"The ends justify the means." Ever heard that phrase used before? It's the notion that WHAT you do doesn't matter, only that it gets results. It's a call to clear your conscience of the blood on your hands if you've brought peace. But another haunting quote is "nothing ever ends." What good is a peace attained by blood if that peace doesn't last? Is it really worth killing innocents if it'll bring 10 years of peace? What if it doesn't even get you that ten years? This is one of those conundrums presented (albeit subtly) by the game Suikoden 1.
The back story of Suikoden 1 (surprisingly deep, all things considered) is that before the game started, there was a civil war in the Scarlet Moon Empire. After a long and arduous struggle, the forces of Barbarossa Rugner prevailed, allowing for what SHOULD have been the end of a long and bloody conflict. However, the City-States of Jowston had taken advantage of the turmoil that the civil war had caused and so they invaded the Empire's northern lands. The new emperor, wanting to keep his Empire united, sought to amass his army and fight off the invaders. Unfortunately, his entire country was (understandably) weary of another armed conflict.
Not wanting to see his Empire occupied by a foreign power, Barbarossa was one hundred percent ready to send armed forces to respond to this act of aggression. However, what can a ruler do if his people are not only weary of war, but find it acceptable for a foreign nation to occupy a part of their country if doing so means not going to war against them? The answer: whip up the nation's spirit by letting them know they're fighting an enemy willing to kill them, regardless if they are combatants or civilians.. Nothing bangs the wars of drum better than the idea that you are fighting for your very survival, after all. The only problem is that Jowston is NOT targeting civilians!
This is where Leon Silverberg comes into the picture. His suggestion is as cold blooded as it is simple: raze the village of Kalekka, leave no survivors, and blame it all on Jowston. THIS will get the people into a frenzy, allowing them to support their Emperor and his war effort. After some deliberation, the plan was agreed upon.
As expected, news of the atrocity allegedly committed by Jowston turns the attitudes of the people into 100% pro-war. Barbarossa gains the support he needed to expel Jowston from his land. In less than a year, he wins his war, keeps his land united, and is finally free to rule the land with the peace he fought so hard to gain. In a more bitter and cynical work, the story of Barbarossa Rugner would have ended here, giving the audience the haunting question of whether it was right for him to massacre his people like that, to allow his nation the chance to fight for their freedom from a foreign power. Works like Watchmen and The Dark Knight typically end with questions like this: do the ends justify the means?
Suikoden, however, is by no means a cynical work; quite the opposite, in fact. The entire Suikoden series is idealistic, almost to a fault. While the individuals behind certain organizations MIGHT be as human as anyone else, with flaws and virtues, there's never any doubt that what they are doing is WRONG. Suikoden is a series that unambiguously decries and rejects Imperialism and despotism. It does not reject war, but rather than present it as glorious, it is presented as a tragedy; sometimes unavoidable, sometimes righteous, but never honorable.
So what does this have to do with the Kalekka Incident? Simply put, Suikoden 1 tells of the civil war that pretty much ended the Scarlet Moon Empire and dethroned Barbarossa Rugner. And this conflict was empowered by, you guessed it, the Kalekka Incident! See, a handful of Imperial officers were so disgusted with what had occured that they RESIGNED from their posts and officially joined the rebellion against Barbarossa Rugner and the Empire! Two of these resignations in particular would end up being DIRECT CAUSES for the Empire's fall: Humphrey Mintz and Mathiu Silverberg,
Humphrey Mintz was a soldier in the Imperial Army who participated in the Incident. He felt so disgusted by what he had done that he SLEW his commanding officer, fled to the Liberation Army, and told them EVERYTHING. The Empire's secret was out, and the Liberation Army now had DAMN GOOD REASON to overthrow the Empire. No, seriously, this entire Incident was like a godsend to anyone and everyone wanting to overthrow the Empire.
The Incident did more than implicate Barbarossa's rule as inept and illegitimate, it demonstrated beyond a shadow of a doubt that the entire government was made of people who saw the common folk as expendable. That the Empire would not think TWICE about killing you if they saw you not as a threat, but as a stepping stone to whatever they wanted not only became a call for rebellion, it became a chilling reality. They already did it to Kalekka, what will stop the Empire from razing YOUR town?
If Humphrey Mintz' resignation and eventual whistleblowing could be considered the beginning of the end for Barbarossa, then Mathiu Siverberg's resignation could well be considered the death sentence for the Scarlet Moon Empire. Simply put, the ENTIRE Liberation War for Scarlet Moon can be divided in two drastically different parts: before Mathiu joined, and AFTER. Before Mathiu officially joined the Liberation Army, said organization was a ragtag bunch of misfits with big ideas, big dreams, but little REAL support, and far less true victories to their name. It's quite telling that before Mathiu joined, their headquarters was a sewer. AFTER Mathiu joined? A castle. Mathiu became literally the tide turner: his strategies became THE defining factor for the Liberation Army's many victories.
Mathiu Silverberg was a member of the Silverberg house of military strategists, most of whom had managed fame and regard for their brilliant war strategies. Mathiu himself was no slouch, and was likely to gain quite the position in the Scarlet Moon Empire once his uncle, Leon Silverberg, retired. It is my personal belief that Mathiu was going to inherit Leon's position as the Chief Strategist in Scarlet Moon, quite the comfortable position indeed. He gave ALL that up in disgust for his role in the Kalekka Incident, and for a long time swore off war. The loss of his sister Odessa, who TOOK UP ARMS AGAINST THE EMPIRE WHEN SHE HEARD WHAT THEY DID IN KALEKKA, shook him up enough to quit his quiet life as a school teacher in a rural town and return to war. He knew the Empire had to go down, and he was going to lend a much needed hand.
Not wanting to see his Empire occupied by a foreign power, Barbarossa was one hundred percent ready to send armed forces to respond to this act of aggression. However, what can a ruler do if his people are not only weary of war, but find it acceptable for a foreign nation to occupy a part of their country if doing so means not going to war against them? The answer: whip up the nation's spirit by letting them know they're fighting an enemy willing to kill them, regardless if they are combatants or civilians.. Nothing bangs the wars of drum better than the idea that you are fighting for your very survival, after all. The only problem is that Jowston is NOT targeting civilians!
This is where Leon Silverberg comes into the picture. His suggestion is as cold blooded as it is simple: raze the village of Kalekka, leave no survivors, and blame it all on Jowston. THIS will get the people into a frenzy, allowing them to support their Emperor and his war effort. After some deliberation, the plan was agreed upon.
As expected, news of the atrocity allegedly committed by Jowston turns the attitudes of the people into 100% pro-war. Barbarossa gains the support he needed to expel Jowston from his land. In less than a year, he wins his war, keeps his land united, and is finally free to rule the land with the peace he fought so hard to gain. In a more bitter and cynical work, the story of Barbarossa Rugner would have ended here, giving the audience the haunting question of whether it was right for him to massacre his people like that, to allow his nation the chance to fight for their freedom from a foreign power. Works like Watchmen and The Dark Knight typically end with questions like this: do the ends justify the means?
Suikoden, however, is by no means a cynical work; quite the opposite, in fact. The entire Suikoden series is idealistic, almost to a fault. While the individuals behind certain organizations MIGHT be as human as anyone else, with flaws and virtues, there's never any doubt that what they are doing is WRONG. Suikoden is a series that unambiguously decries and rejects Imperialism and despotism. It does not reject war, but rather than present it as glorious, it is presented as a tragedy; sometimes unavoidable, sometimes righteous, but never honorable.
So what does this have to do with the Kalekka Incident? Simply put, Suikoden 1 tells of the civil war that pretty much ended the Scarlet Moon Empire and dethroned Barbarossa Rugner. And this conflict was empowered by, you guessed it, the Kalekka Incident! See, a handful of Imperial officers were so disgusted with what had occured that they RESIGNED from their posts and officially joined the rebellion against Barbarossa Rugner and the Empire! Two of these resignations in particular would end up being DIRECT CAUSES for the Empire's fall: Humphrey Mintz and Mathiu Silverberg,
Humphrey Mintz was a soldier in the Imperial Army who participated in the Incident. He felt so disgusted by what he had done that he SLEW his commanding officer, fled to the Liberation Army, and told them EVERYTHING. The Empire's secret was out, and the Liberation Army now had DAMN GOOD REASON to overthrow the Empire. No, seriously, this entire Incident was like a godsend to anyone and everyone wanting to overthrow the Empire.
The Incident did more than implicate Barbarossa's rule as inept and illegitimate, it demonstrated beyond a shadow of a doubt that the entire government was made of people who saw the common folk as expendable. That the Empire would not think TWICE about killing you if they saw you not as a threat, but as a stepping stone to whatever they wanted not only became a call for rebellion, it became a chilling reality. They already did it to Kalekka, what will stop the Empire from razing YOUR town?
If Humphrey Mintz' resignation and eventual whistleblowing could be considered the beginning of the end for Barbarossa, then Mathiu Siverberg's resignation could well be considered the death sentence for the Scarlet Moon Empire. Simply put, the ENTIRE Liberation War for Scarlet Moon can be divided in two drastically different parts: before Mathiu joined, and AFTER. Before Mathiu officially joined the Liberation Army, said organization was a ragtag bunch of misfits with big ideas, big dreams, but little REAL support, and far less true victories to their name. It's quite telling that before Mathiu joined, their headquarters was a sewer. AFTER Mathiu joined? A castle. Mathiu became literally the tide turner: his strategies became THE defining factor for the Liberation Army's many victories.
Mathiu Silverberg was a member of the Silverberg house of military strategists, most of whom had managed fame and regard for their brilliant war strategies. Mathiu himself was no slouch, and was likely to gain quite the position in the Scarlet Moon Empire once his uncle, Leon Silverberg, retired. It is my personal belief that Mathiu was going to inherit Leon's position as the Chief Strategist in Scarlet Moon, quite the comfortable position indeed. He gave ALL that up in disgust for his role in the Kalekka Incident, and for a long time swore off war. The loss of his sister Odessa, who TOOK UP ARMS AGAINST THE EMPIRE WHEN SHE HEARD WHAT THEY DID IN KALEKKA, shook him up enough to quit his quiet life as a school teacher in a rural town and return to war. He knew the Empire had to go down, and he was going to lend a much needed hand.
Some of you might have wanted me to make this blog while focusing on the notion of False Flag Operations, perhaps drawing parallels to certain events that have happened in real life. I'd like to apologize for any disappointment you may have felt, but I'm not here to debate conspiracy theories. I'm here to talk about something greater.
Art and Literature are riddled with works that force the viewer to make difficult, perhaps unanswerable questions regarding morality. I had previously mentioned two: Watchmen and The Dark Knight. Both works feature lies used to help make the world a better place. In Watchmen, the character of Ozymandias fakes an alien invasion in hopes of averting nuclear war. The graphic novel ends with the foreboding sense that perhaps the peace he gave the world through his lie would soon unravel. The Dark Knight ends with the truth about Harvey Dent, a beloved DA who became evil, hidden away so as not to besmirch the memory of the man who worked so tirelessly to rid Gotham City of its criminal underbelly. Both works end with the truth covered up, leaving the viewer with the question of the lie being good or not. What's worth more: a lie that brings peace, or a truth that destroys it? Do the Ends justify the Means?
Suikoden 1 takes that idea and stomps on it flat. By making the ENTIRE conflict be an indirect fallout from the Kalekka Incident, Suikoden makes it clear that the answer to that question is a big, resounding NO. The Kalekka Incident is clearly and unequivocally presented as something wrong and unforgivable, and the player is actually made to traverse Kalekka at least once per game. They get to travel through the ruins of the town, in one of the few places in the entire game to not even have a BGM, underscoring the tragedy of what had occurred there.
This is where Suikoden 1's uncompromising idealism really shines, because it also presents the Liberation War as being morally righteous. This is no coincidence, and it's by no means a failure of narrative on the game's part. Suikoden 1 is in fact giving the player a very harsh but all too important lesson: if a government mistreats its people, then it becomes a moral obligation to do all that can be done to overthrow said government. This is made clear from the moment the game makes you go through Rockland: this contrast between Gregminster (a shining metropolis) and Rockland (a dirt poor town just a short walk away from Gregminster) serves as a wake up call to the player regarding how the people of the Empire REALLY live.
With the Kalekka Incident Suikoden is in fact saying that the ends do NOT justify the means; everything you do has consequences, and sometimes those consequences will be fatal. The bill always comes due, and often it comes sooner than expected. Barbarossa Rugner hoped to bring peace and unity to his land, but he crossed the line when he gave the go ahead to Leon's plan. Everything bad that happened to him was his own doing, his own fault. Barbarossa destroyed his own empire.
Sometimes we need that idealistic work of art to truly remind us that, although morality itself is a social construct, there's a REASON for its existence, There are times when we need to be reminded that there are lines we should not cross, actions whose consequences are much too large to ignore, no matter what benefits they may brings. Yes, sometimes morality is a large gray area, but sometimes in life, we really DO need to see things in black and white. We should NEVER look down on a work that unambiguously says that killing civilians in the name of peace is wrong; we should instead be weary of the day when we start thinking that maybe, JUST maybe, killing civilians in war is morally ambiguous. I, for one, truly hope to never see the day we debate the moral righteousness of mass murder.
Art and Literature are riddled with works that force the viewer to make difficult, perhaps unanswerable questions regarding morality. I had previously mentioned two: Watchmen and The Dark Knight. Both works feature lies used to help make the world a better place. In Watchmen, the character of Ozymandias fakes an alien invasion in hopes of averting nuclear war. The graphic novel ends with the foreboding sense that perhaps the peace he gave the world through his lie would soon unravel. The Dark Knight ends with the truth about Harvey Dent, a beloved DA who became evil, hidden away so as not to besmirch the memory of the man who worked so tirelessly to rid Gotham City of its criminal underbelly. Both works end with the truth covered up, leaving the viewer with the question of the lie being good or not. What's worth more: a lie that brings peace, or a truth that destroys it? Do the Ends justify the Means?
Suikoden 1 takes that idea and stomps on it flat. By making the ENTIRE conflict be an indirect fallout from the Kalekka Incident, Suikoden makes it clear that the answer to that question is a big, resounding NO. The Kalekka Incident is clearly and unequivocally presented as something wrong and unforgivable, and the player is actually made to traverse Kalekka at least once per game. They get to travel through the ruins of the town, in one of the few places in the entire game to not even have a BGM, underscoring the tragedy of what had occurred there.
This is where Suikoden 1's uncompromising idealism really shines, because it also presents the Liberation War as being morally righteous. This is no coincidence, and it's by no means a failure of narrative on the game's part. Suikoden 1 is in fact giving the player a very harsh but all too important lesson: if a government mistreats its people, then it becomes a moral obligation to do all that can be done to overthrow said government. This is made clear from the moment the game makes you go through Rockland: this contrast between Gregminster (a shining metropolis) and Rockland (a dirt poor town just a short walk away from Gregminster) serves as a wake up call to the player regarding how the people of the Empire REALLY live.
With the Kalekka Incident Suikoden is in fact saying that the ends do NOT justify the means; everything you do has consequences, and sometimes those consequences will be fatal. The bill always comes due, and often it comes sooner than expected. Barbarossa Rugner hoped to bring peace and unity to his land, but he crossed the line when he gave the go ahead to Leon's plan. Everything bad that happened to him was his own doing, his own fault. Barbarossa destroyed his own empire.
Sometimes we need that idealistic work of art to truly remind us that, although morality itself is a social construct, there's a REASON for its existence, There are times when we need to be reminded that there are lines we should not cross, actions whose consequences are much too large to ignore, no matter what benefits they may brings. Yes, sometimes morality is a large gray area, but sometimes in life, we really DO need to see things in black and white. We should NEVER look down on a work that unambiguously says that killing civilians in the name of peace is wrong; we should instead be weary of the day when we start thinking that maybe, JUST maybe, killing civilians in war is morally ambiguous. I, for one, truly hope to never see the day we debate the moral righteousness of mass murder.
No comments:
Post a Comment