« Curt Schilling for Senate! | Home | Review: “All About Steve” »
What Can “Star Wars” Teach Us About War?
By Kyle | September 3, 2009
Military strategists are puzzling over why the Rebel Alliance didn’t pursue an insurgency campaign against the Empire instead of taking them on head-to-head in conventional battle situations. I think this reading of the situation misunderestimates the essential contribution of the Ewoks, who were basically furry Viet Cong responsible for destroying Imperial morale, tying up resources and even making possible a counterattack on Son of the Death Star, which was controlled by a station on Endor. I wonder how many strategic studies published in the Empire after the wars questioned the wisdom of building not one but two Death Stars in such a way that they could be destroyed by a single well-placed shot.
September 3rd, 2009 at 4:56 pm
It was never stated outright in the films themselves, but I believe that Death Star II was an effort to lure the bulk of the Rebel Alliance’s fleet out into the open.
Before the Battle of Hoth, the Alliance stuck to planet-bound bases, which was difficult (but clearly not impossible) for the Empire to find. Afterwards, they stayed spacebound, which is difficult to maintain but made them nearly impossible to find.
(Imagine an empty baskeball court with a few handfuls of sand scattered across it. Pre-Hoth, the Empire had to scour the individual grains for the latest Rebel base; post-Hoth, they would have had to look in the space between grains.
So, Emperor Palpatine concocted a brilliant plan to draw them out.
1) Start building another Death Star, a weapon so powerful that the Alliance would use everything it had to destroy it. The Empire can build DS II much more quickly than the first one, in part because the project no longer needed to remain such a secret.
2) Make the second battle station impregnable on completion but a ripe target beforehand.
3) Oversee its completion personally, which would also prevent overly ambitious men like Tarkin from using it against you.
4) Leak all of this to the Rebels, that a second Death Star is being built, where it’s being built, and that the Emperor himself has taken up residence inside.
If his plan had succeeded, the Alliance would have been crushed, the Skywalker problem would have been handled one way or the other, and he would have a planet-killer as a personal flagship.
He just didn’t count of the killer teddy bears or the treachery of his apprentice.
September 4th, 2009 at 12:23 am
The tactical maneuvering in all the Star Wars films was awful as well. (The last three were just plain awful.)
This a society that has produced spaceships that travel at or near the speed of light…but their robots continue to rely on aimed fire weapons? And take dozens of shots to score a hit? They develop walking fortresses that can be tripped up by well-placed vines? They line up their “tanks” in nice neat rows so as to be as vulnerable as possible to incoming “artillery?” I could go on and on (and did in the theater, much to my wife’s dismay…”can’t you just sit back and ENJOY the movie?” “NO, I can’t!”)
I saw Star Wars when I was 15 and thought it the most wonderful movie in the world. George pounded it out of me before I got out of my 40s. An awful movie maker who got lucky…once.
September 4th, 2009 at 1:41 am
What can Star Wars teach us about war?
Bugger all.
It can teach us bags about how to make money from fanboys though. Lucas is the Sun Tzu of geek exploitation media.
September 4th, 2009 at 4:31 am
@K Hahaha - a voice of reason! The sheer gullibility of some people never fails to astound…