Palpatine's Biggest Mistake that Doomed the Empire

[Music] hi friends welcome back to another episode of generation tech my name is Alan now most Star Wars historians will give you like 20 different reasons why the Galactic Empire ultimately ended up failing they'll talk about frivolous spending on super weapons suppression of the average citizens basic freedoms and the Emperor's belief in dark arts and magic they'll also speak about key moments in history where the Emperor made great mistakes like with the destruction of Alderaan or at the Battle of Endor now these are all very valid points and observations but a small part of the larger failure of the Empire and very few historians actually talk about the one sole reason one the Empire ultimately ended up failing under Palpatine's rule now what does unrest occur why do seemingly normal people disrupt their own lives to go out and oppose a government this is an extremely important question when you're trying to fight off an insurgency a smart leader understands that even a dictator with complete authoritarian control of their entire nation is so somewhat accountable to the people they govern identifying the root causes of any problem will allow you to counter dissidents effectively and also address any problems in your own style of rule an inflexible leader who is completely unwilling to compromise well either be deposed of or be forced to enact such extreme and cruel measures that they will destroy the very nation they're trying to govern so what afflicted Palpatine's Empire well in the very beginning everything seemed to be doing quite well the Galactic Empire experienced very little civil unrest post Clone Wars during those post-war years most citizens in the galaxy were just happy to see things return to normal Palpatine's massive reconstruction program was centered around increasing the size of the central governments and the federal military force all of this spending alleviated any concerns that the galaxy was heading into a recession you see in a last year of the war the Galactic Republic was on the verge of defaulting on its debt but then a series of separate attacks on the intergalactic banking clan force the banks to give up their control to the federal government setting up a central bank for the first time in Galactic Republic history with control the bank's Palpatine was now able to continue funding his ambitious plan to evolve the Galactic Republic to the more militarized Galactic Empire one of the most important parts of this plan was gaining control of the galaxy's military-industrial complex in order to decrease the costs and maintenance of the Imperial military which was rapidly growing now many companies in this industry agreed to work alongside Palpatine and help him reach his goal of a massive galaxy-wide military force those that did saw a huge increase in their business and at least in the short term great profit and growth those who oppose Palpatine and refused to give in to his demands were usually removed either through legal means or accusations of tax fraud or some other more nefarious methods their businesses and resources would eventually be seized and absorbed by their more Imperial friendly competitors and some entire industries would even be nationalized the militarization of the Empire drastically changed how the galactic economy functioned for one the federal government's military and military industrial complex overnight became the largest employer in the galaxy and when Palpatine decided to discontinue the Kamino clone trooper program there was an even larger vacuum of recruits in the Armed Forces this was especially problematic because Palpatine wanted to actually increase the size of the federal military even after most of the major fighting of the Clone Wars had ended one of the first things he did to solve this manpower issue is set up a galactic wide military recruitment system that posed as a galaxy-wide education system Palpatine issued standardization for all local primary education systems which was designed to find the most capable and talented humans and feed them into Imperial military academies spread all across the galaxy getting into one of these military academies was considered not only a great honor but also lets the best employment opportunities available for about 99 percent of the galaxy's population this one to a very unfortunate - brain drain - other professions and industries of course the galaxy wasn't always like this as corrupt and inefficient ends the coal Act Republic was it still provided over a very robust and diverse free market economy a weak central government and lack of regulations meant that opportunity was abundant for anyone who's hungry for it even led to the recognition of corporations as political entities with the votes in the Senate along with the creation of special tax free economic zones that spanned entire swaths of the galaxy now that's lack of regulation ultimately led to cronyism in the Senate and several coalition's of predatory corporations and massive income inequality but still things were kind of better for the average citizen when compared to the Empire's transition to what seems like a permanent wartime economy now during times of war it's common for the government to obviously shift to a war economy in the world wars of the 20th century almost every major power shifted a huge percentage of their civilian workforce an industrial output to the war effort in World War one patriotic Frenchmen in automobile maker Renault agreed to supply the French military with tanks at costs during World War Two Henry Ford transitioned several of his automobile plants to build bombers and Sherman tanks meanwhile in Germany BMWs concentration camp prisoners to manufacture motorcycles and cars for the Nazis now in the short term a wartime economy can generate a large economic boost through spending some I argue that it wasn't just FDR's New Deal that ended the Great Depression for the United States they would say that the start of hostilities in World War two and the massive amount of military spending in employment also helped unemployment definitely declined as millions of young Americans were drafted to fight in the Pacific in Europe an increase in taxes war bonds and war rationing along with sharp increases in government spending then hurt as well this led to a large increase in our country's GDP following Pearl Harbor the u.s. experienced double-digit growth for three years in a row as the US military industrial complex provided war materiel not only to the rapidly growing US armed forces but to all of its allies as well now GDP growth is one of many different metrics that can help us determine how a country is doing and to be honest it's not even that great of a metric a lot of politicians will try to skew public perception on how they're doing by using such numbers the Chinese government was criticised for including all real estate construction activity in their GDP growth even for buildings that were never sold including those in China's massive ghost cities Reagan's Star Wars missile intercept program has cost hundreds of billions of dollars in the last four decades and added a great deal to the GDP but it has so far given close to zero value to the citizens of this country sure military spending in defense spending is important but hundreds of billions of dollars in growth and say the automobile industry which lowers the cost of vehicles and gives the majority of Americans access to transportation is far more valuable efficient economic growth should have a multiplier effect on the economy automobiles decreased travel time and increased worker efficiency some people can even start a business in their own automobile as taxi drivers or delivery drivers which further create services for those who don't have cars or can't drive this increases the range of those people which gives businesses a much wider reach and more opportunities to grow as well a tank or an airplane immediately loses value the second leaves the factory while in Warren facing is essential crisis these are necessary evils but ultimately they do not add value to the economy now Palpatine missed a huge opportunity at the end of the Clone Wars if you look at America post-world War two we experienced massive demilitarization a decrease in the federal budget by around 62 percent and the economy went into a boom cycle for several years instead Palpatine transitions the empire into a permanent war economy which spells the true beginning to the Empire's end wartime forces the populace endures sacrifices usually in the name of patriotism for one's country during World War two American citizens who are glad to buy war bonds or even donate scraps of metal so that they can be used to build war materials this is because the US had a legitimate enemy in the as powers a war economy needs to have an enemy in order to justify its existence the North Korean regime in its own special way needs America to play the role as the big baddie in order to justify its own extreme form of centrally planned permanent war economy and to this day it still uses that excuse to repress his population and keep a tight fist wrapped around its economy North Korea spends an estimated 25% of its GDP on defense compared to South Korea which spends around 3.6 percent of its GDP on defense a comparison of North Korea and South Korea's GDP since the Korean War shows us the difference between a centrally planned permanent war economy and a regulated free market economy today North Korea's GDP is around 40 billion dollars which is around the same as Montana a state with one of the smallest economies in our Union South Korea's GDP on the other hand is 1.6 trillion 40 times as much of course GDP as we mentioned before is not the best metric to use and I'd be a hypocrite if I only gave you those two numbers so let's look at some different stats the average North Korean man is around 1 to 3 inches shorter than the average South Korean man due to malnutrition we know it's malnutrition because there's very little genetic differences between South and North Koreans and perhaps even more alarming is the difference in the average life expectancy between the two countries and no it's not just because Kim jong-un is running around executing people with AAA guns massive famines and a lack of modern health services attribute greatly as well after decades are trying to maintain a permanent war economy the Galactic Empire was in serious decline in stagnation now this was due to the fact that the majority of the workforce and capital in the galaxy was involved in the military industrial complex and other related industries alike us spending an investment in commercial in civilian industries meant a lack of innovation and the type of multipliers we mentioned before when we talked about the invention of the automobile we made things even worse was the Galactic Empire didn't really have a great evil American baddie to point its finger at the Empire was facing a serious legitimacy crisis it had to continuously invent enemies for its Menace military to fight ultimately the truth was the Galactic Empire military was designed not to fight a foreigner style force but to suppress its own people which eventually gave rise to the Rebel Alliance as more and more people were beginning to realize this truth this was only further driven by the massive destruction of local economies thanks to this permanent war economy even if Luke and the rebel lines had failed at Endor the rebellion would have never stopped growing as the Empire's economy was continuing to stall in and destroy itself after the disasters of the feet of the Rebel Alliance at the Battle of Hoth the Rebel Alliance came back twice as strong but at this point Palpatine had already lost his mandate to rule the galaxy no type of reform or liberalization of the economy could save him Palpatine knew this and it only hardened his resolve to suppress those who went against them all times in politics people like to focus on very emotional and sensational issues when in reality the government's one single job is to create a safe and stable environment for people to prosper and in this case Palpatine was a huge failure well guys let me know in the comment section below what you think about my analysis of Palpatine's biggest mistake don't forget to subscribe and hit that notification button down below so you don't miss out on the rest of our content and as usual thanks for joining us today if you're watching this you are generations in

Channel: Generation Tech

Views: 608,974

Keywords: generation tech, star wars, Palpatine, Chancellor Palpatine, Emperor Palpatine, Galactic Empire, Imperial military, Imperial navy, galactic empire navy, palpatine's biggest mistake, Why did the galactic empire fail, Battle of Geonosis, clone trooper, Intergalactic banking clan, Palpatine nationalizes the banks, Palpatine economic policy, imperial economy, Galactic civil war, rebel alliance, Rogue one, darth sidious, New order, rise of the empire, palpatine's death

Id: e4QQKSknKIE

Length: 12min 29sec (749 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 10 2020