Is the attack on teldrassil really that unjustified?

[Fenderxx]

From a moral perspective, I would have to say the attack is unjustified. (From what we currently know) The Alliance and Horde are not currently at war, per the Before the Storm Book. I understand capturing this new "resource" and protecting it for yourself.. so any conflict in Silithus is fine... but going to the Night Elf home land... where they have lived longer than the Horde has been on this world, .. and killing a civilian populace.. is not moral or justified in game.

[Charge me Doctor]

I don't think that her justification to attack teldrassil is valid, she had no clue that alliance is building some sort of azerite-powered weapon, and if teldrassil was really a main hub for stockpiling azerite they could easily blockade it and plunder ships full of azerite.

[Aucald]

From a moral perspective, I would have to say the attack is unjustified. (From what we currently know) The Alliance and Horde are not currently at war, per the Before the Storm Book. I understand capturing this new "resource" and protecting it for yourself.. so any conflict in Silithus is fine... but going to the Night Elf home land... where they have lived longer than the Horde has been on this world, .. and killing a civilian populace.. is not moral or justified in game.

The original Horde plan for Teldrassil is occupation and not destruction or death - they want to control Teldrassil as the port of call for the Alliance's Azerite distribution. When invading civilians are actually explicitly spared by Saurfang's command - one of the quests you undertake as Horde in Darkshore is allowing civilians to exit the battle area and seeing them to relative safety. Teldrassil burning is due to an as-yet unknown occurrence that no one was explicitly expecting - Sylvanas' dialogue after the occurrence points out that she didn't expect it to occur, and it has changed the direction of the conflict going forward.

[Gurmech]

It is not unjustified, but it does mean the Horde can't claim victim status when the Alliance inevitably retaliate.

I would go as far as to say there is no such thing as anything "unjustifiable". If I kill you AND your children, then I know there aren't anyone coming after me or mine for revenge later etc.

[Fenderxx]

The original Horde plan for Teldrassil is occupation and not destruction or death - they want to control Teldrassil as the port of call for the Alliance's Azerite distribution. When invading civilians are actually explicitly spared by Saurfang's command - one of the quests you undertake as Horde in Darkshore is allowing civilians to exit the battle area and seeing them to relative safety. Teldrassil burning is due to an as-yet unknown occurrence that no one was explicitly expecting - Sylvanas' dialogue after the occurrence points out that she didn't expect it to occur, and it has changed the direction of the conflict going forward.

I understand breaking up a supply line, or creating a blockade... but invading, and pushing out a people from their homeland, even if you are trying to spare some.. does not seem moral or justified to me. I know the cause of the tree burning maybe unknown.. but regardless the Horde bares the responsibility for that.

[Mahmeya]

Just think about it, they wanted peace after MoP And They Had it, what did the alliance do in the meantime?

Jaina threatens to end the horde and tries to convince Varian to kill the horde leaders at the end of SoO
Greymane assault horde troops unprovoked and loses the sky breaker
Caila Menethil tries to cause mass rebelions and defections within lordaeron and the forsaken to the alliance
They attack and murder innocent goblin miners who are mining for Azerite

This was all after ensuing peace with the alliance after Garrosh. The Horde didn't provoke the alliance one more time after that

Jaina: said before, was done before + it was her opinion, she has no way to push it through and failed to be truly convincing. No impact on anything.

Greymane: Yes, he's to blame here. Anduin gave him a few words about that eventually, though it was quite late. Sylvanas is not truly innocent, all it would take to prevent it would be to arrange meeting with Anduin and tell him what she told him in the book - just way sooner.

Calia: she acted on her own, the allaince had no idea of what was about to happen. Plus, using "mass" for a group of 5 (or so) is quite the exxageration

Goblins: already said, they were doing quite some damage by the mining

[Dziubla]

This is objectively false, have any of you pansies whinging about Sylvanas even read the book? You can see her internal narration where she first recalls them and only gives the order to shoot to kill when Calia announces herself and parts of the Desolate Council go with her. Her reason for accepting the meeting is because she thinks it'll fail and demoralize the Forsaken, bring them into her camp.

Yes, that is her reason. And the moment she notices that it didn't demoralize ALL of them, and some of the meetings were going well, she immediately becomes angry, and already plans to do something about it, even BEFORE Callia reveals herself. She starts shooting NOT because of Calia, but because some forsaken are starting to defect, which would most likely happen if Calia was there or not. Also, she shoots people LOYAL to her, because...guess what. They had a pleasant experience with their human loved ones, and would like to repeat it, and Sylvanas can't have that. Any kind of hope for "her people", anything that would, scratch that, that MIGHT turn them away from her, that would have the SLIGHTEST chance for that...can't have that. Tyranny all the way.

[LoLcano]

Alliance vs Horde is basically Palestine vs Israel . Every incident is answer to a past action which itself was answer to an incident before that and so it goes on .

[zknm7]

When did the motto of the Horde change from "Victory or Death" to "Run for your Life"?

Hahahaha, this made me laugh so much!

[Zequill]

Good, I was wondering how real war could be justified before looking at this thread. Took me about 3 reply to understand how warmonger people can be...

[frogger237]

Just think about it, they wanted peace after MoP And They Had it, what did the alliance do in the meantime?

Jaina threatens to end the horde and tries to convince Varian to kill the horde leaders at the end of SoO
Greymane assault horde troops unprovoked and loses the sky breaker
Caila Menethil tries to cause mass rebelions and defections within lordaeron and the forsaken to the alliance
They attack and murder innocent goblin miners who are mining for Azerite

This was all after ensuing peace with the alliance after Garrosh. The Horde didn't provoke the alliance one more time after that

Good troll and I know I shouldn't respond but:

Goblins are murdered after they slaughtered Alliance spies(and any other Alliance who happen to be nearby) in a neutral area. Also the Alliance quests tell you to destroy shredders without goblins in em while the Horde quests specifically tell you to kill any Alliance you see.

None of those spies would be in the mining area if the Alliance attacked first they would be gathering intel near the Horde camp as they would have already have gotten the samples and would then need to know what the Horde planned to do with it which they wouldn't find in the mining area.

Infracted.

[Steampunkette]

Yes, that is her reason. And the moment she notices that it didn't demoralize ALL of them, and some of the meetings were going well, she immediately becomes angry, and already plans to do something about it, even BEFORE Callia reveals herself. She starts shooting NOT because of Calia, but because some forsaken are starting to defect, which would most likely happen if Calia was there or not. Also, she shoots people LOYAL to her, because...guess what. They had a pleasant experience with their human loved ones, and would like to repeat it, and Sylvanas can't have that. Any kind of hope for "her people", anything that would, scratch that, that MIGHT turn them away from her, that would have the SLIGHTEST chance for that...can't have that. Tyranny all the way.

See... you say that. But you skip over the middle part where she decides she doesn't have to do anything.

When Annie comes back she realizes that the Desolate Council is going to be divided between those who are truly Desolate, like Annie, and those who aren't, like Elsie. And that rift will destroy the council without her ever having to lift a finger.

THEN she blows the horn when she realizes Parqual, the Felstones, and the unnamed sisters are defecting. If they had run she was going to kill them ('Cause Sylvanas always kills those who swear their service to her and then bounce to the Alliance), but Elsie and the others probably would've been spared. Why? 'Cause she already realized the Desolate Council was going to be destroyed from within. Having 1/3rd of it Defect is just icing on the cake.

But then Calia is there. Can't let her start a Civil War/Revolution against Sylvanas. And leaving the council alive to see her die would create a martyr and risk Civil War. Nope. At -that- point she sends the riders to kill everyone.

Context, Frogger. There's a larger one.

[Aucald]

I understand breaking up a supply line, or creating a blockade... but invading, and pushing out a people from their homeland, even if you are trying to spare some.. does not seem moral or justified to me. I know the cause of the tree burning maybe unknown.. but regardless the Horde bares the responsibility for that.

War is seldom moral, and seldom justified - I was just mentioning that the original campaign wasn't meant to mercilessly kill or slaughter civilians or anything of the like, it was a purely strategic move on the part of the Horde to cause political harm to the Alliance's interests in Kalimdor. Without knowing how or why Teldrassil burns I'm loathe to blame it on the Horde, per se; it certainly *could* prove to be their fault, or it could be entirely some other party's fault depending on what actually occurs.

[MrSaggins]

When you consider that the point was to close off the main shipping port for the Alliance on Kalimdor it seems poorly handled. The Horde could have merely burned the docks, or blockaded the unblessed world tree. All that was required was an embargo on the continent (which could have been cool for Kul Tiras to break later), with the Horde navy strategically blocking all Alliance (Rut'theran/Exodar/Feathermoon), neutral (e.g. Goblin) and questionably loyal Horde (e.g. Goblin) ports.

That said, Sylvanas makes it clear that things didn't go as planned, and she may have merely wanted an occupation and embargo.

[Schattenlied]

Jaina threatens to end the horde and tries to convince Varian to kill the horde leaders at the end of SoO

That happened during MoP, not after MoP.

Greymane assault horde troops unprovoked and loses the sky breaker

http://www.wowhead.com/quest=40794/f...ueens-reprisal

They had intel suggesting Sylvanas was there to steal power for herself. Greymane still hadn't gotten justice for the death of his son, he went and got it.

Caila Menethil tries to cause mass rebelions and defections within lordaeron and the forsaken to the alliance

No she didn't, she was just trying to save those who already wanted to leave. People should be allowed to leave if they want to.

They attack and murder innocent goblin miners who are mining for Azerite

Given that we don't know the canon quest order for that zone, it's entirely possible that it was retaliation for the Horde player killing the SI:7 agents at the command of the leader of the miners. The Horde quest says the spies were just "snoopin around", which strongly suggests no hostilities had taken place yet.

The Horde didn't provoke the alliance one more time after that

Except for the time in WoD where they attacked the Alliance in Ashran completely unprovoked because they were afraid the Alliance was going to use the ancient artifact to destroy the Horde... Starting the entire Alliance vs Horde conflict on Draenor.

[Steampunkette]

War is seldom moral, and seldom justified - I was just mentioning that the original campaign wasn't meant to mercilessly kill or slaughter civilians or anything of the like, it was a purely strategic move on the part of the Horde to cause political harm to the Alliance's interests in Kalimdor. Without knowing how or why Teldrassil burns I'm loathe to blame it on the Horde, per se; it certainly *could* prove to be their fault, or it could be entirely some other party's fault depending on what actually occurs.

This is all true. But there are two facts to consider:

1) The justification of the war is to avoid Destruction. Sylvanas is certain that, given enough time and access to Azerite, the Alliance will create ever more powerful weapons of destruction and eventually use them on the Horde. She outlines a method of keeping the Alliance from getting it, a way to minimize the damage to the civilian populace of Teldrassil and the other Nelfy Lands, and general presents the most justifiable war one can have: To defend oneself from the threat of a neighboring enemy. Particularly one that, at multiple times in history, has declared intent or attempted to commit genocide... I don't think we can stress that, enough.

2) In Before the Storm, Anduin states that there is no Peace between the Horde and Alliance. That there's basically nothing more than a Cease-Fire going on. One which was already broken by the Alliance during the events of Legion, and once again after the Burning Throne. And then once more on the Arathi Highlands... after a fashion. Anduin even admits to Genn that she could use Calia's presence on the battlefield at Anduin's insistence as a justified cause for war in the eyes of the other Horde Leaders, and not be blamed for killing the Desolate Council because of what has happened.

Ending a Cease-Fire with the intent to defend oneself against a superior foe by occupying a single city to stop an enemy from creating an even more devastating imbalance of power with the foreknowledge of their previous war crimes committed -under- that Cease Fire is a lot more justified than most people like to imagine.

[frogger237]

Context, Frogger. There's a larger one.

You are going to have to explain that to me because from the very moment you talk to Blightcaller they want every Alliance that could possibly see it dead. Meanwhile on Alliance they want someone who can survive impossible odds and get out alive.

And if you are trying to defend it as them just protecting themselves from the big evil Alliance then every single bad thing the Alliance has ever done would be justified as well.

[MrSaggins]

Alliance gunning down unarmed orcs in the Jade forest
Massacre at camp taurajo
The list goes on

The list actually doesn't go on, and that's a problem. Garithos had a profound effect on the Sin'dorei, but he was just one Alliance general. And all of this fails to stack up to decimating Gilneas, Southshore and Theramore. Burning a few teepees and unarmed combatants can't compare with leveling cities, and that's a problem.

Blizz really needs to write more war crimes into the Alliance. Jaina's waves should have been redirected and at least drowned Razor Hill or something. I just imagine dwarven explorers uncover some Eonar-made Titanic device that gnomes get to working and Tyrande unleashes it at the Crossroads, killing nearly everyone. The Allaince druids see it as a win. It's revenge for Teldrassil, and the life energies of the device turn the Northern Barrens into a paradise, but countless Horde civilians were impaled into the dirt by violently spreading roots. Mulgore druids have mixed feelings about the transformation of their ancestral stomping grounds, but largely resent the premeditated massacre and withdraw from Moonglade.

[Corroc]

When you consider that the point was to close off the main shipping port for the Alliance on Kalimdor it seems poorly handled. The Horde could have merely burned the docks, or blockaded the unblessed world tree. All that was required was an embargo on the continent (which could have been cool for Kul Tiras to break later), with the Horde navy strategically blocking all Alliance (Rut'theran/Exodar/Feathermoon), neutral (e.g. Goblin) and questionably loyal Horde (e.g. Goblin) ports.

That said, Sylvanas makes it clear that things didn't go as planned, and she may have merely wanted an occupation and embargo.

Blockade is not a long term solution. It draws alot of resources when you can just take over the place.

[Super Dickmann]

Yes, that is her reason. And the moment she notices that it didn't demoralize ALL of them, and some of the meetings were going well, she immediately becomes angry, and already plans to do something about it, even BEFORE Callia reveals herself. She starts shooting NOT because of Calia, but because some forsaken are starting to defect, which would most likely happen if Calia was there or not. Also, she shoots people LOYAL to her, because...guess what. They had a pleasant experience with their human loved ones, and would like to repeat it, and Sylvanas can't have that. Any kind of hope for "her people", anything that would, scratch that, that MIGHT turn them away from her, that would have the SLIGHTEST chance for that...can't have that. Tyranny all the way.

You killed your own argument. What she plans to do is stop the meeting with the preset signal, which she does. Then, when she hears Calia is there, she decides to kill them because she can see people deserting and she can see Calia, so she has every reason to believe it's a coup. Her gruesome murder of eight people who were innocent and she had no way of knowing this and four who were guilty traitors in high office will surely be the end for Sylvanas. None of this was premeditated, it was a spontaneous decision to the reasonable assumption that the meeting was being used to gather support behind a pretender to her seat.