How many nights has this question kept you up late? I believe I have the answer. I feel it is safe to say that our beloved stormtroopers are in fact clones. Why then are the Imperial Officers then your regular Joes Imperial Citizens? Easy, they have not been altered, therefore they can lead. Also, with the clones/troopers the Kaminos have sped up their growth rate. This must have some physiological side effects since the troops cannot have a regular childhood. They spend the first 20 some years of their lives in half of the time. Can you imagine being twenty years old, but only being 10? Confused? Try being a clone bred only for combat. They are emotionless, physiologically drained drones, that is why you need "real" beings to lead them. That's my story. What's yours?

Not all Stormtroopers are clones. Some are recruits and they raise in the ranks just like in the real military.

Yeah, since Palpatine knew he couldnt recruit enough people to start an entire empire, he decided to use the clones to begin it. After he got his army of clones and his Empire in power, more people wanted in and the recruiting started. But that theory you have does explain a lot and I have wondered that too! Thanks!

No, thank you. I'm glad I could help. I'm sure old Palpy recruited from the ranks of the Imperial worlds and into the army. What better way than to indoctrinate the worlds than to make them a part of the Empire. All dictatorships do it. Plus the people you conquer are expendable (from the dictator's point of view).

doesn't leia hint at the 'clone-ness' of the stormtroopers when she asks luke if he's "too small" to be one?:confused:

Could be... or it could just be that the one of the Empire's had size standards for recruiting and Luke didn't pass those standards.

Kryllith

I agree. If the Stormtroopers are also used as a form of "honor guard" then they definitely have height standards: or it could be that they are all physically the same.

The Empire probably has some kinds of regulations on the size and build of recruits. You don't see any fat Stormtroopers after all. :p

Yeah, the Stormtroopers are both clones (from many sources, not just one person) and are recruited. Star Wars Insider has an article confirming this. I believe there was a draft as well.

The story about officers is not certain. I've heard a rumor that officers are always regular humans and never clones. Clones were always at the bottom of the pile as cannon fodder and were never promoted due to mental limitations. My personal theory is that the hosts who were selected to be cloned were placed as low-ranking officers. Kind of like how Jango Fett supervised the training of the Clone Troopers. Then those officers were promoted, and as more hosts were selected, they would take the old officer's place.

Maybe we'll discover the origins of Imperial Officers in Episode III.

So, there could be clones of Tarkin out there, or Piet, etc. I'll bye that for a dollar. The Kaminos also told Obi that the clones had been "modified" so that they were more docile than the original host to make them more docile and loyal. Now, you want generals that are loyal to you but you also want them to be mentally stable and these clones could possibly be unstable. If one or two or even a hundred come up as a "bad batch" you could simply dispose of them or use them as a "military distraction" in some campaign somewhere because here they are considered disposable and not "real" just better than battle droids.

An obscure Star Wars magazine article in 1980 or '81 says that Stormtroopers are clones. This was completely ignored by everyone, including the EU authors until AOTC was made.

In the DVD commentary for AOTC, Lucas says that he intended for us to make the connection with the Stormtroopers having come from Jango and the Clonetroopers (it's during the "head bumping" scene where Slave 1 escapes from Obi-Wan on Kamino).

In ANH (I haven't checked the DVD to see if anything was done about this but so far nobody has mentioned it, so I doubt it has been changed) we can clearly see Stormtroopers that are different heights and have different sounding voices (and they don't all sound like the actor who played Jango or even Boba, though I find the idea of dubbing Boba's voice to match Jango's idiotic, since Boba didn't have his father's accent when his dad died, so why would he suddenly have it 20+ years later? and accents aren't genetic!).

The official retcon for the Stormtroopers (assuming Episode III doesn't spell it out for us of course) is that yes, the Stormtroopers are clones, but they may have introduced other clone "Sources" (besides Jango or Boba) after AOTC, and this explains the different heights and voices. OR, that at some period after AOTC they added recruites or conscripts to the Imperial army.

In the EU they clearly didn't know about the Stormtroopers being clones (Lucas changed his mind) because we see former stormtroopers that look nothing alike, and nobody goes "hey, it's Boba/Jango Fett!" when they see them. Likewise they aren't aging rapidly (as far as we know) and when the Rebels/New Republic DO encounter "clones" they are shocked as if this was something never before seen in the Galaxy, and they just got done beating down the Empire, so you'd think they would have figured it out by now if clones were in widespread use during Palpy's reign.

As to the officers, well they aren't clones, as far as we know.


I think before AOTC, we all had the impression that the Stormtroopers were the "regular army" of the Empire. The rank & file, the main troops, etc. The officers and naval troops were the minority.

Now, in AOTC we're given the idea that the Clone/Stormtroopers are actually an ELITE FORCE, and actually don't number that many (1.2 million soldiers for a GALACTIC ARMY?!). Granted, they may up production in the rest of the movies, but if it's just Kamino producing them, at their current rate of production they're only going to triple the number of troops by the time of the OT (1.2 million troops every 10 years, so 3.6 million by the time of ANH and they won't have any ready by the end of ROTJ, plus the original troops may be too old to fight, being aged 40 years in the 20 years between trilogies since they age doubly fast, making them equivalent to 60 year old veterans... so we're talking an Elite Force of about two and a half million Stormtroopers for the Empire, if it's just Kamino).

Well....clones would make stupid commanders....they are pretty much robots...lol...The Kamino peoples made them less independent...which isnt good for a commander because if your a leader and you tell your commander to go kick @$$...he will go and kick the enemies butt instead of shooting them....

All good points that I agree with and had hoped others would bring along for the ride, thanks. If you are the emperor, then you need as many storm troopers as possible in order to maintain control with fear. I'm sure many "factories" were constructed on other planets and other "originals templates" for soldiers were used and then mixed with the army, it only makes since. We also know that you can't possibly control the entire galaxy with an iron fist nor garrison every planet with these troops, you can't make enough of them fast enough, thus the need for the Death Star and the Imperial Navy. Space travel was so important to trade for the systems so the Imperials controlled interstellar space travel as much as possible with their Star Destroyers as well and they needed competent officers to do it and the Kamino clones can't do that because they are "less independent" as stated above. You need "real" beings to make an officer, not a copy.

He actually brain washed a lot of the people, like Dash Rendar's brother.

Originally posted by Kurgan
I find the idea of dubbing Boba's voice to match Jango's idiotic, since Boba didn't have his father's accent when his dad died, so why would he suddenly have it 20+ years later? and accents aren't genetic! actors man, actors.

Originally posted by InsaneSith
actors man, actors.

That's it, Lucas needs to redub young Boba's lines in AOTC: The Special Edition!!!



(did you see that one coming? ;) )

Some troopers are clones, but they are cannon fodder because they were made from a copy of a copy. Make sense?

Anyways, only some were clones, but many were humans trained at the Imperial academys. SW databank has some stuff on this, too lazy to find any links :p

So it's like half and half?

I would think there are more recruis than clones, if there ARE any clone stormies, simply because as someone stated above ^ it would take a lot of planets producing a lot of clones to get enough stormtroopers. There would be far more stormies if they were made up of refular people that joined the Imperial Navy.

Originally posted by Kurgan
That's it, Lucas needs to redub young Boba's lines in AOTC: The Special Edition!!!



(did you see that one coming? ;) ) that's just stupid, how can you make the guy that played jango sound like a 10 year old boy? :p

With all of the other "changes" GL made I'm surprised he didn't do that.

Originally posted by InsaneSith
that's just stupid, how can you make the guy that played jango sound like a 10 year old boy? :p

Computers man, computers! Or just find a kid who speaks with the same accent.

Originally posted by Nairb Notneb
How many nights has this question kept you up late? I believe I have the answer. I feel it is safe to say that our beloved stormtroopers are in fact clones. Why then are the Imperial Officers then your regular Joes Imperial Citizens? Easy, they have not been altered, therefore they can lead. Also, with the clones/troopers the Kaminos have sped up their growth rate. This must have some physiological side effects since the troops cannot have a regular childhood. They spend the first 20 some years of their lives in half of the time. Can you imagine being twenty years old, but only being 10? Confused? Try being a clone bred only for combat. They are emotionless, physiologically drained drones, that is why you need "real" beings to lead them. That's my story. What's yours? A lot of clones died in the clone wars. The Emperor recruited new soldiers.

Originally posted by Revan Solo
A lot of clones died in the clone wars. The Emperor recruited new soldiers.

And also made new clones.

Originally posted by Revan Solo
A lot of clones died in the clone wars. The Emperor recruited new soldiers.
Yes many clone troopers did die in the Clone War, and during that war the Officers were the Jedi with a few clones trained as nco's and field officers only (hence the color markings on the battle armor). The officers of the Empire were not Jedi for some reason (go figure). The Empire had a void to fill (at its birth) and needed military minds for Admirals and Generals, etc so Palpatine invented the governing system of the New Order and out governors, or Moff's in charge of sectors, like Grand Moff Tarkin.

by the time of ANH the empire was recruiting new members ... after all, wasn't luke mad at uncle owen because he wasn't allowed to go to the academy like his friend biggs?

Originally posted by adillon
by the time of ANH the empire was recruiting new members ... after all, wasn't luke mad at uncle owen because he wasn't allowed to go to the academy like his friend biggs?

You think that meant the Imperial academy? Just later in that scene Luke says and I quote "I hate the Empire".

Originally posted by TK-8252
You think that meant the Imperial academy?
yeah, i do ... according to the star wars databank:

Darklighter was able to live out Luke's long-held dream of joining the Academy. Skywalker, however, had to stay behind on his uncle's moisture farm. When Biggs returned to Tatooine, he was a changed man. He opened Luke's eyes to the true nature of the Empire, and confided in Luke that he had defected from the Empire to join the Rebel Alliance.

Originally posted by adillon
yeah, i do ... according to the star wars databank:

Darklighter was able to live out Luke's long-held dream of joining the Academy. Skywalker, however, had to stay behind on his uncle's moisture farm. When Biggs returned to Tatooine, he was a changed man. He opened Luke's eyes to the true nature of the Empire, and confided in Luke that he had defected from the Empire to join the Rebel Alliance.

When did Luke talk to Biggs? It must have been after the scene with Luke and his aunt and uncle eating at the homestead and before Luke said "I hate the Empire".

There are a couple of deleted scenes where Luke talks to Biggs at length about the Empire and the Academy. These are NOT found in any released version of the film.

But you can view them on the "Star Wars: Behind the Magic" CD-Roms (released back in 1998), and download clips off the internet (Jedinet.com has some).

I re-watched these again recently and it sounds to me almost like this is the OT era's version of the "national guard."

I can't help but get the Vietnam War reference, but basically Biggs' is at the Academy and he says how "The Empire isn't going to draft me.." etc.

I'm not sure as the details, but apparently going to the Academy itself isn't a guarentee of helping the Empire, but the Empire perhaps recruites from there (or drafts, as Biggs says). Hence why many of the young starpilots are leaving the Academy and secretly joining the Rebellion.

One interpretation is how the modern military works in the US for a lot of people. People don't join because they want to risk their lives or fight wars. Rather, they join because they want to "make money for college" or "get some practical experience" etc. or out of some sense of civic duty to one's country. So these guys who join for those or similar reasons don't necessarily agree with the Empire or the wars it's fighting (in this case against its own citizens or helpless neighboring systems) so they don't want their skills to be utilized for those ends.

We should remember that the Empire is basically the government of the SW galaxy. Joining the Rebellion is thus an act of treason.

Now there's some doubt in my mind as to whether or not Tatooine is actually part of the Empire (it's apparently not part of the Old Republic), but it could be that it is and due to corruption and lack of strategic value its just largely ignored, and thus run by gangsters and criminals instead.

true, it doesn't explicitly state that it was the imperial academy, but it's very easy to deduce that from what the databank has to say about biggs.

@ kurgan ... don't forget that people may join the military for that 'sense of adventure'. the television advertisements flooding the airwaves these days, especially from the army and navy, glorify the armed forces to one degree or another. it's a very timid form of propaganda ... but these days it's called advertisement. :p maybe the empire utilized similar means to recruit new members, only showing what they wanted to show, making the empire seem like the career of a lifetime where one can do some good for the rest of the galaxy.

If you have ever listened to the radio drama version of ANH it goes into this scene of Biggs and Luke's conversation of Tashi Station in Anchor Head. This is all in the data bank on the Star Wars web site too. Biggs tells Luke that after graduation (I believe) he and some others are going to join the rebellion. Biggs has graduated from an academy and Luke wants to go to the academy. Luke's portion is documented in ANH, Uncle Owen won't let him go, remember? The point being that an acadamey is for officer and specialty training, not regulars. In order to be a pilot one must be an officer, thus one can go to the academy to become a pilot and/or officer just like Biggs did. Thus another question comes to mind, are the TIE pilots clones?

No, Tatooine isn't under Imperial law. It's part of the Outer Rim, which is not run by a galactic government. Tatooine is run by the Hutts. Yes there is Imperial presence on Tatooine at times (such as the Sandtroopers seaching Mos Eisley for the droids), but that's like how American troops are over in Iraq (and pretty much every country in the world). Which makes you wonder... why didn't all those citizens who disliked the Empire just move to Outer Rim planets? :p

And just a BTW, the Rebel Alliance is technically a terrorist organization. It just doesn't seem that way since they're the "good guys." ;)

Originally posted by Kurgan
Computers man, computers! Or just find a kid who speaks with the same accent.

No Kurgan! No more ideas! Leave the movies alone!


:D

Originally posted by Mike Windu
No Kurgan! No more ideas! Leave the movies alone!


:D

Riddick says: Ain't me you gotta worry 'bout...

Originally posted by adillon
@ kurgan ... don't forget that people may join the military for that 'sense of adventure'. the television advertisements flooding the airwaves these days, especially from the army and navy, glorify the armed forces to one degree or another. it's a very timid form of propaganda ... but these days it's called advertisement. :p maybe the empire utilized similar means to recruit new members, only showing what they wanted to show, making the empire seem like the career of a lifetime where one can do some good for the rest of the galaxy.

True. I have those ads from the 80's stuck in my mind with the "be all you can be" and "save money for college" ads. But you're right.

***

As far as why people didn't just move to the Outer Rim territories, there's a couple of factors probably at work:

1) Too afraid. In other dictatorships of the world they've gone out of their way to stop people from leaving. And people did risk their lives to escape Nazi Germany and the USSR for example, but many were afraid of getting killed leaving (though the fear of staying and disappearing in the night was obvoiusly stronger).

2) Outer Rim planets were pretty crappy. Sure, it sucks to live under a dictatorship, but maybe the Dictator has a good health care plan or a nice transportation system. But maybe the crime lords don't. Or you end up living on a dust bowl planet like Tatooine which isn't very pleasant.

3) Too Costly. Sure they have hyperdrive to fly all over the galaxy, but perhaps this is a luxury that only criminals, the rich and leaders can afford to do. If transporation is restricted this might make even more sense. If the majority of the Galaxy is controlled by the Empire you have to go a long way before you can find someplace that is safe, and they still might come after you. Perhaps there are long lines of people waiting to get tickets for illegal transports out of the Empire and ticket prices are at a premium.

4) Political reasons. Perhaps the Outer Rim people generally resent the "immigrants & refugees" from the Empire, and this tension makes moving large numbers of people to the Outer Rim unfeasible. Some planets might even reguarly blockade, shield, or shoot down ships that come in from the Empire to their space to discourage this kind of thing.

***

As to the Rebels being terrorists, yes I know the whole "One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter" argument. And I know that these days people tend to label "what they do to us" as terrorism and what happens to our enemies as the work of "freedom fighters," etc. I tend to identify terrorism is the targetting of civilians with violence for political gain. At least where the movies are concerned, we don't witness the Rebels doing that. They are guerrilla fighters (non-conventional soldiers), and this is described as a civil war. They engage the military of the Empire in combat, basically.

The Empire on the other hand, targets its own citizens for political expediency or to cover for their own crimes (Alderaan, Luke's aunt & uncle, the Jawas, officers that Vader doesn't like, etc).

Granted, in real life wars and civil wars are not cut and dried black & white affairs with one side being completely virtuous and the other completely barbaric (in WWII the Allies committed plenty of atrocities of their own and soon after, as did the Axis powers), but Lucas has always described his tale as Good vs. Evil in the classic mythological and comic book/serial sense.

Originally posted by TK-8252
When did Luke talk to Biggs? It must have been after the scene with Luke and his aunt and uncle eating at the homestead and before Luke said "I hate the Empire".
there's also this little tidbit of info under luke's profile in the star wars databank ...

Luke honed his piloting skills alongside Biggs in Tatooine's infamous Beggar's Canyon, racing his T-16 skyhopper. Biggs and Luke often spoke of joining the Imperial Academy. Despite his dreams, Luke was not allowed to attend. His uncle needed him on the farm, and so when Biggs went away to the Academy, Luke was stranded on Tatooine.

could you imagine how things would've been different had biggs not defected to the rebellion and luke had the opportunity to attend the academy?

Or, what if Biggs hadn't defected and got assigned to the Death Star squadron? Then he'd have fought against Luke at the Battle of Yavin. Talk about major internal conflict - of course, he probably wouldn't have realized that he'd just vaporized his childhood buddy :cool:

The Rebels had to have been labeled as terrorists by the Empire's propaganda. By the truest definition (as stated above) the Rebels as depicted in the movies were not terrorists however but merely rebels because they fought the government and attacked military targets and did not incite "terror" as a means of seeking freedom from the empire. The Empire was more of a terrorist entity than the rebels were. It was a dictatorship. It ruled with terror through the New Order. It used the faceless army of the Stormtroopers to install fear into its citizenry. It also used the fear of instant death and destruction through the Death Star (which is why it had to be instantly destroyed).

Being an intelligent group however, the empire knew that indoctrination would also assist in its control of the galaxy, thus the Imperial Academy. Make the people one of you and you can control them. Keep them poor and dependant on the government and they will need you so badly they will do what you want because they have no choice even join your army, thus the academy again. Clones are needed for the initial armies installment and to help maintain control of the ranks, but if the empire ceased their "fabrication" then they most likely lost control of their army and then lost control of the galaxy. I believe they stopped making clones. If they had, then they could have defeated the rebels.

It's hard for me to imagine that the Kaminoans would willingly continue to supply clones for the Empire, once the Republic was overthrown. In any event, I see Kamino as a target by either the new Empire for occupation and forced continued production of clones, or the the Rebellion for destruction to stop the production of clones.

Since we never see any Kaminoans in the original trilogy, one might surmise that the Kaminoans didn't throw their lot in with the Rebels. Still, I do find it hard to believe that the Rebels would slaughter the Kaminoans to stop the clones. Perhaps the Rebels do attack, catching the Empire off guard, and rather than let the cloning facility fall into the hands of the Rebels, the Empire scuttles every cloning facility in the face of the surprise Rebel advance?

Speculation, true, but I've always wondered what happened to end the Clone Wars, and why they weren't simply seen as the initial stages of the Imperial revolution and the ensuring Rebellion. Unless there is some clear demarcation of peace between the combat of the Clone Wars and the start of hostilities during the Rebellion, in my mind they are all part of the same conflict.

If it's a penny for your thoughts, that's my two cents - keep the change.

There could be another explanation.

The Empire learns that the Kaminoans are not going to cooperate with them anymore but lend themselfs to the rebels, and are being crushed by the Empire. Either the Empire destroyes the facilities, or the Kaminoans do it themself to prevent the Empire of exploiting the technology any further.

2 cents? Well worth a buck and a half my friend!

I would speculate that the Empire took control of all cloning facilities/technologies as soon as possible in order to control them. The only thing that might have prevented this was a Jedi sabotage job on the facilities (before they completely fell prey to the Jedi purge) preventing any immediate clone construction thus creating the Empire's need for recruitment of armed forces. This too is speculation and would be difficult to fit into the plot of RotS I would think.

okay, this isi not so confusing, cause they look different :(

but, what gets me, is the clone trooper generals, they ARE the same, why?

Good question Okniel. I believe that all field troops need leaders don't you? Even with advanced technological communication devices, leaders have to be in the field with their troops, you can't lead a battle from a bunker. At the time of the Clone Armies creation, the Republic had no military what so ever. All they had was a small police force of the Jedi, basically. They had to use what they had at the time, clones. The Jedi were the main generals in the field. During the Battle of Geonosis, Yoda was the main General of the army, then Windo. The other Jedi took lead of other battalions and the clones then took lead of smaller squads themselves. But all major battle decisions were made by Jedi, even Padawan Anakin seemed to outrank the clone officers when he began barking orders from the gunship as did the Senator from Naboo.

All I know is, they will be having to do massive replacements of the Clonetrooper ranks for all those they lose in the Clone Wars.

1.2 million soldiers is a ridiculously low number for a Galactic Army, period. And unfortunately, that IS the number of individual soldiers, according to the canonical AOTC novelisation.

My theory was that the "Grand Army of the Republic" was just rhetoric by Palpatine and he's including in that statement any future recruites, etc of the eventual Imperial Armed Forces. Ie: the military buildup.

Or perhaps they will start pumping out clone factories on lots of planets (hard to do if the Clones are supposed to be a secret from everyone so that they are shocked by Clones in the post-ROTJ EU). Or they will change the clone process so that they can make them faster.

After all, the Jango Clones are going to be old men in hafl the time as normal humans would be since they have 2x growth acceleration. Unless there is some magic "off switch" that makes them age normally once they reach "maturity" (at 10 years).

How long will the Jango clone stock last? He's dead now, but Boba is alive. Or it could be from multiple "templates" of other people, etc.

We'll see if any of this is spelled out in Episode III and the accompanying canonical materials. Should be interesting.

1.2 million troops is a mere pittance of a squad for an army. With the speed at which the Separatists should be able to shell out battle droids, especially after seeing the factory scene in AOTC, 1.2 million troops is way to small of a force. That is also to small of a force to be able to control the galaxy, much less be feared by. It would be very difficult to control a system with that amount depending on the population (taking Earths population of 6 billion as typical).

I have the encyclopedia and it says that the empire clones the better soldiers.(the real soldiers from an academy)The older clones from episode 2 are most likely dead.If you don't know by now the Republic is the Empire,they just collasped and the emperor took over.

The batches of Kaminoan clones are not released only every ten years. If that was true, everyone of the Jango clones would be the same age, they are clearly not. They start subsequent batches before the previous batch is finished. Sort of an assembly line kind of thing.

I tend to agree. I think there's always several batches baking in the ovens, all at different stages of development. We saw as much in Attack of the Clones.

Yes we did. We saw mature clones and we saw little Jango's running around "learning" to be good little soldiers. If they are living at an accelerated growth rate then their shelf life is quite short. New batches would need to be grown often.

good point, though i would think that they could genetically alter the clones to return to normal growth rate after they reached maturity...