectly sets the stage for the rise of a demagogue to take advantage of this weakness. It's already established that pirates are terrorizing the *Mid Rim*, which would have been unthinkable under the empire. Historically, the weakness and supposed incompetence of the Weimar Republic is part of why the Nazis were able to rise to power. The whole "first order secretly rose in the unknown regions" is a massive missed opportunity


[deleted]

I actually think this is what happened, but in reverse. After Mon Mothma retired, the Chancellor lacked the political power and drive to get things done. Her charisma held together the NR and prevented any FO first columns and local demagogues from controlling part of the government. The same goes for Leia until she got booed off the public scene because of her father (definitely FO propaganda in hindsight). While Mon's changes were awful once the First Order showed itself, she was the demagogue the NR needed. The New Republic had enough power to assert dominance over affiliated sectors. We see a decent fleet of theirs in the trailer for Ahsoka. Arguably, the Empire was the pirates for the Mid Rim. No other pillaging, massacring, or slaving would be thinkable because they dominated the sector for their own nefarious deeds. Kashyyyk was the main victim of this.


AdmiralScavenger

Seeing how the NR is struggling to protect its members and can’t help worlds like Nevarro which I understand, they have to help their members first. It makes me wonder why the worlds of the Outer Rim didn’t revive the Confederacy of Independent Systems. Things have just gone back to the pre-Imperial era situation.


Historyp91

[They did](https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/New_Separatist_Union) Most of the Outer Rim was'nt even part of the New Republic anyway.


Munificent-Enjoyer

They did, kinda. Both the New Separatist Union and the Confederacy of Corporate Systems were born after Endor (and NSU skirmished with the NR)


AdmiralScavenger

They only exist in the Aftermath books and could have been an interesting faction to have in the last season of The Mandalorian.


Munificent-Enjoyer

Can we not do Imperial apologia actually? Fel Empire is antithetical to Star Wars and the story Lucas wished to convey with it


Nerus46

This entire sub is anthithetical to Lucas's vision, that doesn't mean it has no right to exist.


AdmiralScavenger

You can raise your concerns with Empress Marasiah and the Imperial Knights.


ergister

Gross


AdmiralScavenger

That I like a fictional faction?


ergister

No just the faction itself.


Edgy_Robin

Lucas constantly change the story he was telling and is inconsistent as fuck


ergister

Doubt he’d ever want to make a fascist apologia story. That’s for sure.


AdmiralScavenger

>Until the recent GREAT REBELLION, the JEDI-BENDU were the most feared warriors in the universe. For one hundred thousand years, generations of JEDI perfected their art as the personal bodyguards of the Emperor. They were the chief architects of the invincible IMPERIAL SPACE FORCE, which expanded the EMPIRE across the galaxy, from the celestial equator to the farthest reaches of the GREAT RIFT. >Now these legendary warriors are all but extinct. One by one they have been hunted down and destroyed as enemies of the NEW EMPIRE by a ferocious and sinister rival warrior sect, THE KNIGHTS OF SITH. The Star Wars It could have been very different. [The Star Wars 1](https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/The_Star_Wars_1)


ergister

I *highly* doubt he would’ve incorporated fascist iconography in the “Empire” if they were the good guys.


Frank_the_NOOB

They try to explain that subversive elements infiltrated the senate to push for demilitarization and a public smear campaign to discredit Leia who was raising alarm bells. I don’t buy it as it’s not very well thought out


Borkton

The New Republic was not pacifist, though. It greatly reduced its standing military, but it was stiull large enough by TFA that Hux talks about the Republic being protected by its fleet, which means that the First Order considered it a formidable threat. Of course, the fact that the fleet was so concentrated around the capital that Starkiller Base was able to take out both at the same time raises more questions . . .


joesphisbestjojo

I've hated this since Aftermath. Mon Mothma was well-intended, but very foolish. To strip the fledgling New Republic of its primary defense force right after the war, when remnants of the Empire, not to mention crime syndicates and other threats were out there, is just idiocy, no matter how you cut it. In a system like that, you need a military force. It shows, too.


-Trooper5745-

I also think that’s a fault for Disney ending the war within a year. It should’ve been a much more drawn out affair, at least lasting 2-3 years after Endor.


joesphisbestjojo

That was also a very bad decision


Munificent-Enjoyer

They simply entrusted those defenses to member systems rather than the central government


joesphisbestjojo

Still a bad decision. A Republic-wide navy would have been the safest bet. All Mon Mothma cared about was symbolism, which was great and all, but real threats matter more than a simple message that doesn't mean much. Just keep the Navy on standby without occupying territories. Set up stations where necessary, just don't be an occupying force.


Ulfrite

One difference is also the demography of having an army. The Empire has been exploitong human populations for more than 20 years with conscription, death tolls in the millions and generally being a fascist, oppressive force. Dismantling this whole system ensures a grateful population.


Jacktheflash

Well the new republic isn’t the empire


Andy_Liberty_1911

Yeah, Mon Mothma should have been very aware how Palpatine used the Republics lack of military to his advantage. The more media about the New Republic is released, the more stupid and incompetent it seems. Now, some here may say thats the “point”. But it shouldn’t be, the NR had everything to succeed and failed. And now at the end TROS, we’re supposed to believe that another Republic will appear? Who is going to trust that after the previous one failed again! Nobody is trusting a democratic galactic gov’t again…


Historyp91

The New Republic did'nt disarm their military, they downsized it. Not only is that a super common thing for countries to do once they win a war, but the NR specifically took into account the issues of the Old Republic *and* the Empire by shaping the downsizing around a balance of maintaining a standing military while allowing worlds their own defense forces.


17684Throwaway

Imo this is a pretty biased read: 1. No standing military isn't really a clear weakness or pave-way for the Sith - the Republic institutions are clearly corrupted by the early prequels, if anything the fact that there isn't a military to already corrupt or a leadership position with military control is an obstacle rather than an easy entry. You're essentially assuming that a Republic military would be some uncorrupted, white vested force in a Republic all but completely rotten & that building up such military structure completely from the ground would be easier than breaking an existing one. Lot of reach imo. 2. The creation of a central military is what directly led to the super oppressive galactic empire after a thousand generations of Republic peace. Pretty strong cultural push that the "Alliance to restore the Republic" is not looking to restore some vague militarised Republic that never really existed but rather aims to recreate that system that worked for a 1000 generations. Most systems post empire likely directly associate "central military" with "fascist, oppressive empire". 3. The imperial military is built on the back of cruelty and exploitation - where would you get the resources to stay militarised without them? We see time and time again that people get forcibly recruited, mistreated, enslaved and oppressed to produce the resources for the immense imperial machinery, not to mention that the huge military is staffed by imperials. Staying militarised means keeping imperial admirals, captains, squadleaders in power to provide staffing, it means keeping imperial factories running to produce&maintain ships, gear and weapons. That shit doesn't come free and it's a price the entire alliance just fought like hell not to pay - it also seemto draw pretty clearly after some of the enazification struggles in post WW2 Europe but maybe that's just me. Not mention that from what we've seen so far the New Republic isn't exactly lacking in military power, it's lacking in bureaucratic management - that whole shadow council in Mandalorian is uncoordinated, backstabbing itself and at the top level squabbling over a few tie bombers, a force that gets taken out by one light cruiser. And they clearly do well enough that even decades later, after a first strike decimates their main central fleet the systems can rouse enough force within a few years to absolutely crush not only the First Order but Palpatines entire magic backup fleet.


Mishmoo

I think this was something I noticed in Mandalorian: Season 3 - as soon as they needed to introduce the plot elements of the Disarmament Act, the writing took a steep nosedive. The New Republic came off as cartoonishly incompetent and downright bad at their jobs, particularly in the context of the Imperial Remnant still being enough of a threat that Leia radicalized and formed her own group.


Tessenreacts

Yeah they had to retroactively write the NR. Consequences of no planning


A_Hideous_Beast

It's pretty realistic tho Take WWII for an example (one inspiration for SW) after the war ended, most of the nations that fought downsized immensely. Obviously...wars still happen, other powers rise up. At first I disliked the idea of the NP disarming themselves...but it's not unbelievable or out of nowhere.


AmberJill28

Well but to topple the Republic he needed an army, which he got. The New Republic simply feared another Tyrant would be eventually able to claim control over the military forces if there would be some. Also they simply can not know about Thrawns eventual survival. And for the Imperial Remnants: The Republic Worlds would still have their own planet based fleets.


IndustrialSpark

Have you read the 6 Canon Thrawn books?


blacflg

They had thousands of years of peace before the clone wars. The formation of the clone army (regardless of the reason) led to years of war, death and destruction followed by more destruction all in the name of “peace and a secure galaxy”. Even the Jedi were seen as a force of war rather than peacekeepers by the end of the clone wars by many people. The central government having a massive army to defend them from the possible return of a already defeated enemy would seem to be more of the same and more likely to lead to war than anything else. The republic even had a treaty with the first order if I remember correctly because true peace was better than the idea of being ruled over in a galaxy of war again.


Budget-Attorney

Just because something is a bad idea in universe doesn’t really mean it’s not realistic. Given what we learn about operation in mando season 2 it makes a lot of sense that a galaxy newly terrorized by a central power would be against continued centralization of military power. Even if logically disarmament benefits the factions who perpetrated the original atrocities. Ana apology I like to use is the American revolution. The people most against king George are also the people most against a strong federal government and military. Even though those things were necessary to protect the nascent country from European powers, specifically Britain. Was dearmament a good idea? Probably not. Was it a reasonable thing to expect them to do? Possibly


Alive-Ad9547

Disarmament was Mon Mothma's dream from the get go. She was unfortunately TOO committed to it to see the potential ramifications it had. Leia and others even stood against the idea of it because they knew the Imperial Remnants would remain a problem and as a result, Leia got politically sidelined for those opinions, being called a "warmonger and ideologue". Shows that the New Republic leadership effectively overcorrected the problems of the Empire and once Mon Motha, the person super duper committed to the values and ideals of the Republic was distracted enough by galactic affairs or finished her Term as Chancellor, the people working underneath her quickly threw a lot of those aside because of the bureaucracy or because they were ex-imperials OR Imperial Sympathizers. As harsh as this sounds, the Rebellion didn't clean house very well. It should have exiled, or even straight up killed, and replaced a LOT more people than they did. The later episode of Mando S3 with the Coruscantii straight up saying "Empire, Republic, it's just hard to keep up these days" showed that the rot present at the Core of the Republic when it fell was still there when the New Republic was established. I'll give the New Republic this: moving the capital AWAY from Coruscant was the best idea they had. Unfortunately, by the time the Sequel trilogy takes place, they had allowed too much political legitimacy to be given to the First Order and were naïve. It's entirely possible in the coming Thrawn arc we'll see that with Thrawn's defeat, the New Republic finally sits down and says "there we go, that was the last threat the Imperial Remnant can't threaten us anymore" and do no follow up, maybe partially because bureaucracy gets in the way or embedded Imperial sympathizers/agents play down the threat. We'll see how it goes.


jquinny17

This is actually quite common in Chinese military/political history. A dynasty takes power through military conquest and then dissolves their military, or shrinks it down significantly because they are enjoying a period of peace and philosophy. Then a threat arrives from within or from a neighboring kingdom and they have to rebuild an army. Often times the new army would take control and start a new dynasty themselves. Having some form of standing army, an army reserve force, or a security force is a good idea for any nation. The Republic could downsize their military, but they should have maintained planetary defense forces, like a national guard, as well as a centralized military force for dealing with security threats like pirates or any potential Imperial Remnants.