Luke Skywalker and the Rebel Alliance
“How do you bring down an empire?” The question came from a shrew-eyed history major in the study area of the liberal arts building. It was a rhetorical question; he was speaking to the wall. Propped up on his lap was a book on the history of Rome. No else paid him any mind. I don’t think anyone even noticed. I was seated nearby and heard the question. Startled, I looked at him. For an instant I thought he was talking to me. But then he went back to reading. The question haunted me for quite a while, and I was recently reminded of it.
How do you take down an empire? Assuming that you’re not a rival empire that is. History gives plenty of examples of people who have tried to bring down various empires. Some succeeded. Many more failed. How did they do it? What were the determininants? What approaches worked best? These are the questions I will attempt to answer in this series of essays. I have decided that there are three types of approaches: the Direct, the Indirect, and the Combination approach. I’ll cover the first in this essay and the latter two in later ones. I may follow up with a concluding essay. I am not yet sure.
First my disclaimer (otherwise known as my cover-my-own-ass-I-hope-because-I-would-look-really-bad-in-an-orange-jumpsuit statement): This series of essays is meant to be a rhetorical, thought provoking theoretical exercise. It is in no way meant to be taken literally as something that could or should be done to any currently existing legitimate government and certainly not to the United States government. This applies despite the fact that I consider our current government to be illegitimate and that it is repulsively, repeatedly, flagrantly, callously, shallowly, defiantly, haughtily, violating the most sacred of our documents –the U.S. Constitution –to the point where they are figuratively (and for all I know, literally) using it for toilet paper. And despite the fact that I once swore an oath to uphold said Constitution against ALL comers –foreign and domestic. And that, once again, I think the current incarnation of our government is hell bent on turning that precious document into toilet paper. This statement is made because I don’t like the thought of creepy men in black suits showing up on my door step. If I disappear, call the ACLU. And I guarantee you one thing: I’ll recite said Constitution word for word at my “hearing”, though I doubt many of them will even know what it says. (Article I, Section…)
Okay, on to the essay.
Let’s say you live in a vast, far reaching, very powerful Evil Empire (and what Empire wasn’t Evil? Name it! I dare you.) You want to bring it down. But how do you do this? How can you fracture something so much more powerful than you are? And preferably, do so without ending up dead yourself. As I said before, I see three approaches. The Direct Approach, the Indirect Approach, and the Combination Approach. I call the first approach the Luke Skywalker Method. If you can’t figure out what this one is (and you grew up in mainstream American culture) I suggest getting a CAT scan or taking an IQ test. The second I call Gandhi’s Way. That will be the next installment. Finally, I’ll get into the combination approach. If you can’t figure out how to reconcile Gandhi with Luke Skywalker blasting the Death Star, don’t worry –I haven’t yet fleshed out the details myself. But I have a good idea, and that’s enough to get started. Better to go off half-cocked as they call it then not go off at all! Okay, so where do we go from here? Aside from hell in a handbasket, which is where we’re going anyway. Read on…
How do you take down an empire? Assuming that you’re not a rival empire that is. History gives plenty of examples of people who have tried to bring down various empires. Some succeeded. Many more failed. How did they do it? What were the determininants? What approaches worked best? These are the questions I will attempt to answer in this series of essays. I have decided that there are three types of approaches: the Direct, the Indirect, and the Combination approach. I’ll cover the first in this essay and the latter two in later ones. I may follow up with a concluding essay. I am not yet sure.
First my disclaimer (otherwise known as my cover-my-own-ass-I-hope-because-I-would-look-really-bad-in-an-orange-jumpsuit statement): This series of essays is meant to be a rhetorical, thought provoking theoretical exercise. It is in no way meant to be taken literally as something that could or should be done to any currently existing legitimate government and certainly not to the United States government. This applies despite the fact that I consider our current government to be illegitimate and that it is repulsively, repeatedly, flagrantly, callously, shallowly, defiantly, haughtily, violating the most sacred of our documents –the U.S. Constitution –to the point where they are figuratively (and for all I know, literally) using it for toilet paper. And despite the fact that I once swore an oath to uphold said Constitution against ALL comers –foreign and domestic. And that, once again, I think the current incarnation of our government is hell bent on turning that precious document into toilet paper. This statement is made because I don’t like the thought of creepy men in black suits showing up on my door step. If I disappear, call the ACLU. And I guarantee you one thing: I’ll recite said Constitution word for word at my “hearing”, though I doubt many of them will even know what it says. (Article I, Section…)
Okay, on to the essay.
Let’s say you live in a vast, far reaching, very powerful Evil Empire (and what Empire wasn’t Evil? Name it! I dare you.) You want to bring it down. But how do you do this? How can you fracture something so much more powerful than you are? And preferably, do so without ending up dead yourself. As I said before, I see three approaches. The Direct Approach, the Indirect Approach, and the Combination Approach. I call the first approach the Luke Skywalker Method. If you can’t figure out what this one is (and you grew up in mainstream American culture) I suggest getting a CAT scan or taking an IQ test. The second I call Gandhi’s Way. That will be the next installment. Finally, I’ll get into the combination approach. If you can’t figure out how to reconcile Gandhi with Luke Skywalker blasting the Death Star, don’t worry –I haven’t yet fleshed out the details myself. But I have a good idea, and that’s enough to get started. Better to go off half-cocked as they call it then not go off at all! Okay, so where do we go from here? Aside from hell in a handbasket, which is where we’re going anyway. Read on…
Luke Skywalker and the Rebel Alliance
Star Wars. We’ve all seen it. There’s nothing like those last few minutes of A New Hope, watching as Luke valiantly destroys the Death Star, and strikes a blow at the heart of Darkest Evil in the name of all that is good and the Light. Even if you’ve seen it a hundred times and you know how it ends, it still feels the same: the pounding heart, the mounting excitement, the go get ‘em! attitude you can’t help but feel. There is an instinctive, visceral feeling in that victory, one that can’t be adequately described in words but that everyone understands down deep where it counts. It is part of the primeval urge to fight for freedom that exists in every human soul writ large on the movie screen.
Darth Vader was not brought down by emails, or letter writing campaigns, or protest rallies. He was brought down by one teenager with too much bravado and too little of that fear and complacency we call common sense. To paraphrase Robert Heinlein, one pissed off man with a knife (or a TIE fighter) can be a lot more dangerous to TPTB than a nuclear warhead.
Or, as the write of Cryptogon (who is both brilliant and a bit paranoid) put it: “In Star Wars, what finally stopped business as usual on the Death Star? Was it thinking positive thoughts? Was it radiating love to Darth Vader? Was it sending letters to the editor? Was it holding focus groups and drinking organic wheat grass smoothies? Prayers? Waving signs? Voting? Faxing? Spray painting peace symbols on the bulkheads of various ships in the Imperial fleet? Were Darth Vader and the terrifying Death Star stopped by reading web pages? By sending emails? By listening to podcasts? By watching documentaries about The Empire on YouTube and Google Video?”
Not hardly. It was an untrained teenage kid playing soldier, along with the rest of the rebels. Though I must admit the image of spray painting Peace symbols on the ships of the Imperial fleet is more than a little attractive. (I personally would love to do that on the sides of the USS Ronald Reagan, for instance. It would be worth the jail term to see the look on the faces of the Neocons.)
I’m talking armed rebellions, insurrections, guerrilla warfare, insurgencies –anything that would fall under the category of open revolt. This is the tactic most commonly tried when attempting to take down an empire. It has resulted in the most memorable successes and the most spectacular failures. It also has the highest failure rate. But I’ll get to that later.
What makes this the most tried route? Well for one, it’s the obvious one. For the past few thousand years since the Imperial Meme took root in the human consciousness, whenever we are faced with a conflict, we pick up the nearest thing that would be a handy weapon and go at it. Well, most of us do. There are exceptions. I’ll get to them in the next post. This is also often the only route that has any chance of success. (You can write letters to Darth Vader until doomsday, and it ain’t going to do any damn good. That’s the truth. Sorry to be blunt for my fellow peace lovers. Sometimes the only way to get freedom is to fight for it.)
Does it work? Yes –and no. It depends. If there is one lesson history has dealt out over and over again: No Empire can defeat an armed insurgency in a vassal state. It has never, ever happened. Every Empire in history has been taught this lesson, most of them the hard way. This holds as true today as it was for the Egyptians, the Greece, the Romans, the Huns, the Mayans…you get the point. If you are an Empire and you are trying to pacify a conquered state (or rebelling colony) you are going to lose. Period. The British Empire learned this lesson during the American Revolution. The U.S. should have learned it in Vietnam, but instead is learning it again on the bloody sands of Iraq. (As an aside, Mr. Bush, allow me to tell you the truth: unless you turn all of Iraq into a lake of molten glass with nukes, you are not going to “win” this war. Even then, that would cause an uprising of other Muslims around the world who would be determined to bring you down. It ain’t going to happen. Deal with it.)
Now, if you are within the Empire and are rebelling you have a much lower chance of success. For one thing, Empires are big, tough, and wily. They didn’t get to be Empires by being soft and fat. If you are going to take one down you had better be fast, clever, and more deadly –and very, very willing to die for your cause. Chances are you will. Most armed rebellions end in failure. Many succeed, only to see the Empire they toppled replaced with a worse one, either imposed from without by invaders or rising from the ashes of the old one. Nature abhors a vacuum. When taking down an Empire, it is best to know what you intend to replace it with, before you topple it.
Here are what I think are the key reasons for the success or failure of many rebellions: 1.) What is the relative strength of the Empire at the time of the Rebellion? If it is a rising star or near peak, an armed rebellion is not only hopeless, it is suicidal. See the bloody results of all the rebellions in Ancient Rome. On the other hand, if the Empire is all ready going downhill, the odds are much better. The American Revolution is a good example of this one. 2.) How many rebels are involved? If it is just one guy and his buddies, he’d be better off staying home and getting drunk. (From a strategic perspective, that is.) But if the rebellion is popular, well staffed, well organized, and well financed then it’s another matter. Financing you say? Hell yes –even the Rebel Alliance had to buy gas from someone. 3.) Is there an alliance between members of various socioeconomic strata? What I mean by this is, foot soldiers and peasant farmers can often fight but they have no idea how to govern –which leads to things like the mess in France after Bastille Day. Put another way, Han Solo could fight but Leia knew how to govern. Both are needed for a successful rebellion. 4.) What’s the plan for toppling the Empire? Without, you’re screwed. Blunt yes, but the truth. 5.) What is going to replace it? As I said before, this is necessary not to storm the Bastille and end up with Napoleon. Even before the American Revolution leaders among the colonists were drawing up plans for an independent country, and it certainly helped that the colonies were pretty much functioning states on their own.
That’s it in a nutshell. The advantages of this approach are that it is obvious, direct, and feels good to the monkey part of our brains and the part that wants to fight for freedom. John Wayne busting the door down is one hell of an appealing image. The downsides: it’s bloody, costly, time consuming, has a high risk of failure, and will certainly result in the death of many, innocent and not, as well as untold destruction. Not the way I would take, given the choice.
So, is this the most valid option for taking down an empire? Or was Gandhi right, and nonviolence is the only way? (And does that even work?) And if not, what does work? What is the best route? Or is there even one? Perhaps there aren’t any easy answers.
The next essay will be titled Gandhi’s Legacy. In the meantime, any thoughts?
-RAS
P.S. Six gets you ten my phone is tapped before the next installment!
Darth Vader was not brought down by emails, or letter writing campaigns, or protest rallies. He was brought down by one teenager with too much bravado and too little of that fear and complacency we call common sense. To paraphrase Robert Heinlein, one pissed off man with a knife (or a TIE fighter) can be a lot more dangerous to TPTB than a nuclear warhead.
Or, as the write of Cryptogon (who is both brilliant and a bit paranoid) put it: “In Star Wars, what finally stopped business as usual on the Death Star? Was it thinking positive thoughts? Was it radiating love to Darth Vader? Was it sending letters to the editor? Was it holding focus groups and drinking organic wheat grass smoothies? Prayers? Waving signs? Voting? Faxing? Spray painting peace symbols on the bulkheads of various ships in the Imperial fleet? Were Darth Vader and the terrifying Death Star stopped by reading web pages? By sending emails? By listening to podcasts? By watching documentaries about The Empire on YouTube and Google Video?”
Not hardly. It was an untrained teenage kid playing soldier, along with the rest of the rebels. Though I must admit the image of spray painting Peace symbols on the ships of the Imperial fleet is more than a little attractive. (I personally would love to do that on the sides of the USS Ronald Reagan, for instance. It would be worth the jail term to see the look on the faces of the Neocons.)
I’m talking armed rebellions, insurrections, guerrilla warfare, insurgencies –anything that would fall under the category of open revolt. This is the tactic most commonly tried when attempting to take down an empire. It has resulted in the most memorable successes and the most spectacular failures. It also has the highest failure rate. But I’ll get to that later.
What makes this the most tried route? Well for one, it’s the obvious one. For the past few thousand years since the Imperial Meme took root in the human consciousness, whenever we are faced with a conflict, we pick up the nearest thing that would be a handy weapon and go at it. Well, most of us do. There are exceptions. I’ll get to them in the next post. This is also often the only route that has any chance of success. (You can write letters to Darth Vader until doomsday, and it ain’t going to do any damn good. That’s the truth. Sorry to be blunt for my fellow peace lovers. Sometimes the only way to get freedom is to fight for it.)
Does it work? Yes –and no. It depends. If there is one lesson history has dealt out over and over again: No Empire can defeat an armed insurgency in a vassal state. It has never, ever happened. Every Empire in history has been taught this lesson, most of them the hard way. This holds as true today as it was for the Egyptians, the Greece, the Romans, the Huns, the Mayans…you get the point. If you are an Empire and you are trying to pacify a conquered state (or rebelling colony) you are going to lose. Period. The British Empire learned this lesson during the American Revolution. The U.S. should have learned it in Vietnam, but instead is learning it again on the bloody sands of Iraq. (As an aside, Mr. Bush, allow me to tell you the truth: unless you turn all of Iraq into a lake of molten glass with nukes, you are not going to “win” this war. Even then, that would cause an uprising of other Muslims around the world who would be determined to bring you down. It ain’t going to happen. Deal with it.)
Now, if you are within the Empire and are rebelling you have a much lower chance of success. For one thing, Empires are big, tough, and wily. They didn’t get to be Empires by being soft and fat. If you are going to take one down you had better be fast, clever, and more deadly –and very, very willing to die for your cause. Chances are you will. Most armed rebellions end in failure. Many succeed, only to see the Empire they toppled replaced with a worse one, either imposed from without by invaders or rising from the ashes of the old one. Nature abhors a vacuum. When taking down an Empire, it is best to know what you intend to replace it with, before you topple it.
Here are what I think are the key reasons for the success or failure of many rebellions: 1.) What is the relative strength of the Empire at the time of the Rebellion? If it is a rising star or near peak, an armed rebellion is not only hopeless, it is suicidal. See the bloody results of all the rebellions in Ancient Rome. On the other hand, if the Empire is all ready going downhill, the odds are much better. The American Revolution is a good example of this one. 2.) How many rebels are involved? If it is just one guy and his buddies, he’d be better off staying home and getting drunk. (From a strategic perspective, that is.) But if the rebellion is popular, well staffed, well organized, and well financed then it’s another matter. Financing you say? Hell yes –even the Rebel Alliance had to buy gas from someone. 3.) Is there an alliance between members of various socioeconomic strata? What I mean by this is, foot soldiers and peasant farmers can often fight but they have no idea how to govern –which leads to things like the mess in France after Bastille Day. Put another way, Han Solo could fight but Leia knew how to govern. Both are needed for a successful rebellion. 4.) What’s the plan for toppling the Empire? Without, you’re screwed. Blunt yes, but the truth. 5.) What is going to replace it? As I said before, this is necessary not to storm the Bastille and end up with Napoleon. Even before the American Revolution leaders among the colonists were drawing up plans for an independent country, and it certainly helped that the colonies were pretty much functioning states on their own.
That’s it in a nutshell. The advantages of this approach are that it is obvious, direct, and feels good to the monkey part of our brains and the part that wants to fight for freedom. John Wayne busting the door down is one hell of an appealing image. The downsides: it’s bloody, costly, time consuming, has a high risk of failure, and will certainly result in the death of many, innocent and not, as well as untold destruction. Not the way I would take, given the choice.
So, is this the most valid option for taking down an empire? Or was Gandhi right, and nonviolence is the only way? (And does that even work?) And if not, what does work? What is the best route? Or is there even one? Perhaps there aren’t any easy answers.
The next essay will be titled Gandhi’s Legacy. In the meantime, any thoughts?
-RAS
P.S. Six gets you ten my phone is tapped before the next installment!
posted by RAS at 12/19/2006 01:51:00 PM
3 Comments:
Great post, thanks. Don't know if you've seen these three short videos from Iraq yet or not, but both show the US Military engaging in some very dubious actions. I have them up on my site at www.minor-ripper.blogspot.com
The revolutionary action hero is an inauthentic, mythic image. The American Revolution was motivated by an alienated subset of colonial elites who were able to exploit a moment of imperial weakness to break a geographically isolated colony away from the empire. Your point about who pays for the revolution is key.
Similarly, Gandhi was able to prevail because the British Empire was greatly weakened, not because his fine moral qualities defeated the imperial will to power. If the British had the money and manpower at the time, they'd still be holding onto India.
The practical lesson is that the fortunes of empires do ebb sometimes, which creates opportunities for powerful interests to arrogate some of the imperial resources unto themselves. We had a recent example in the collapse of the Soviet Union that some find analogous to our prospective future, and others point to the corporatist takeover of Weimar Germany, but of course every moment in history is unique. Given our love of the entrepreneurial spirit, my money is that the next big thing in power politics is a patchwork of multinational corporations and private security contractors will gradually make our nation and empire obsolete, and our nationalism will become rather like the monarchy in the Old World: largely a ceremonial formality, with little practical power. Hallibuton and KBR, Blackwater, Pinkerton et al. are the wave of the future, and they will be handed power because they serve the same interests as the government with less accountability.
Frijoles, while your basic premise of the American Revolution is correct, there were many, many people who were very heroic and did fight for independence out of good motives. There are always such in these type of wars.
As for Gandhi, my interest in him lies less in his moral qualities or lack thereof, and more in the methods he used. I will also address why he was able to do what he did in the next installment.
Ripper, I'll check out your site in the next couple of days when I have time to download them.
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