No, they are not!

The Empire certainly has sunk to a new low, to say the least! Here I am, serving on my personal home world of Kamino, probably the second best place for me to serve next to the battlefield, and I am surrounded by idiots who have given me a new perspective on how to look at ordinary people from backwater worlds, at least when it comes to making them soldiers.

I am Clone Commander Cody, battalion commander of the still-functioning 212th Attack Legion, though most people within the Empire prefer to call me CC-2224, my unit number, instead. I still don't understand why the Empire decided to ramp up the uniformity of its troops; nobody ever tells a clone anything! I have served the Empire faithfully since the end of the Clone Wars, helping the 501st Legion with such important missions as the defeat of many Separatist holdouts and the unexpected clone rebellion on Kamino. We clones of Jango Fett never were people who enjoyed killing our own kind, but those clones were bred to take up arms against the Empire, and had no regard for us, so we didn't find it as difficult to wipe out those rogues when we were ordered to.

It was after that, when things started to go downhill for the clone army. The Emperor decided that an army of genetically identical clones was too susceptible to corruption and could be used against him. As a result, he started arranging for clones to be produced from different templates besides Fett (though the Fett DNA would still surely be used to make more clone stormtroopers), and he also opened a recruiting program to get ordinary humans into the ranks of the stormtroopers. And let's just say that I don't think I'll ever be the same as I was during and just after the Clone Wars.

It has been two years since the official declaration of an "Alliance to Restore the Republic" by several Imperial senators, leftover Separatist warriors, people from neutral planets, and treacherous Imperial deserters, and I am stuck with the worst possible troopers a veteran of the Clone Wars could possibly have. It was hard enough adjusting to clones of other templates, because they were like aliens to my kind, like they came from another galaxy altogether. But the enlisted troopers are even worse, and unfortunately, I have to train and lead several platoons of enlisted troops here in Timira City on Kamino.

Let's get something straight here, first. I am of the firm opinion that clone troopers, particularly ones cloned from elite fighters like Jango Fett, are not only made for combat, but more fit for it than ordinary people are. Ordinary people have their own lives to live, and we clone stormtroopers fight daily to make sure they live in peace with the utmost freedom. We are bred and trained to be precise, perfect warriors, what with our adherence to orders, our instincts and creative thinking in combat, and our humility as soldiers who do not seek glory or fame, but rather a humble commitment to protecting the innocent, upholding the law, and serving the public trust, all while seeking a good and heroic death in order to "seed the stars," as Taun We and Glorii Profus once put it, with our valiant souls. We know that orders, followed instantly, keep you alive, and prevent society from falling apart. Think twice, and you might be dead.

And we have served well for so many years, with most of our numbers seeding the stars just like they had always dreamed of. But now, with the influx of different clones and enlisted men and women, not to mention the Emperor redirecting the cloning program to other pursuits, the operational effectiveness of the Imperial Army has declined significantly. It astounds and disgusts me how stupid and clumsy these recruits, volunteer and conscript alike, can be, even during training. I mean, just the other day, during maneuvers, I witnessed a new recruit bang his head on a blast door! Why does the Empire allow people like that to be soldiers in the Stormtrooper Corps? The clone troopers I used to know during the Clone Wars would have never made a mistake like that! Waxer and Boil were troopers worth being proud of, fighting their foes like the brave, strong men they were, Echo, Fives, and Hevy of the 501st were the same way, Captain Rex was an unusually independent trooper whom nothing could take down, and even 99, a deformed maintenance clone in Tipoca City, Kamino, who was physically unfit for combat, had courage and devotion to the Grand Army of the Republic that puts these losers to shame instantly.

Long story short, a Fett clone trooper has the perfect common sense a soldier needs to survive and make a difference in a war, and these hastily grown "new guys" and the enlisted fools are sorely lacking in common sense and even in sense of their surroundings. They are inferior soldiers, to put it mildly. Now I know why most of the normal people who fought in the Clone Wars and were not Jedi were considered to be "lesser heroes" or not heroes at all by the general public; they couldn't fight like we could. And where did that hotheaded Jedi Rahm Kota think he was going to get with his own miniature militia of non-clone soldiers, anyway?

I miss the old Grand Army of the Republic. It was a truly incredible fighting force, and its members were the best troopers the galaxy has ever seen. I love it so much, you could say I have a feeling of nostalgia over the "army of one man," as we proudly called it. I miss Waxer and Boil, Echo, Fives and Hevy, Rex, 99, and all the others whom I fought beside. Let's face it; ordinary people are just not cut out to be troopers, whatever Kota and the Rebel scum have to say to the contrary, and I would gladly sacrifice all of these expendable jerks who can't adapt to the life of a stormtrooper properly for just one real Jango Fett clone trooper. They are a disgrace to Fett's legacy as well as the legacy of the GAR, and I'm fully convinced that if Fett were still alive today, he would have them all killed for the same reason.

But I'm not even going to let that dissuade me from being the best clone trooper I can be, because I do have the sense of my surroundings and common sense to conduct myself in battle. I've heard rumors that Kota and his unstable "Starkiller" clone friend are going to attack Timira City soon, and I, at least, intend to go out with a bang, not a whimper. I will seed the stars!

Please R&R! Who do you think is more in the right? Rahm Kota or Commander Cody?