Wednesday, February 13, 2013

Decisive Battles: Hoth 3ABY

Oh. My. Fucking. God.

Have you ever come across something that you recognize immediately as It, The Shizzle, the Sweet Spot, that spookily perfect fit for your brain housing assembly that somehow manages to hit every refractory nerve ending dead smack center?

Well for me this one touches 'em all: Military history. Science fiction (or, to be exact, space opera) High Nerdism. Star Wars. Academia.

Oooh. Yes. Ya got me, Ackerman; right in the ten ring.

I can die a happy man now.

And - once you've read through Inside the Battle of Hoth at first link, then it's over to here for a CMA-style symposium on the original monograph and discussion of critical analysis of the battle itself:
"We do not speak of the sources of failure, but they should be well known. The first was the commitment of extensive resources to the construction of strategic weapons which could, by their very nature, make no tactical contribution. The second was the decision to abandon the tactics and procedures which had won the Clone Wars; well equipped clone armies honed to razor sharp conventional military effectiveness. We have little space here to revisit the destructive “Clones can’t do Counterinsurgency” debates that helped lead to a shift in personnel policies, but it is clear that these misguided efforts to defuse the rebellion by co-opting individual insurgents inevitably produced a force unready to fight high intensity, conventional battles against dedicated, well-equipped, and well-trained foes." (Farley, 2013)
Yes! Beyond awesome; awesomesauce! This is taking George Lucas and running with his incapable-of-writing-normal-human-dialogue ass at it's finest!

Enjoy.

4 comments:

Leon said...

You could do something on the design and procurement process of the Death Star...

Leaving large "shoot torpedo here" openings to your reactor should be a basic no-no.

Swanditch said...

The author of the original article ignores the fact that the chief motivation, whether fully conscious or not, for Vader's actions was the desire to capture his son and daughter alive. Either one of them alone presented a greater threat to the Empire than the entire rest of the rebellion. In other words, there was a secret agenda for the invasion.

FDChief said...

Both of your comments are addressed right in the articles in the symposium:

Leon - from Crispin Burke's Vader Lost Bigger At Bespin: "By the next film, Vader’s been removed from field command, relegated to overseeing defense contractors working on yet another flawed and bloated acquisitions program.

"Shoot Missiles Here"?

Yep.

Swanditch - from Daniel Nexon's Feel the Power of the Dark Side": "But such errors pale in significance to Ackerman’s disturbing lack of faith. He dismisses Vader’s approach as a “classic fiasco” of “theology masquerading as military judgment.” Ackerman clearly underestimates the power of the Force — and thus the strategic context of the Hoth engagement. The rebellion was a relatively “insignificant” component of the true battlespace of Star Wars: the Force itself and the Jedi-Sith struggle over its proper balance."

This whole thing is just insanely awesomely awesome...

Swanditch said...

Yeah, Nexon and to an extent Gerald get it right. Focussing on the externals of the battle is a mistake.

Tangentially, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xV7Ha3VDbzE