The Tarkin Doctrine basically doomed the empire from the start

Palpatine was way better at taking over the galaxy than he was at actually running it..

Ironically the weakest link in the empire was... the Emperor. His mindest was exellent for the ranks of the sith, in small numbers. But when expanded to the empire entire, it faced the same issue that led the sith of old to fall apart. The infighing and paranoia weakned the empire. Putting ethics aside for a moment, there was so many ways that Palpatine could have handled the situation that would have been more intelligent. but he gave into his desire to rule through personal power and fear alone. Though to Palpatine, the Empire was a means to an end, not really an end unto itself. It was a tool in his persuit of power.

People really need to understand that in a lot of the shows/games/movies, we see basically the elite forces of the Rebels, vs the general troops of the Empire. Also that the Imperial tech was functional and dangerous, but the people in charge of it often used it's strengths poorly.

on the topic of dictators involved in the design process, Sadam Hussein's son was a big starwars fan. When he got put in charge of designing the helmets for the special forces, he based it off darth vader. If anyone is curious, the helmets were crap and broke easily

Their doctrine was mostly overwhelming numbers in conventional fights. They weren’t prepared for the guerrilla tactics that could whittle them down from any direction and fade.

I love how you showed Darth Vader’s rising when you said “high-tech killing machines”.

I remember hearing a while back that the Yuuzhan Vong ships blasters torn through shields like those shields weren't even there. So even if Sidious didn't *know* about that with this threat he vaguely knew was coming, his TIE fighters would have done a much better job in dogfights as they're trained to be more agile and not rely any on shields, since they didn't have any.

The problem with ruling with fear is that when the people realised that there is nothing to fear what's going to stop them from rising up? For example when some farm boy from Tatooine blew up the first Death Star the galaxy realised that the Empire could be beaten and support for the Alliance skyrocketed, so the Tarkin Doctrine was soon shown to be massively flawed and was made even worse by how much the Empire relied upon it.

After watching the Andor series, they really hammer home how most of the Empire's effectiveness relies on intimidation and terror tactics. I adored how much it made clear: we vastly outnumber them, and they know it. They lash out not from a position of authority but from fear.

The Jedi lost because they were still fighting the last war (they didn't adapt to the rule of two), so why was the Empire still fighting the Clone Wars (overwhelming numbers) over adapting to the tactics of the Rebel Alliance? It seems that the Jedi and the Sith had trouble adapting overall. This is especially surprising since the Sith waited one thousand years for the grand plan to come to fruition.

It would be hard for the Imperial army to set up a perimeter defense. Each person has to trust the other soldiers to their back and sides.

Whenever nameless rebels fight Imperials they're wiped out. Every Star Wars show/movie approaches the world with a different level of seriousness. We can't interpret Rebels and Andor the same way.

I remember reading in a legends book about "salvagers" that would hang around as ISD's resupplied as they'd toss out particul cases of materials before jumping and these people would collect them, repack them as full cases and resell back to the empire

It was never designed or intended to fight a war on equal terms with a near-peer opponent. It was built to support Palpatine's personal rise to power and oppress anyone who might get ideas about peace or freedom.

I wish they would make a show completely from the empire's prospective. You see their from childhood and the rest of their life all the way to the destruction of the deathstar and beyond. And not just one person but multiple families. From the lowly grunt to the officer.

It sucks that the Imperial Military are treated as butt monkeys to the Rebel Alliance in every battle where they get always beaten and humiliated and always miss their shots.

Tbh Seeing how many times and how easily Venator goes down in Clone wars, I think it just wasn't the ship fit for Republic tactics. The Imperial class is much better fit to the way you actually see Venators utilized. Of course, this is more of a problem with tactics, than design itself.

Man, your channel is the best. No one quite breaks down the lore and logistics quite like you do. You're like a cool history teacher.

It was said that Palps knew about the incoming threat of the Yuuzhan Vong galactic invasion and that he spent decades building and arming up an entire imperial military force to counter it. Yet if the military of the Galactic Empire was nothing more than a paper tiger, then what chance did it even have against the galactic invaders? 🤔

It seems like even from a "Tarkin Doctrine" standpoint, the Venator-class would've still fit the Empire's "looks scary" needs by simply replacing those twin mini-towers with a more imposing-looking superstructure while retaining the huge starfighter hangars. Plus, the size of a TIE Fighter swarm it could've launched would have its own fear factor. A Venator carried 420 fighters, with all of them parked on the hangar floor and all of them ranging from slightly to a *a lot* bigger than a TIE Fighter. Adding the typical ceiling racks for more TIEs, you could easily fit a thousand in a Venator. And having your sensor scope completely blacked out because that many fighters are approaching is going to be a lot scarier than merely seeing one big ship and 72 small fighters.

Gotta say, you've improved a lot over the years and become a lot more knowledgeable than you used to be. You're now fun, logical and engaging to listen to. :)

The problem with the Imperial Military (particularly the stormtrooper Corp) is that is was ment to DETER a galactic wide war. Not fight one.

Imagine waking up being an Imperial who's late to work and you remember your boss is literally a 200 year old serial killer who shoots lightning from his finger tips....

Those Ewoks certainly handed the imperial military a big bag of FAAFO!

Palpatine has also done a lot of the same things that Putin did in his regime set up. Put underlings loyal only to him in positions they are vastly under qualified for and pitted them against each other for his favor, only to dispose of them when convenient. Which is strange cause Lucas modeled Palps after Nixon, initially. But the parallels between Palpatine and Putinare vastly more fascinating.

You know what the irony is? Both thrawn and Vader rewarded competence, recognized it, and utilized it in it's proper manner. However one would reorient talent to a direction where it was better serve the empire if it didn't work for him The other choked them to death

Hey Alan! Love your work. Big fan!

I've just discovered this channel and these videos are great, very clear, concise and unbiased. Just straightforward information. They're great, thank you for making them.

The reason I believe line-of-sight engagements are so popular is because no one really had the experience of long range smart munitions. Think about it, most of the galaxy was enslaved by the Rakatans, when they fell the galaxy used their technology. They didn't have to evolve their technology like we did, going from LOS combat to Firing Smart Munitions absurd distances from the enemy. Without evolving like this they never made highly effective long range smart munitions and consequently never made effective technology to counter smart munitions. It ofc doesn't change the fact that it's stupid to not use Smart Munitions, but it could be a good explanation as to why they're not widely seen.

During the Age of Sail, the greatest range of a cannon with gunpowder was about a mile at most and the further away you were from the target, the less effective it was so the battlelines were VERY CLOSE indeed

When I think of paper predators, such as the paper tiger, I like to think of origami predators/tiger…

This is easily one of my favorite Star Wars channels. I listen all the time. Your breakdown and interpretation of worldbuilding is amazing and aligned with my own. Love it! For anyone who wants some more Imperial/Galaxy-wide content akin to Andor with worldbuilding and politics, here is some good books imo from Legends and Canon: Darth Plagueis(Legends), Revenge of the Sith Novel(Legends), Catalyst(Canon), Tarkin(Canon), Thrawn(Canon), Heir to the Empire(Legends), Bloodline(Canon) The 2nd season of Bad Batch was really good too.

Pretty sure the ISD's primary anti fighter defense was the entire wing of 72 TIE fighters that defended it...

Your discussion on how a civilian like Palpatine interfering in the development of military technologies and strategy reminds me of some real world parallels. Both Hitler and Stalin interfered in the manufacture of warplanes. Hitler insisted that the Me-262 be a bomber while Stalin initially insisted that the Il-2 bomber not have a rear gun compartment. Their interference caused lives and hurt their militaries’ ability to fight.

I really like these longer videos 😁 Thanks for all the hard work you guys do

In all fairness, the Galactic Empire would have been more interesting had it lasted a bit longer than it did. It was a generational Empire but it wasn't exactly around for centuries or millennia. Had it survived longer, it would have stood a much better chance of solidifying and crystallising into something more terrifying. Even as much as a _relative_ flash in the pan that the Galactic Empire was, in relation to the vast spans of Galactic History, the groundwork was still there (during the Imperial Expansion Era etc) for something far more difficult to fight. Even after a couple of decades they had the Death Star and 25,000 ISD's they were upgrading and eventually converting into _Imperial II_ 's (from _Imperial I_ 's) Without falling apart or being changed too much from what they were supposed to be about, look at it this way: imagine if Palpatine _was_ Galactic Emperor over an even larger Empire than we know he had post-Imperial Expansion Era, and imagine if that amounted to 200 years, or 250 years, or more. Think about it. His grasp on people's lives would have been so resolute as so to be almost unbreakable at that point, multi-generationally (at least for most species) The level of knowledge and expertise he'd have had by then with crushing and quelling rebellions on countless backwater planets and wayward star systems, would be horrifying. It was on the cards as well, as we know that some form of his cloning efforts did succeed _even with his OG body being atomised over Endor_ so no, this isn't impossible. He'd definitely have been living quite a while longer than he did in ROTJ in that body, in spite of how worn out it clearly was getting. But he was technically never stronger than that, at least, until the sequel abominations happened. Especially the Palpatine we see in Episode IX whom is basically Super Palpatine to all intents and purposes (until Rey turned out to be Giga Palpatine out of nowhere, before identifying as a Skywalker. Logic!) Imagine if the Empire had been doing it's thing for 200-300 years rather than about 30. It'd be festooned with artefacts of an elder age, it will have all but conquered the entire galaxy and it will have already long dispensed of the Hutts and other criminal syndicates, only needing their own horrific might of arms. Their indoctrination would be multigenerational to the extent of being three or four times longer, maybe even five times longer, than the entire miserable story of the North Korean regime going back to Kim Il Sung. Imagine North Korea or the mid 20th century Germans being around for 300 years, rather than how long they have and had been around. It's genuinely quite unnerving if you think about it at length. There'd be multiple game-ended planetary systems from across the galaxy, reduced to asteroid fields for Imperial mining operations to come in later. You'd see multiple further genocidal purges and the obliteration of countless rebel cells. Battering the resilience out of the populations of the galaxy with Coruscant acting like the overseer of a giant panopticon. And Palpatine's military would be beyond staggering. Not just quantitatively massive, like what you're calling the so-called 'Paper Tiger' already was. But also qualitatively masterful. It'd be a genuine nightmare scenario making the OT GE and the ST FO both look like chump change armies (especially the latter) The Final Order - according to sequel logic, at least; but we can just ignore that, go right ahead I don't mind lol - would rise and rise long before it did in Episode IX. Palpatine would not only annex, conquer and subjugate the rest of the galaxy, probably in time to do it all with his original body (albeit, by then starting to literally and figuratively fall apart), but he'd then be able to use the Clone body we saw in TROS. And, with better technology, because Moff Gideon would not be a rogue actor in the Imperial Remnant, but still just a part of the Empire with everything he could want from Mandalore, in the scenario that Imperial hegemony _never ends at all_ (which leaves not only Mandalore screwed, but also pretty much everyone else in that sector of space) A youthful replacement clone Palpatine body would allow Palpatine - at immense power now, stronger than ever before, matching youthfulness of body with an increasingly elderly and expert mind, his youthful visage belying the nightmarish, walking force nexus of the dark side within - to then make plans for the cloning tech to be improved. Doubtlessly as he'd get so much stronger, the clone body would get more rapidly deteriorated and age faster. But with a practically limitless supply of clone bodies in storage on ice or in some biochemical gel or something, then it would be possible for Palpatine to reign supreme for essentially, all time. Only the Will of the Force, and Skywalkers, prevented this in truth. You wouldn't want to see what the Imperial military would have become 200 years plus into it's regime (or even just 100 years, maybe even 75 years) Although of course, even more so if we're talking about 200 plus years. And the notion of looking at where they are after 500 years or 1,000 years, really starts to get interesting. Because at that point, maybe they are so advanced, and so powerful, even trying to question them would be as futile as it could ever be in Star Wars. Worse, if we remember SW Rebels, Palpatine could have been on the verge of controlling time travel options, possibly from Lothal. The Imperial Navy would probably have a couple dozen times more capital ships (as it should), and very impressive ones at that. The Imperial Army would be several trillion strong. There'd be things we could scarcely imagine. Comparing a 30 year long flash in the pan to the idealised Galactic Empire all could be considered unhelpful, though imagine 200 year in their prime Stormtroopers with SAS levels of combat skill. It'd be seriously scary. We just got to quick fieldnotes version of that potential. Beskar Stormtroopers would be common except alone they'd be Clone Troopers again from a reliable template and they'd possibly clone a Praetorian Guard for that. Speaking of which, there'd be a lot more of them, too. The Inquistorious would have morphed into part of the Praetorian Guard (unless Palpatine just, killed them all, then, like housekeeping the Empire) for lack of Jedi to kill. New force sensitives would go to an expanded, legion sized Praetorian Guard. At least in the sequel logic timeline, Rey would never have been an orphan and raised her entire life in the Imperial Citadel on Coruscant. She'd likely have been a Sith Lord herself and extremely powerful in the force much like her grandfather. But she wouldn't have cringy sharp teeth or a questionable folding hilt dual lightsaber that would make an Inquisitor blush. Rey would essentially be the new Vader. And the only chance anyone had of getting rid of creamy Sheev. But unless Sheev had truly lost his marbles, that wasn't going to be happening. He'd have her under control. At least for a while (maybe not letting _her_ have clone bodies to outlive her or something) And in that super grim scenario, then Palpatine outlives his own granddaughter and just, keeps chugging along like Vitiate come again... P. S. - Kylo Ren wouldn't exist, Luke and Leia would be long dead and the Jedi BTFO'd to the Netherworld. So, in this absolute worst nightmare scenario, it'd be all the more reason for both Sheev and Rey to be unimaginably powerful. Maybe either verging on Chosen One Anakin's true potential or essentially being just under that _individually_ for a time. And if I was being really mean in how I wrote this, I'd have Sheev murder Rey, absorb all her power TROS style and then just become a Force God of some kind, stronger than even Anakin was supposed to be as the Chosen One. _Midichlorian Count_ 50,000 or something lol because frick everyone else I guess. And if you think about it, could he not spend centuries in that line of thought, perfecting how to increase his clone bodies' per cell midichlorian count, to artificially make himself way stronger than Anakin had ever been anyway? Maybe that is the direction the sequels should have gone in, with Palpatine trying to be a better, stronger Anakin all along. Oh well. Anakin was >20,000 per cell aged 9 years old and at least ~25,000 per cell aged 22 ish (before the fateful duel on Mustafar; the first one, I mean) I've seen some suggestion Lucas even thought 40,000 ish was possible for the Chosen One if he reached full-potential, but I dunno about that. Working on the basis of 25,000, then sure, maybe. But the implication is that Palpatine was usually around 20,000 if not approaching 21,000 in later life, as his mastery of the dark side became consummate. If he reached a level of skill where he could make up for the shortfall and stay ahead of Rey even if she was technically stronger than him (which, don't get me wrong, I 100% don't think she should be, but Kathleen's Disney would want her to be of course), he could bide his time and then, maybe when Rey was elderly, try and kill her and absorb all her power. He could still finesse her on skill (ask ROTS Kenobi) That way, he'd transcend to a higher state of being perhaps. At which point, he'd be stronger than the Ones and about twice as strong as Anakin in Episode III prior to losing to Kenobi, and maybe 20% more than Anakin's very highest potential estimate by Lucas (again, can't remember where I heard 40,000 but if that is true that is mental because Kenobi is about 14,000) To be honest the entire way midichlorian levels were worked out makes me grumpy. I know some people loathe the very existence of midichlorians and I get that. But it is what it is. Personally I'd have someone like best lad Dooku be at about 18,500, but I think his given midichlorian count was about 17,000 which I find stupid. He was very close to Yoda whom was more like 19,000-19,500.

People shouldn't be afraid of the government the government should be afraid of the people it's not just relevant in star wars but the real world

I always thought the Empire was doing like most militaries do, and training, building up and generally preparing to fight the last war. The Clone War saw huge capital battleships with supporting fighters, like over Coruscant. The battles against the Rebels was small scale skirmishes, mostly featuring fighters and the huge improvements in small scale bombs, torpedoes etc, not to mention the ability of fighters to ignore shields (or so it seems).

Star destroyers relying on fighter screens isn't necessarily a problem in itself. The problem is the fighters they choose. ISDs would be unstoppable mobile fortresses if they had a permanent swarm of Droid fighters around them. And an appropriate compliment of support ships.

I wouldn't use seven year's war logic on them because the military did do more than be show boys, but they are an interesting topic.

CHECK OUT OWNASABER: ownasaber.com/ - 30% OFF on all lightsabers for the month of May - Use Promo Code "EWOK" for $15 OFF - Free Shipping on all orders

Personally, I blame the simple character plot armour from the original Star Wars trilogy, which was fine for the original SW trilogy as said plot armour wasn't that obvious and did not detract from the original trilogy's story-telling and enjoyment. It became too much and too obvious when that was carried over to other SW titles like the family-friendly SW: Rebels series and SW titles with named characters (like the Mandalorian and Kenobi series) which demanded heavy character plot armour. I guess that was why I was so interested in Rogue One, the Andor series and even Solo as the character plot armour and Imperial School of Marksmanship tropes are not so obvious in those 3 titles and blended in very nicely.

On the ISD vs Venator arguement. Templin Institute made a good point about how the Clone Wars was brutal, and would have taken a toll on the superstructure of serving Venators, so scrapping or selling off would make sense. What doesn't make sense is completely ditching their tactical niche and discontinuing the line. A carrier task force of 1-2 Venators loaded with hyperspace capable fighters and dropships, paired with Arquetens escorts, or even a Victory Class SD for heavy firepower would have been optimal for tactical flexibility. As for being inspired by ancient Sith designs, even the Harrower class from the old Sith Empire had greater capacity for carrier operations than an ISD.

I appreciate the level of analysis in this video, but I think sometimes people have a tendency to analyze Star Wars with a viewpoint looking at our own military, and as much as Star Wars is inspired by certain military practices, I think doing direct comparisons can be misleading. The closest thing and ISD can be compared to are aircraft carriers, but ours don’t have shields and hyperspace capabilities. They also work as mobile FOBs as well. To say they are only used for broadside tactics is an oversimplification

I have been following and watching your videos for years. This channel stopper being solely about fandom and more about life lessons a long time ago and im here for it.

The comparison to the Russian military is striking

The one problem with the Venator-class is that it doesn't have as many destructive hardpoints as other ships of similar size. The Providence-Class from the same era definitely outclassed it in firepower. It also wasn't equipped with ion cannons, which would give the ISD a nasty advantage over the Ven's antiquated shield systems. There were also only about 2-3000 of these, while at the hight of the Empire there were 25000(!) ISDs, plus Dreadnaught and Arquitens cruisers.

the more of these videos I watch, the more I think Alan is not talking about the Galactic Empire, but is actually talking about the American Empire.

Very well said. Some great points

The Empire was designed for one thing and one thing only, from the military to the bureaucracy: Oppression. It wasn't meant to face challenges and find solutions but just stomp the jackboot harder and harder in the deluded hope that it would somehow fix things. Imperials weren't even immune from this as everyone from the admiral to the office worker to the stormtrooper was expected to backstab each other to get ahead and then oppress everyone even incrementally beneath them. Heck even the vaunted jobs that the Empire promised and hoped would sastify the populace just became another liability for the Empire as they just couldn't help stamping down the jackboot and curtailed worker rights and pay into unlivable conditions whenever they didn't just outright enslave the workers and their families. If it wasn't for the clone wars basically destroying any meaningful force in the galaxy the Empire shouldn't have lasted five years much the less the decades that it did.

The true weakness of the Imperial Star Destroyers was the complete lack of tactical blueberries. The passion that tactical blueberry brings to the table can not be denied.

We also need to remember that their methods and reasonings are different in both Legends and Canon. Because In legends Palpatine whole plan was predicated on outer galaxy threats, hence the need to control through fear and consolidating WMDS

I hope you make a video on a theoretical Thrawn Doctrine.

This was very well written work.

How much was Palpatines age an issue? he was 88 by the time of the battle of endor, sith lord or no age will begin to effect anyone when the time come add in the ravages of the darkside on the mind and I begin to question just how lucid Palpatine was at any given time. also on a side note it wouldn't surprise me if most people didn't rebel simply because it just felt easier to wait for him to die and hope his replacement was better

Nice video!

i think Imperial equipment actually makes complete sense for the intended goal of the Imperial Military: maintaining order. most of the time, the Empire doesnt chose where or when fights take place; its the Rebels who have the flexibility and freedom to strike on their own terms. small corvettes and frigates in place of Star Destroyers would be easily overwhelmed by a determined Rebel assault, so a Star Destroyer is probably essential for being the hard outer shell of a fleet or battlegroup and maintaining the situation until reinforcements can be dispatched to help in the event of an ambush or raid. the main issues with the Empire are all plot based: their *anti-ship weapons* cant penetrate Mon Calamari cruisers shields? they dont use Interdictors because racism? the Star Destroyers have no corvette support and a small fighter compliment because...reasons? theres just so much plot-armor in the Star Wars universe that it becomes downright silly once you think about it.

Many people always talk about power struggles being what brought the Empire down but praise the Mandalorians for their warrior culture that brings the same problems with consecuences that are ten times worse. Not saying the Empire is perfect but that there are some that don't see the same problems on other sides like the mandalorians or the incredibly corrupt New Republic.

Could you do video on what it would look like if the Jedi coupled the Republic

That’s what happens when you focus on shiny world destroying orbs and not a legit military ran by proven clones. Would’ve saved a lot of people headaches and heartaches. If the clones were in the fight the rebels would’ve been screwed unless Luke were in every single battle.

Some of thrawn's ideas were rejected for semi-logical reasons. The cancellation of the TIE defender project happened because a single TIE defender would be as expensive as like six TIE fighters or some ridiculous number. In the long term, TIE defenders WOULD HAVE bolstered the strength of the empire due to their projected success rate, however the emperor was not interested in long term strength. He wanted as many fighters as he could get on the field. A tyrant like him thrives on creating war, not stopping it. The more low-quality fighters in the world, the more death and destruction whilst having the least loss. TIE defenders would cut down on death and destruction, due to there being less of them AND due to the more often surrenders that would have happened, and losing a single defender would be extremely costly compared to losing a single fighter. Two things he wasn't interested in. Thrawn's vision for an empire would absolutely be much more stable than Palpatine's, but it would definitely be smaller, and it would DEFINITELY be less oppressive

I love how u tie in current u.s. political and economics in with the star wars empire. Loving it.

Love this!

hey G-Tech, i like the lid in the background XD

Thanks for bringing the paper tiger concept to Star Wars

Was I hearing super fast build mode in the background😂 But regardless of the song You are my go to channel for star wars info Thank you for uploading vids ❤

If you study history, you can sort of see what's going on here, fighters beat battleships, WW2 was where Lucas got the idea from, then he used assault carriers in the in the prequels and messed up the time line, meaning people would have to invent a way for the Empire to go backwards to massive battleships and point defence interceptors (another dated idea). Still makes more sense the the sequels, less said about them the better.

A sociological explanation of Star Wars is so great to get. Keep up the good work.

You would have thought that with 1000 years of planning the actually ruling of the galaxy would have been considered.

there should've been a mix between a star destroyer fleet and venator fleet, this way star destroyers can engage in hovering near a planet and providing artillery fire, with venators being break throughs and landers with it being the main source of air support

I wish Star Wars as a brand wasn’t so inconsistent. I like to analyze the logistics behind the wars fought but there’s not a great way to make sense of things in a consistent way.

11:11 - One of the parts I liked in Mass Effect was pointing out that one reason why the Reapers were so dangerous wasn't just because of their technological advantage but because they didn't rely on supply lines for fuel, power, support, etc. Logistics is a major if not overwhelming advantage, especially on defense. It also goes with a quote from a TTRPG Game Master who ran superhero games like HERO and MnM that always stuck with me -- 'It doesn't matter how powerful your ability is or how big of a number you can roll, if you can't explain how you are making it work in this situation then you may as well not have it.' So as it goes with your point. It doesn't matter how many naval officers and SSDs and turbolasers the Empire has, if they can't reliably get these things to the relevant theater of conflict then do they really even have any power? So the Empire being screwed over by faults in its logistical train, which is really being screwed over by faults in its military doctrine and economy, makes so much sense.

Another Excellent video and lesson! Thank You. Great Socio-Economic Military Industrial Complex integration overview. Be Safe out there. Peace & Health to Us All.

paper empires wash away quite easily in the rain

Others have pointed it out but I really agree that the Empire's biggest weakness was the dictator at the top of it. I always remember the scenerio (I'm not sure if this one is still canon or not) where Admiral Thrawn personally objected to the idea of the Death Star, believing that a much better use for the resources would be to build more ships, advance both ships and fighters as well as equipment, and maintain order in the galaxy through a strong foundation of a mighty imperial fleet that's everywhere and a well equipped military. His objections fell on deaf ears though, because Palpatine was obsessed with his giant symbol of absolute power and terror (especially the terror part probably.) in the Death Star and for reasons only comprehensible to a Sith, keeping the individual members of the military with the cheapest options the Empire can muster. Its true to life, even the most formidable militaries have a tendency to fall apart with an unstable despot no one wants to challenge or even question at the top. Andor showed that there were hella competent members of the empire, but even they themselves had to put up with stupidity straight from the top. Poppa Palpy might have been able to shoot lightning out of his hands but he was a shitty ruler. (probably intentionally so but nonetheless.) Even when you step back and think about it, the Empire is at its most frightening when the rebellion is dealing with a huge, unstoppable military with a red saber wielding death wizard at its tip. The sheer, humbling reality of how big, established, and resourced the Empire is. That's when its scary. When they made the Death Stars though, they basically made a big single boss for the good guys to concentrate all of their efforts on destroying. Is it a coincidence that the Death Star like weapons tend to be featured in the more "fun" movies as opposed to ESB or Andor which dealt with more of the former? Whatever happens to him at the end of Ashoka, Thrawn just constantly proven right.

How would a tie fighter do against Buzz droids

When you actually think about it the imperial army was not battle tested. It’s foundations may have been the GAR but clone wars veterans that rose in the aftermath of that conflict to lead the new imperial military especially tarkin learned the wrong lessons from the war. Quantity vs quality merit/critical thinking vs absolute loyalty/incompetence,maximum military presence across the galaxy vs a tactically flexible force able to move from battle zone to battle zone. Fear and intimidation vs smart battle tactics and parasitical weapon/vehicle designs. For 20 years the empire did not have any major conventional conflicts to actually test their weaponry and tactics then perfect as the GAR had it was army in peace time more accustomed to anti smuggling/piracy patrols garrison duty and policing. So when war finally broke out the glaring issues ignored years before come to the surface.

I miss the days when I was Generation Tech

Theres an excellent channel named "Media Zealot" that does critiques on stupid villain factions. Not only did he mention the glaring flaws in the Imperial military. But he pointed out what you said in this video aswell. How Palpatine pretty much grew very complacent once actually forming the Empire. (something he pretty much admits to in one of the novels I believe.) And how the rule of two is pretty much incompatible with two Sith at the top of the galaxy. Highly recommend you give that video a watch.

Ideal imperial load out is a a pair of ISD's with at least 1 venator per ISD (or 1 secutor per flotilla) plus 4 to 5 arquitans, 6 to 8 gozanti's, and then 12 to 15 consulars optimized for anti fighter duties.

I don't know what you mean about turbolasers. They have incredibly long ranges and are the standard capital ship weaponry in the starwars universe....Turbolasers have ranges of tens of thousands of miles. If not hundreds of thousands. It just looks different on screen because people don't wanna watch a battle that takes place off screen.

16:00 pretty much every major power has a mixed market with a moderate military industrial complex ready to be expanded in times of war. That kind of concept your speaking off was a mentality before ww1 and it left people unprepared then and let mustache man run rampant the time after.

""...ancient Sith drawings and childhood trauma" Absolute poetry.

Note the cheaper option is sometimes the best. During Vietnam the iowa class battle ship was reactivated because it was safer and cheaper to lob a 16 inch shell then rick a jet and pilot

Hey generation tech had a video idea how would you run the RDA from avatar specifically the first movie the caveat is that you have to use the same people that are there you just run things idk if y’all think that’s a good video idea just wanted to pitch it to y’all!

Can you do a what if video where you could build the imperial military, like you got the job instead of tarkin

TIEs had the Honda K series of Ion Engines. VTEC and all.

The ISD was not slow in sub-light speed. It was able to catch the Tantive IV, which is a Blockade Runner.

Finally, zhe beard is bacc

I think its inaccurate to say they are a Paper Tiger. They are more then an on paper force. They are more of a Garrison force type military - with the Star destroyers essentially mobile forts/Garrisons. This begets a certain limited set of responses that doctrin tryes to overcome. The Star destoryers provide a huge force multiplier and deterent factor but it can only be in one place at a time. As for the effectiveness if the troops in the field; In episode IV old ben explains the Stormtroopers are pin point acurate when at the Jawa sandcrawler. On the Deathstar the Stormtroopers are diliberatly bad shots? Huh diliberate? Yes they had a tracker on the MF to reveal the locataion of the Rebel base. Therefore the troopers were letting the "rebels" go to bag the bigger win of Yavin. Go watch it again with this in mind.

Could you do USASOC vs Empire troops like you did USMC vs stormtroopers?

Havent watched this yet but i know its good

Something I'll never understand is why if the Empire was willing to adopt the CIS's general strategy of overwhelming numbers when developing the Tie Fighter why they didn't just go all the way with it and rather than getting pilots killed outfitting each fighter with a droid brain, costs would of stayed roughly the same barring a lack of a time investment as there wouldn't be a reason to train pilots, they'd lose no man power, and linked droid intelligences usually have better situational awareness which in a dogfight is a must have.

if you play empire at war remake, you will found venator is more useful than isd, on the one hand they don’t have shield generator module which the isd has(basically first target for any bomber) on the other hand, it has so many fighters can actually do something when you fight rebel ship.

1:00 didnt all those things you previously mention go into that though?

What about the Republic and Separatist militaries? What are their strengths, flaws, and culture?

Well, the Sith doctrine tends to create a lot of backstabbing. Palpatine battle meditation was also split watching over Luke and Vader (you can see it in the scene when Luke and Vader blades cross in front of him and then moves to the Rebellion gaining the upper hand).

Wasn't expecting that shave, lol

5:20 you missed a "from a certain point of view" reference. ;)