RWBY Thread III: Time To Say Goodbye

[kokuenDG]

so gotta few things that need to be said real quick.
We get a lot of reports from this thread. A lot of it is just a series of people yelling at each other over arguments that have been rehashed hundreds of times since the end of the recent Volume. And I get that the last Volume - and RWBY in general, really - has some controversial moments that people will want to discuss, argue about, debate, etc.

That's fine. We're not going to stop people from doing that, because that's literally what the point of the thread is. However, there's just a point where it gets to be a bit too much, and arguments about whether or not Ironwood was morally justified in his actions in the recent Volume, or if RWBY and her team were in the right for withholding information from Ironwood out of distrust, or whatever flavor of argument of the day descend into insulting other posters, expressing a demeaning attitude towards other's opinions, and just being overall unpleasant. That tends to happen a lot in this thread. We want it to stop happening in this thread.

So! As of now the thread is in a higher state of moderation. What that means is that any future infractions will result in a weeklong boot from the thread, and repeated offenders will likely be permanently removed. So please, everyone endeavor to actually respect the other's arguments, and even if you strongly disagree with them please stay civil and mindful when it comes to responding to others.

In addition, users should refrain from talking about off-site users in the thread. Bear in mind that this does not mean that you cannot continue to post tumblr posts, for example, that add onto the discussion in the thread, with the caveat that it's related to RWBY of course. But any objections to offsite users in the thread should be handled via PM, or they'll be treated as thread violations and infracted as such.

 

[LordYam]

They can take a running jump. If he had not created Amity, everyone would be screwed.

It's fashionable to blame the people making the hard decisions and to cast them as villains deliberately trying to cause trouble for the bourgeoisie viewers, it seems.

Ironwood has a country to save. If they have any better ideas, they would not need to constantly wait for him to save the day. As it is, they got the entire country destroyed, rather than just half, because listening to a scruffy old soldier is beneath them.

Unless, of course, the writers pull the traditional miracle to save RWBY from the consequences of their stupidity.

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Except he was willing to let 90% of the country (the poor) burn in the process. Ruby had a plan to evacuate the poor onto Atlas which would have allowed Ironwood to take the city into space without the whole "leaving the poor to die". Ironwood said "fuck that". He also ruined the second evacuation plan which would have saved lives, forcing the desperate third plan.

The job of a soldier is to obey the political leadership even if he disagrees with them. Ironwood broke that responsibility and thus failed his duty as a soldier. He also repeatedly fucked over the poor of Mantle and locked Atlas away from the rest of the world when what was needed was for everyone to stand together.

Most of the time "people making hard decisions" at best only make them because they or someone else fucked up earlier and limited their own options or at worst ignore other options because they're less convenient (Israel could EASILY end the conflict if they gave the palestinians complete control over their own water supply borders and roads and abandoned their settlements but that would mean giving up their dreams of lebensraum so better just resort to mass murder and using human shields.)

When people criticize the people making "hard decisions" it's usually because their sadistic idiots doing what's convenient rather than what in the long term might actually be right.

 

[TreyTheExplainer]

Except he was willing to let 90% of the country

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Half. Not 90%, half. RWBY ensured all would burn instead.

Because yeah, James Ironwood only made triage when it became clear to him that either everyone dies or only half of them do. Salem was invincible, his forces outmatched, and literally the only option was to somehow take Atlas above the clouds where Grimm cannot reach.

He was absolutely correct. RWBY just didn't want to make the decision because the idea that victory will not just come to their feet goes against everything they know.

They were also correct. Things just work out for them even when they fail. It worked in Beacon when Ruby's eyes just triggered out of the blue, in the village when Qrow arrived to save them, and in Haven when Raven and Blake arrived and ended the threat without prompting.

So why not expect the writers to save them again, eh?

Israel could EASILY end the conflict if they gave the palestinians complete control over their own water supply borders and roads and abandoned their settlements but that would mean giving up their dreams of lebensraum so better just resort to mass murder and using human shields.

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To quote the Palestinians: "from the rivers to the sea".

 

[LordYam]

Half. Not 90%, half. RWBY ensured all would burn instead.


To quote the Palestinians: "from the rivers to the sea".

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No it was 90. And RWBY's original plans would have saved that other section without much hassle.....and Ironwood promptly fucked that up by shooting down the ships out of spite. The only reason they relied on the gateway was because of Ironwood getting in their way.

Ironwood has no one to blame but himself. HE burned Mantle and he himself realizes it in the end.

Likud's charter makes it clear they want all 100% of the land, the King Crane Commission showed that even in the 20s most jews were hoping to dispossess Palestinians of their land, Ben Gurion made VERY clear he fully intended to abolish partition and claim everything (meaning that even if the Palestinians HAD accepted it the Yishuv would have just cooked up an excuse to expel them later), and the Yishuv from the beginning treated the Mihzrai Jews and Arab Muslims as animals.

Add in that most palestinians in the 90s SUPPORTED a two state solution and no. ISRAEL has the power, and ISRAEL prolongs the conflict because they think that their past suffering gives them the right to brutalize others so long as they feel safe.

 

[Matrix Dragon]

The job of a soldier is to obey the political leadership even if he disagrees with them. Ironwood broke that responsibility and thus failed his duty as a soldier. He also repeatedly fucked over the poor of Mantle and locked Atlas away from the rest of the world when what was needed was for everyone to stand together.

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This right here. He wasn't a hard man making the hard decisions. He was a coward and a traitor to his nation, that left the majority of the civilian population to die even before volume 8. HE FAILED IN HIS RESPONSIBILITIES.

 

[gman391]

The flaws were organisational and cultural more than anything else.

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I was thinking more in how they lined up in front of the walls for that fight with the Grimm. But yes it is cultural and organizational. There's a reason why I said it's all very British. Like Ironwood reminds me a lot of Sir Douglas Haig from ww1. A skilled officer in terms of organization but prior to ww1 had never actually fought a peer enemy, and it showed terribly and would earn him the moniker 'Butcher Haig' after his death. Nearly 3 million British soldiers died at the Somme alone, but unlike Haig, Ironwood doesn't have the resources of the British Army to draw on, and doesn't have anyone who can effectively hold him to account. And also unlike Haig, Ironwood seemed to the end unwilling to learn or grow as a general.

Like Haig definitely earned his moniker, but he did learn and try new things, and by the end of the war he was a very solid general, but the unfortunate thing is that learning how to general was at the time and often still is, something you learn by paying a blood price.

To further the whole (likely unintentional) British Army parallels. The Atlesian Army itself seems rigidly classist and ossified. I have no doubt that Winter is a skilled soldier and specialist. But it does seem highly suspect that she just happened to become Ironwood's righthand woman. Much as in the British Army for most of it's history it was less your skill at arms that mattered for promotion but who you know and how much money you could pay. Despite his obvious skill Marrow was clearly promoted less for his ability, and more to uh, placate the proles as Haig might say.

So yeah, it wasn't the soldiers who failed, and RWBY didn't portray them that way. It was the Army as an institution that failed. It was the leadership that failed, but the soldiers themselves...seem to be doing as well as can be expected given the catastrophic mismanagement from the top down.

 

[TreyTheExplainer]

No it was 90

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Your reason for saying this? Do you understand how impossible it would be?

Ironwood has no one to blame but himself. HE burned Mantle and he himself realizes it in the end.

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No, the writers just turn him crazy to avoid addressing the argument. Same as they did with Adam and that Argus midget.

When writers don't know how to refute an antagonist's words, they just turn him into a moustache twirling puppy kicker and let the matter drift off, then drop a Deus Ex Machina.

Old trick.

 

[LordYam]

Yep. Ironwood was making the CONVENIENT choices rather than the hard ones. A truly hard choice would be to actually listen to the others giving him advice and put his projects on hold to protect the people of Mantle.

Ruby's first two plans WOULD have worked. Ironwood spitefully ruined them because he was paranoid and so he doomed his nation. He also trusted WATTS while he was in custody.

And no. Soldiers have always been tyrants. The Nazis and soviets used soldiers. In both cases they were tyrants.

 

[ShuraNoDougai]

Probably because the walls look like a token thing instead of what the other kingdoms have. Atlas has never been threatened by Grimm since it has risen high to the sky. They thought themselves untouchable and paid the price for it.

 

[Matrix Dragon]

Probably because the walls look like a token thing instead of what the other kingdoms have. Atlas has never been threatened by Grimm since it has risen high to the sky. They thought themselves untouchable and paid the price for it.

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They looked pretty thin in what we saw of them. They weren't intended to keep out Grimm, just divide the farmland from the city. The islands barricades were the hardlight shields that Salem destroyed with what was essentially Grimm siege weapons.

 

[Zam]

One fan story had Hazel be the recruiter and trap Lionheart in a pretty clever way.

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Given the councilors who gave Leo grief were doing so due to explicit bigotry, taking them out somehow serving Salem strikes me as weird optics at best and at this stage that doesn't really trap Leo? Like he could literally just say, "Oh, OK then, well they were still bastards getting in the way of my efforts to fight Salem & I'm significantly more well informed than them so better for the job anyway, thanks bye."

I'm not going to get into the police thing because its off topic, but suffice to say, something like 95% of crime is informed not by malice but by circumstances, address the circumstance, the crime stops.

In any event. The Atlas soldier is shown fighting bravely against overwhelming odds, shit tactics but you know what that's a failure of? Leadership.

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One thing one should remember about RT is that they do seem pretty sympathetic to on the ground soldiers, they don't care for the military leaders, or the military industrial complex, and they do acknowledge that not every soldier is some good hearted guy just wanting to defend against nominal Nazis, but overall their attitude seems to be, 'the system and leadership is predatory' over 'army bad'.

Half. Not 90%, half. RWBY ensured all would burn instead.

Because yeah, James Ironwood only made triage when it became clear to him that either everyone dies or only half of them do. Salem was invincible, his forces outmatched, and literally the only option was to somehow take Atlas above the clouds where Grimm cannot reach.

He was absolutely correct. RWBY just didn't want to make the decision because the idea that victory will not just come to their feet goes against everything they know.

They were also correct. Things just work out for them even when they fail. It worked in Beacon when Ruby's eyes just triggered out of the blue, in the village when Qrow arrived to save them, and in Haven when Raven and Blake arrived and ended the threat without prompting.

So why not expect the writers to save them again, eh?


To quote the Palestinians: "from the rivers to the sea".

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... You do recall RWBY saved everyone right?

Yeah how dare Palestinians suffering genocide want their land back.

So yeah, it wasn't the soldiers who failed, and RWBY didn't portray them that way. It was the Army as an institution that failed. It was the leadership that failed, but the soldiers themselves...seem to be doing as well as can be expected given the catastrophic mismanagement from the top down.

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Some very solid insights here, and another thing to keep in mind, has Atlas even fought (Or won) a war in living memory? Not that I recall, as you say it seems like Ironwood has never fought a peer and we know he was functionally useless at fighting the White Fang given they just grew and grew for five years until combusting thanks to internal issues.

Yep. Ironwood was making the CONVENIENT choices rather than the hard ones. A truly hard choice would be to actually listen to the others giving him advice and put his projects on hold to protect the people of Mantle.

Ruby's first two plans WOULD have worked. Ironwood spitefully ruined them because he was paranoid and so he doomed his nation. He also trusted WATTS while he was in custody.

And no. Soldiers have always been tyrants. The Nazis and soviets used soldiers. In both cases they were tyrants.

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Indeed, its like I've noted elsewhere, Ironwood chose to bail on Mantle just cos he was scared of Cinder, doubled down when he found out about Salem and this was despite the fact that in both cases, he wasn't even in a "back against the wall" situation yet and was frankly obligated by his job to actually take the risks to save the civilian population. RWBY were willing to risk their lives to do it, but Ironwood wouldn't.

 

[LordYam]

Your reason for saying this? Do you understand how impossible it would be?



No, the writers just turn him crazy to avoid addressing the argument. Same as they did with Adam and that Argus midget.

When writers don't know how to refute an antagonist's words, they just turn him into a moustache twirling puppy kicker and let the matter drift off, then drop a Deus Ex Machina.

Old trick.

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Mantle is where the poor people live. Atlas is where the rich people live. Pretty sage guess

No they actually didn't. Ironwood demonstrated arrogance, paranoia and control freak tendencies from day 1. In volume 4 he's willing to leave the rest of the nations to hang even though everyone needs to stand together. In Vol 7 he redirects resources meant for mantle to his own projects, leaving them to hang The heroes suggested reasonable plans. Ironwood was "NO, I don't WANNA" and spitefully ruined them.

Hell JACQUES of all people accurately pointed out that Ironwood wasn't willing to trust others even though he was demanding people trust him. For all that Jacques was an asshole he was entirely right on that score.

Given the councilors who gave Leo grief were doing so due to explicit bigotry, taking them out somehow serving Salem strikes me as weird optics at best and at this stage that doesn't really trap Leo? Like he could literally just say, "Oh, OK then, well they were still bastards getting in the way of my efforts to fight Salem & I'm significantly more well informed than them so better for the job anyway, thanks bye."

I'm not going to get into the police thing because its off topic, but suffice to say, something like 95% of crime is informed not by malice but by circumstances, address the circumstance, the crime stops.


One thing one should remember about RT is that they do seem pretty sympathetic to on the ground soldiers, they don't care for the military leaders, or the military industrial complex, and they do acknowledge that not every soldier is some good hearted guy just wanting to defend against nominal Nazis, but overall their attitude seems to be, 'the system and leadership is predatory' over 'army bad'.

... You do recall RWBY saved everyone right?

Yeah how dare Palestinians suffering genocide want their land back.

Some very solid insights here, and another thing to keep in mind, has Atlas even fought (Or won) a war in living memory? Not that I recall, as you say it seems like Ironwood has never fought a peer and we know he was functionally useless at fighting the White Fang given they just grew and grew for five years until combusting thanks to internal issues.


Indeed, its like I've noted elsewhere, Ironwood chose to bail on Mantle just cos he was scared of Cinder, doubled down when he found out about Salem and this was despite the fact that in both cases, he wasn't even in a "back against the wall" situation yet and was frankly obligated by his job to actually take the risks to save the civilian population. RWBY were willing to risk their lives to do it, but Ironwood wouldn't.

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1.) I don't remember the details; it may have been more out of personal reasons (i.e. they were making his lives hard and he wanted to knock them down a peg) and regardless of his reasons he still worked with Salem by doing so even if it was by accident. At that point his own cowardice caused him to dig himself deeper rather than just admit his cockup to Ozpin (who would have genuinely understood).

2.) While most crime can be stopped if you address circumstances, there are always going to be some people who whether through choice, upbringing or on rare occasions genetic factors cannot and will not reform. So like it or not some form of law enforcement is needed and in practice neighborhood watches tend to be even more unhinged than police (Police screening keep SOME of the worst out whereas neighborhood watches will accept any idiot who volunteers).

 

[TreyTheExplainer]

You do recall RWBY saved everyone right?

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is where the poor people live. Atlas is where the rich people live. Pretty sage guess

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...is that actually canon? Because Atlas is just as large, clearly more economically developed and high tech, and the centre of the country's military.

Speaking of which, Atlas is not the US. The general of the military and Atlas Headmaster have seats on the government, and one seat was vacant. So Ironwood had legal authority to make all the decisions necessary, which he used adeptly to save the day before the writers remembered that he's not the protagonist.

Then they proceeded to drop Diabolus Ex
Machina on him and Deus Ex Machina on the heroes, turned him into a fascist out of the blue (because military =Nazis for RT), and then have him kick puppies in every scene to stop viewers from judging his argument on its own merits.

No wonder so many dropped the show. I certainly do.

 

[LordYam]

...is that actually canon? Because Atlas is just as large, clearly more economically developed and high tech, and the centre of the country's military.

Speaking of which, Atlas is not the US. The general of the military and Atlas Headmaster have seats on the government, and one seat was vacant. So Ironwood had legal authority to make all the decisions necessary, which he used adeptly to save the day before the writers remembered that he's not the protagonist.

Then they proceeded to drop Diabolus Ex
Machina on him and Deus Ex Machina on the heroes, turned him into a fascist out of the blue (because military =Nazis for RT), and then have him kick puppies in every scene to stop viewers from judging his argument on its own merits.

No wonder so many dropped the show. I certainly do.

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No he wasn't saving the day on his own, nor did he have authority (the other council members were around and they VERY clearly disapproved). He was initially fucking it all up. Team RWBY got him to work with Robyn and actually try to help people....before Ironwood succumbed to paranoia and decided to burn the poor to save the rich.

They DID address the argument on it's merits. The problem is that his plan was both cruel AND stupid. He was planning to sacrifice the poor of his country and the team presented TWO alternatives to his plan and he spitefully ignored them. On it's merits they were awful from the word go.

As mentioned earlier he had control freak tendencies from the beginning, as well as arrogance.

So no it wasn't Diabolous Ex Machina. Ironwood was just a power hungry control freak who chose the convenient option and abandoned his duty to protect his people. RWBY didn't get deus ex machine.

That you blindly worship the military and refuse to admit that the system can allow abuses isn't my problem.

Same with law enforcement and how you couldn't accept that cowboy cops ARE authority simply because they're members of the organization and don't get punished by their superiors.

 

[Mook]

Like, just show them in the background a few times hanging out, Yang making Blake laugh.
Heck you can easily do this with all characters.
Give us an actual scene of our heroes training. And while Jaune gets bapped around you can have say....Yang and Nora sparing or working out.
Or the cast is in the library for more than 1 or 2 scenes and we see Weiss helping Ruby with homework.

Like, in My Hero was see plenty of background/foreground moments with our young cast. Like, some of the kids trying to stick a christmas hat on Bakugou while other characters are moving the plot with dialogue.

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That's a good point. One of the major advantages of modern CRWBY is that their crowds department fucking rocks these days. The volume 7 and volume 8 commentary track had a lot of praise for them for always being able to say "sure, we can figure out a way to do that" every time the writers needed something to happen in the background or in crowds.


Meanwhile volume 1 RWBY basically couldn't handle having real crowds at all. But with good crowds and good use of characters doing stuff in the background there's so much you can do to add extra characterization just with small glimpses of stuff here and there. Like Yang's friends from Signal could be given actual character designs for example and she could hang out with them in the background every now and then.



Oh. And with the power of hindsight Team CFVY would be fully designed from the getgo so you could add a quick but in the cafeteria scene with maybe Yang and Pyrrha deciding to go over and deck Cardin for bullying Velvet only to sit down when the rest of her team shows up and resolve the situation before they can.

 

[TreyTheExplainer]

So no it wasn't Diabolous Ex Machina

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Salem breaking her millennia long seclusion just to provide Ironwood an unwinnable battle isn't that because.....what?

Also, he was quite willing to work with whoever offered, or Robyn would have been in prison. He was literally breaking the law to go soft on her.

 

[Zam]

1.) I don't remember the details; it may have been more out of personal reasons (i.e. they were making his lives hard and he wanted to knock them down a peg) and regardless of his reasons he still worked with Salem by doing so even if it was by accident. At that point his own cowardice caused him to dig himself deeper rather than just admit his cockup to Ozpin (who would have genuinely understood).

2.) While most crime can be stopped if you address circumstances, there are always going to be some people who whether through choice, upbringing or on rare occasions genetic factors cannot and will not reform. So like it or not some form of law enforcement is needed and in practice neighborhood watches tend to be even more unhinged than police (Police screening keep SOME of the worst out whereas neighborhood watches will accept any idiot who volunteers).

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1: To be honest that kind of just sounds like a more round about way of getting to the same character. This is why I prefer to make cowardice inherent to Leo over some new development and just something his allies missed or misinterpreted due to circumstances and he played into.

2: As noted, I am talking about like 95% of crime, and the rest is best left for PMs to be frank, though I should note social workers are also things.

...is that actually canon? Because Atlas is just as large, clearly more economically developed and high tech, and the centre of the country's military.

Speaking of which, Atlas is not the US. The general of the military and Atlas Headmaster have seats on the government, and one seat was vacant. So Ironwood had legal authority to make all the decisions necessary, which he used adeptly to save the day before the writers remembered that he's not the protagonist.

Then they proceeded to drop Diabolus Ex
Machina on him and Deus Ex Machina on the heroes, turned him into a fascist out of the blue (because military =Nazis for RT), and then have him kick puppies in every scene to stop viewers from judging his argument on its own merits.

No wonder so many dropped the show. I certainly do.

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"In time, it became apparent that the city of Mantle was living in Atlas' shadow. And so the decision was made to move the Kingdom's capital. Mantle was old news - and the Kingdom of Atlas was born. "A golden age of prosperity" they called it - but those left behind in Mantle would probably tell you it was the coldest winter they ever knew."

The creators straight up said Atlas is based on the US and also legal authority (Which the other councilors protested and still involved him secretly embezzling, which is a crime) to do something doesn't make it right, or are you one of those people who thinks the Founding Fathers were all heroes despite most being unrepentant slave owners?

Ironwood was always a fascist, if you missed this it was your fault, not the writers. Also, if you seriously think a guy who was expressly framed as already becoming unhinged in V4 and growing more so as the series went on who is now operating on no sleep after having ripped his own arm off is going to be making good decisions then I have a bridge to sell you.

Yet here you are, and here you will likely stay, along with all those other people who claim to drop the show yet continue watching it and ranting about it every single day.

 

[LordYam]

Salem breaking her millennia long seclusion just to provide Ironwood an unwinnable battle isn't that because.....what?

Also, he was quite willing to work with whoever offered, or Robyn would have been in prison. He was literally breaking the law to go soft on her.

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And once Cinder left the chess piece he ignored all that and tried to have Robyn jailed. He only showed willingness to work with Robyn after Team RWBY floated it, and when they suggested a more humane AND practical plan he ignored it. TWICE.

 

[gman391]

RWBY's opinion of the military is I think deeply informed by the experiences that soldiers had in the Forever War (Afghanistan and Iraq) Where a lot of people died because some rich fucks, were angry over how the 1st Persian Gulf War turned out. Where no matter what option was chosen, the result was always the same, more dead people, more dead soldiers, and no end in sight. In light of that depressing reality for many militaries over the past Eighteen odd years, it's no surprise that there's a bone deep cynicism about the army higher command. It's hard not to be cynical when the bastards ordering you to die for king and country never seem to be in a position to also die for king and country.

And unlike most Hollywood productions where if they so much as hint at the military as whole being bad, they'll lose funding, RT has the ability to make that point. That just because you have orders, doesn't make 'em right. Just because you're military, doesn't make you right. And that's ultimately I think which produces such a visceral reaction to Ironwood's fall. America and by extension most of the world has been fed a steady diet of 'military good' for generations at this point. Since oh, I want to say ww1, but that can be argued, at least since ww2. Now there's plenty of reasons, some good, a lot bad for that. However, it does mean that there's a kneejerk propaganda response to overcome.

But, the military like most institutions has well problems within it's self. However, unlike most institutions it's uniquely unsuited for self reflection because that requires honest criticism, and honest criticism means telling your superiors that their ideas are bad and they should feel bad. Which uh, is 'bad for discipline' as Cadorna might say (Lmao he'd have you shot for criticizing him....no parallels here) So the only real time that happens is when the brutal darwinism of war makes it so you have to adapt or die. (Mostly people just die)

Back to Atlas, the last time it was facing that particular test was the Great War near 80 years ago, and it died, but apparently much like the Prussians after ww1, it didn't *learn* so once again the same mistake comes out. The belief that technology and cold 'pragmatism' can overcome anything. Despite the world of Remnant never working like that at all. And that 'cold pragmatism' is usually just 'be shitty to people we don't like and pretend it's justified'

Like I think that CRWBY made a mistake giving James the Mettle Semblance, I do, because it was never needed. But he was always kind of a bad general who didn't learn from his mistakes my dudes.

 

[Matrix Dragon]

So no it wasn't Diabolous Ex Machina.

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Hell, Salem hadn't even announced she was coming when Ironwood stopped the evacuation, sent Winter off to steal the Maiden powers for operation: SPAAAAACE!, and made plans for martial law to remove the council as a political threat. The only threat he knew of at the time was Cinder running around ON Atlas. And that was all it took. Salem making her appearance? That was solely to keep pressure on Ironwood so he'd keep fucking up like she wanted. He did most of the work for her.

legal authority (Which the other councilors protested and still involved him secretly embezzling, which is a crime) to do something doesn't make it right, or are you one of those people who thinks the Founding Fathers were all herpes despite most being unrepentant slave owners?

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I'm just grabbing this now before you correct that spelling mistake, because it's hilarious

 

[Zam]

And once Cinder left the chess piece he ignored all that and tried to have Robyn jailed. He only showed willingness to work with Robyn after Team RWBY floated it, and when they suggested a more humane AND practical plan he ignored it. TWICE.

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Also he was basically having a panic attack when it was clear Watts was locking them out of their systems and needed everyone else to calm him down and coach him through doing sensible things. Like, Ironwood is not good at managing shit on his own, he constantly needed to be pulled back from more brutality and corruption across V7 and hand held in earlier volumes even as he fucked everything up and whenever left to his own devices he inevitably made things worse.

 

[Matrix Dragon]

Whoever promoted Ironwood to General is hopefully kicking themselves in the afterlife, while someone else explains the Peter Principle to them...

"But he was so good as a Captain..."
"And you were around to keep an eye on him Bob!"

 

[Mook]

On the topic of Huntsmen vs real life mercenaries I would like to point out a crucial detail that people always leave out when making the comparison.


Monsters. Demons. Prowlers of the night. Creatures of Grimm.



In the real world the primary business of mercenaries was and is war. Aka go around and kill or threaten other humans so that you can take their stuff. When mercenaries turned on their employers for not paying that's just utilizing the same principle against a new target. Kill or threaten other people so that you can take their stuff.


But on Remnant and fantasy worlds with consistent monster threats the primary source of income for Huntsmen/mercenaries/adventures is killing monsters that threaten to kill people. Instead of dehumanizing people so that you won't have to feel bad for killing people to take their stuff the occupation instead is more likely to draw in altruistic souls who are willing to put their own lives on the line to protect others. And since monsters, Grimm in particular are basically omnipresent there's never a risk of running out of work to do that justifies people paying you for protection.


Huntsmen are somewhat analogous to mercenaries sure. But in many ways they have more in common with firefighters. They perform a dangerous job stopping natural disasters that are always a treat to people and sometimes have to put their lives on the line to do so. Some of them might go bad, some of them might only care about the paycheck.

But most go in with aspirations for heroism and their culture and teachers is going to nurture that attitude even further to ensure they don't go bad.

 

[Carrnage]

Yes. Where do you think the Imperialists got their slaves? The feudal classes are always the enemies of the peasants, no matter the region or religion or colour.

Warriors, being the essence distilled of feudalism, have always been tyrants. Soldiers, being servants of a modern state, have always beem defenders.

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What the fuck.

First of all the Knighthood as an actual martial class and military paradigm stopped before the colonial era even started though it wasn't exactly official until backlash against WW1 mismanagement forcibly removed hereditary nobility from the military in any privileged status.
Second if you really think soldiers are as a rule defenders of freedom then you've never heard of; tianamen square, polish occupations, colonial occupations, the irish troubles, the trail of tears, the rape of nanjing, etc etc.

edit, Hell i wouldn't say independant warriors are perfect but regimented militaries have plenty of atrocities under their belt.

 

[gman391]

I'm just going leave a quote by Smedley Butler (Career Marine, and probably the reason the Bussineman's Plot failed, he was the most decorated Marine in US history at the time of his death in 1940 with 16 medals)

"I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer; a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902–1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents."


And the Atlesian Military seems mostly to have operated along similar lines, ensuring that it's industries, it's technology never had any pesky protectionism getting in the way of making money. It's not for nothing that Ironwood was well acquainted with Jacque. Given it's abysmal failure at actually fighting Grimm both time's its shown. It seems that gunboat diplomacy is rather what it excelled at.

Whoever promoted Ironwood to General is hopefully kicking themselves in the afterlife, while someone else explains the Peter Principle to them...

"But he was so good as a Captain..."
"And you were around to keep an eye on him Bob!"

Click to shrink...

I rather suspect Ironwood was promoted to general on patronage rather than merit. A sort of "You're Alex's kid, of course there's a place for you in the general staff" type rather than being promoted by seniority or talent. As he seems an extremely effective small unit operator, but rather pants at anything else. Including politics, and at the level Ironwood is operating politics is a skill deeply needed for the effective management of the military. So likely excelled out of the academy in his first small missions against whoever, although probably suffering losses there. (Given his adamant stance on replacing soldiers with robots, it's probable that this came from something early in his career) rapidly promoted out of the field and brought on to the general staff likely as a trainer given Ozpin's later recruitment of him for the Academy. But as people retired, died or were cashiered, Ironwood ended up as the Commanding General in Chief of the Atlesian Army.

Which was just a terrible thing all around.
But he's Alex's kid, he's our sort, and how bad could he be really?
---Some nameless and very dead Atlesian Staff officer.

 

[ShuraNoDougai]

At this rate Trey you gotta see is it really worth dying on that hill?