Innocent Ruthlessness - Kali'sto

Certain moments tend to stand out in what are otherwise slowly churning processes. They are moments that define and recontextualize your understanding of your circumstances, of the situation you are in, or the people you know. And yet, they are blips, simple moments in a process which continues on, yet everything seems changed. For me, such a moment was during a battle on Atraken.

We were fighting to capture a city which had sided with the Separatists and provided them a beachehead during the initial stages of the invasion. As we fought our way towards the city center, Splinter and his squad had cornered a group of civilians, including children, which detained them and prevented them from reinforcing the troops on the left flank. However, Splinter feared that they would be unable to hold their position whilst watching their captives, and asked Rays and I if he should kill them. He said it so innocently, without any hint of malice or cruelty. It was just procedure to him, perhaps a necessary step on the road to winning the battle.

I was silent with shock. It seemed unthinkable to me that anyone could consider such a step, and yet Splinter and many of his troops were willing to do it. Gala roared with rage at Splinter for even considering such an action. However, the decision was Rays' to make.

He hesitated, and glanced towards me before making a decision. He then told Splinter to spare the hostages' lives. The battle continued on. We, luckily, won it regardless, though Splinter felt that we could have won more efficiently and with fewer casualties to our own ranks had we freed ourselves of the burden of watching the hostages. After a lengthy retro-analysis of the battle, Rays admitted that he couldn't disagree.

Soon afterwards, Rays spoke to me in private and explained to me something I hadn't realized: the clones had been bred to win battles, and their instructors on Kamino had been unconcerned with morality, just results. Splinter's mentality was one of ruthless pragmatism, a quality encouraged by the Kaminoans and the war. He told me that fighting alongside me, Gala, and the other nonclone Scorchers had changed him: he believed that he otherwise would have made the choice to kill the hostages to win the battle. He was ashamed to admit this, terrified of his own naivete. I looked him in the eye and reassured him that he hadn't made that choice, that he had grown beyond that innocent ruthlessness, that he was a better man. Regardless of the reasons, he made the choice to spare their lives and find another way to win. That was what mattered.

That brief moment recontextualized everything for me. Given our evolution from animals, it makes sense that we focus on what's right in front of us, and yet that puts us directly at odds with understanding the larger, interconnected galaxy we live in. The warning signs of the Republic's decline had been there since I was born, but this was the first time I seriously doubted if we were in the right. The clones had been raised to be the perfect soldier: loyal, skilled, and efficient. Morality had not been a concern at all. And I started to wonder if that mentality was spreading to the rest of the Republic, and perhaps even to the Jedi.