Bah! Dai Atlas is a prat! Actually in a war war of ideologies Dai Atlas and his methods are one of the most counter productive, self defeating, hypocritical ways of fighting. In fact in while it's good for a body count in the short term, that kind of brutal 'effectiveness'Originally Posted by GoktimusPrime
just creates more hateful, resentful soldiers and martyrs in your enemy over the long run. Not to mention the friggin inhumanity of it.
There is no such thing as the 'nature of war', just the nature of man and the weak, deluded, cruel, sadistic and fearful men and women who indulge or succumb to acts of evil because they can get away with it. Nothing and I do mean NOTHING justifies acts of cruelty and brutality or genocide. (3 War journalists in the family and 2 who have fought has left me with a bitter distaste for war.)
I agree with the Japanese fans here, Dai Atlas is one of those leaders I would be happy to see stricken form TF lore. Make no mistake Dai Atlas's aim was genocide and there is nothing more inhumane, more evil, than genocide. He was leader willing to stoop to any level to win the war, even denounce the very code of honour his side was founded upon. In the real world we have the Geneva Convention to protect against prats like him and the aforementioned people.
Plus, if you're fighting an ideological war in which your side embodies and fights for the qualities of freedom, truth etc, for all beings and you loose this in favour of becoming a ruthless cold killer, then what the is the point of the war!? It becomes nothing but a mindless, irrational squabble for simple selfish self gratification.
The reality is you have to hold a degree of compassion or at least some respect for the enemy or you will very quickly find yourself embodying many of their qualities you find so abhorrent. The second you believe you have the right to kill/maim/torture a person because of allegiance, religion or gender is the moment you yourself become an embodiment of evil.... In fact some of the most disgusting, unspeakable evils known to humanity have been committed by those who claim compassion has no place in war and hide behind the so called 'fog of war'.
Optimus Prime, on the other hand is the kind of leader I would unequivocally and with out any hesitation run head long into battle and lay down my life for. Someone who stands for higher ideals rather than a simplistic, animalistic need for survival. And who holds to those values despite all the evil the cons throw at him. *waves OP pompoms*
Like you say Gok, his compassion isn't a weakness, its what defines him and makes him an autobot The very fact that the Decepticons lack compassion is what makes them Decepticons, its how they are able to commit the atrocities that they do.
I remember so vividly my grand pappy telling me about his experiences during WWll. He enlightened me to the true nature of war and its varying grotesqueries. One of the things he told me - "it is so very, very easy, to succumb to the powerful allure of hatred and darkness that festers and grows all the more potent inside of us [during wartime]. No one is immune to it. I watched good men, good, but weak men sacrifice their humanity to the depravities that such hatred coaxes from us. It is only the strongest and most courageous of us that retains their compassion, decency, honour in the face of the unspeakable evils of war. Only the very strongest." Not his exact words, but the powerful message it left with me anyway. And it is for that very reason that in terms of awesome leaders Score :OP=100000000 Dai Atlas= -1000000000 and Michael Bay's OP= -infinity
Compassion aint a weakness in war Gok, its the single most important safe guard to your humanity.
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