Will Dany burn Essos on the way to Westeros?

[BlackLightning]

21 minutes ago, #1dolFAN said:

Blasphemy. The day I see a sex slave giving orders to a Dothraki screamer is the day all the gold in Casterly Rock runs out.

The power of khaleesi varies on their khal husband. Most khaleesis I imagine would be little more than glorified sex slaves but Daenerys had a special relationship with Drogo (or rather, Drogo had a special interest in her that has yet to be explained) so she was afforded a bit more status and respect in the khalasar.

And I don't know...I think that the mines of Casterly Rock will start to run a little dry by the end of A Dream of Spring. Tywin is one of the most dishonest, secretive people in the entire series (he lied to himself all the time and kept his secrets as if he was suffocating and they were air) and Cersei is probably the silliest, most fiscally irresponsible person in the entire series. Jaime is negligent because he has other loftier concerns and Tyrion, while he IS good with money, is also very greedy and has a tendency to overpromise...even if he pays his debts.

It wouldn't surprise me in the least if it were revealed that the Lannisters are not as rich as Tywin made them out to be. His children are probably in for a unpleasant surprise now that winter is here and that they are losing control of King's Landing and the 7K.

5 minutes ago, #1dolFAN said:

I’m sorry but completely destroying ones enemy has nothing to do with “U.S. policy”. Doesn’t matter if you’re American, Babylonian, Persian or Ghengis Khan, it’s just sound policy.

Check the 48 Laws of Power.

Agreed.

I'm  not sure what's the big deal with this "we should handle hostile, unrepentant enemies as if they were priceless glass dolls" mentality. 

On 11/24/2019 at 9:30 PM, Jonthedragon said:

Will she burn the cities in the area of the Old Valyrian Freehold on the way to Westeros? I do wonder if she will travel along the Devil Road which she saw as the road home on her flight on Drogon. She would be massively feared upon arrival with god knows how many people she frees / follow her.

No, I don't think she'll burn Essos on her way to Westeros. Maybe it will appear that way to the Westerosi and any of the Essosi elite who love and profit off of slavery and misery.

But I definitely believe that she will conquer Essos (except for maybe Braavos) and re-establish the Valyrian Freehold. Some cities will be destroyed or abandoned along the way...like I can't imagine that Norvos is not going to be destroyed. The city is completely comprised out of wood and Mellario Martell will likely do something stupid after believing that what happened to Quentyn is Daenerys' fault and not Quentyn's fault.

[SeanF]

3 hours ago, Rose of Red Lake said:

 Plus, "burning all the bad people to solve problems" is very U.S. foreign policy, i.e. something a 5 year old would come up with.

It worked pretty well for the USA in 1945.  No one would say that Harry Truman or Curtis Le May were acting like 5 year olds.  They acted like military commanders who were as ruthless as they had to be.  

[#1dolFAN]

26 minutes ago, Jabar of House Titan said:

but Daenerys had a special relationship with Drogo (or rather, Drogo had a special interest in her that has yet to be explained)

What’s yet to be explained? After experiencing nothing but doggystyle his whole life, Danny put that Valyrian poom-pool on the Khal and turned his mind upside down!

[SeanF]

35 minutes ago, Jabar of House Titan said:

The power of khaleesi varies on their khal husband. Most khaleesis I imagine would be little more than glorified sex slaves but Daenerys had a special relationship with Drogo (or rather, Drogo had a special interest in her that has yet to be explained) so she was afforded a bit more status and respect in the khalasar.

And I don't know...I think that the mines of Casterly Rock will start to run a little dry by the end of A Dream of Spring. Tywin is one of the most dishonest, secretive people in the entire series (he lied to himself all the time and kept his secrets as if he was suffocating and they were air) and Cersei is probably the silliest, most fiscally irresponsible person in the entire series. Jaime is negligent because he has other loftier concerns and Tyrion, while he IS good with money, is also very greedy and has a tendency to overpromise...even if he pays his debts.

It wouldn't surprise me in the least if it were revealed that the Lannisters are not as rich as Tywin made them out to be. His children are probably in for a unpleasant surprise now that winter is here and that they are losing control of King's Landing and the 7K.

Agreed.

I'm  not sure what's the big deal with this "we should handle hostile, unrepentant enemies as if they were priceless glass dolls" mentality. 

No, I don't think she'll burn Essos on her way to Westeros. Maybe it will appear that way to the Westerosi and any of the Essosi elite who love and profit off of slavery and misery.

But I definitely believe that she will conquer Essos (except for maybe Braavos) and re-establish the Valyrian Freehold. Some cities will be destroyed or abandoned along the way...like I can't imagine that Norvos is not going to be destroyed. The city is completely comprised out of wood and Mellario Martell will likely do something stupid after believing that what happened to Quentyn is Daenerys' fault and not Quentyn's fault.

When it comes to Daenerys, there seems to be a lot of pearl-clutching, and an insistence she adheres to standards that no military commander would adhere to.  She's no harsher than either Stannis or Robb Stark.  Justice in this world is eye for eye, and elite adult males are held responsible for the crimes of their governments.

[BlackLightning]

54 minutes ago, #1dolFAN said:

What’s yet to be explained? After experiencing nothing but doggystyle his whole life, Danny put that Valyrian poom-poom on the Khal and turned his mind upside down!

Drogo had a mansion in Pentos. The Dothraki don't own land or houses. So why would a Dothraki khal have a mansion in Pentos? Why would a Dothraki khal be allowed a permanent dwelling in Pentos.

And it's a mansion that's well provisioned and well maintained with its own servants/slaves.

And he was especially gentle with Daenerys. Most Dothraki men, much less khals, aren't so gentle.

Besides, there's the very likely possibility that Drogo's mother is still alive. And she'd be a member of the Dosh Khaleen if she is.

50 minutes ago, SeanF said:

When it comes to Daenerys, there seems to be a lot of pearl-clutching, and an insistence she adheres to standards that no military commander would adhere to.  She's no harsher than either Stannis or Robb Stark.  Justice in this world is eye for eye, and elite adult males are held responsible for the crimes of their governments.

Exactly, military commanders in the present don't even adhere to these peoples standard much less medieval military commanders.

As a matter of fact, Daenerys is gentler than Stannis, Tywin and Robb combined.

56 minutes ago, SeanF said:

It worked pretty well for the USA in 1945.  No one would say that Harry Truman or Curtis Le May were acting like 5 year olds.  They acted like military commanders who were as ruthless as they had to be.  

Thank you again.

The Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombings in 1945 are the very reason why the USA is the absolutely singular superpower that it is today. Our power is waning but our closest competitors/rivals (China, Russia, North Korea, Iran, etc.) would have to all team-up and work together in order to completely destroy us. Why? Because of our show of force in Japan at the end of World War II.

Didn't good old Hoster Tully (who no one in the fandom has a problem with) completely destroy his vassal's keep and township and prevent it from being rebuilt because his vassal openly defied him in war?

[#1dolFAN]

5 minutes ago, Jabar of House Titan said:

Didn't good old Hoster Tully (who no one in the fandom has a problem with) completely destroy his vassal's keep and township and prevent it from being rebuilt because his vassal openly defied him in war?

Hence the practice of sowing the lands with salt, therefore rendering it barren.

[SeanF]

6 minutes ago, Jabar of House Titan said:

Drogo had a mansion in Pentos. The Dothraki don't own land or houses. So why would a Dothraki khal have a mansion in Pentos? Why would a Dothraki khal be allowed a permanent dwelling in Pentos.

And it's a mansion that's well provisioned and well maintained with its own servants/slaves.

And he was especially gentle with Daenerys. Most Dothraki men, much less khals, aren't so gentle.

Besides, there's the very likely possibility that Drogo's mother is still alive. And she'd be a member of the Dosh Khaleen if she is.

Exactly, military commanders in the present don't even adhere to these peoples standard much less medieval military commanders.

As a matter of fact, Daenerys is gentler than Stannis, Tywin and Robb combined.

Thank you again.

The Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombings in 1945 are the very reason why the USA is the absolutely singular superpower that it is today. Our power is waning but our closest competitors/rivals (China, Russia, North Korea, Iran, etc.) would have to all team-up and work together in order to completely destroy us. Why? Because of our show of force in Japan at the end of World War II.

Didn't good old Hoster Tully (who no one in the fandom has a problem with) completely destroy his vassal's keep and township and prevent it from being rebuilt because his vassal openly defied him in war?

I was reading about the War in the Pacific.  On one island, the Japanese had built a complex underground bunker.  The Americans would have lost thousands of men, trying to capture it.  So, the solution was to pump in millions of gallons of seawater, laced with oil and petrol, and ignite it.

You can bet if Dany did that, she would be denounced as a monster, Mad Queen etc.

[Jon The Dragon]

Wasn't Japan on its knees militarily just before the Atomic bombs landed? I wonder how it would be viewed in the books if Dany burned a civilian population of a beaten adversary (the show did this extremely poorly). Just because you can, doesn't mean you should. Extreme military strength is scary however its used. Killing is wrong. In the end its the normal people who suffer the most while the people in power play their games.

[BlackLightning]

1 hour ago, SeanF said:

I was reading about the War in the Pacific.  On one island, the Japanese had built a complex underground bunker.  The Americans would have lost thousands of men, trying to capture it.  So, the solution was to pump in millions of gallons of seawater, laced with oil and petrol, and ignite it.

You can bet if Dany did that, she would be denounced as a monster, Mad Queen etc.

Funny.

That's probably exactly how Casterly Rock will be made uninhabitable and/or useless by the end of the series.

15 minutes ago, Jonthedragon said:

Wasn't Japan on its knees militarily just before the Atomic bombs landed? I wonder how it would be viewed in the books if Dany burned a civilian population of a beaten adversary (the show did this extremely poorly). Just because you can, doesn't mean you should. Extreme military strength is scary however its used. Killing is wrong. In the end its the normal people who suffer the most while the people in power play their games.

Was Japan on its knees military just before the Atomic bombs landed? Unofficially, yes. But to Japan's enemies it was very unclear and a lot of people in Japan didn't actually know how dire their situation was. News travelled slowly back then, especially with propaganda machines as elaborate as the early 20th century Japanese. Besides, there was no official surrender from the leaders. They were planning on doing a massive kamikaze move where they fight to the death and/or kill themselves and try to take their enemies down with them. It would've been an absolute nightmare The Japanese archipelago would've become the world's largest graveyard, full of Japanese, Americans, Soviets, Chinese and British men and women alike.

The bomb drop was unpleasant and distasteful but necessary. Well, maybe not the second one. But the first one was...

I can easily see Daenerys destroying a civilian population of an adversary if say they were being mind-controlled/mind-raped by Euron, overran by magical zombies or infected with the practically-incurable greyscale disease. In other words, the civilian population would have to be far beyond help for Daenerys to just burn them all. It's extremely out-of-character for Daenerys to go insane and then snap back into sanity

Oh trust the people in power who like to play their games will suffer by the time this series ends.

Not only is winter (and just nature in general) the great equalizer but I think Daenerys is specifically going to have massive problems with the nobility in both Essos and Westeros moving forward. I think Daenerys is going to take the fight directly to them without completely estranging herself from the smallfolk. If she does estrange herself, I think that in the end, the smallfolk of Westeros will mourn her. We already know that the ones in Essos will...

[Shi Qiang]

On 11/24/2019 at 9:30 PM, Jonthedragon said:

Will she burn the cities in the area of the Old Valyrian Freehold on the way to Westeros? I do wonder if she will travel along the Devil Road which she saw as the road home on her flight on Drogon. She would be massively feared upon arrival with god knows how many people she frees / follow her.

I doubt it.  She is the main protagonists in this story.  The hero.  She is not going in that direction.  The ones going on the evil path are the Starks.  The ice is the antagonists in the story.  It is what the living will have to fight to preserve life in the west.  So anyway, back to the question.  It is not necessary for Daenerys to act alone.  Remember, she is already worshiped by the R'hllorians.  The slaves will act on their own to win their own freedom.  Mhysa is the catalyst and the inspiration for the slaves to believe they can do it.  The numbers are on their side.  They have the means.  All they need is the will power. 

[SeanF]

1 hour ago, Jonthedragon said:

Wasn't Japan on its knees militarily just before the Atomic bombs landed? I wonder how it would be viewed in the books if Dany burned a civilian population of a beaten adversary (the show did this extremely poorly). Just because you can, doesn't mean you should. Extreme military strength is scary however its used. Killing is wrong. In the end its the normal people who suffer the most while the people in power play their games.

Yes and no.  Japan was beaten, but its leaders were still holding out for a peace that would let them retain Korea and Formosa (Taiwan) and Manchuria.  They thought an invasion of Japan would inflict such casualties on the US, that they could negotiate an advantageous peace.

If the argument is that killing is wrong, regardless of circumstance, then that needs to applied to all characters, not just Daenerys.

[Jon The Dragon]

I suppose that gets back to Tywin's question if it's more noble to kill thousands in a battle or a dozen at dinner.

[SeanF]

3 minutes ago, Jonthedragon said:

I suppose that gets back to Tywin's question if it's more noble to kill thousands in a battle or a dozen at dinner.

Tywin was lying, because thousands were killed.

[Jon The Dragon]

Good point! 

[SeanF]

1 hour ago, Allardyce said:

I doubt it.  She is the main protagonists in this story.  The hero.  She is not going in that direction.  The ones going on the evil path are the Starks.  The ice is the antagonists in the story.  It is what the living will have to fight to preserve life in the west.  So anyway, back to the question.  It is not necessary for Daenerys to act alone.  Remember, she is already worshiped by the R'hllorians.  The slaves will act on their own to win their own freedom.  Mhysa is the catalyst and the inspiration for the slaves to believe they can do it.  The numbers are on their side.  They have the means.  All they need is the will power. 

Not necessarily.

The show canon and book canon may be the same.  D & D wanted to make the points that there is something bad about women who seek political power, that reformers are tyrants by nature, that fighting against injustice is wrong, and that oligarchy is preferable to hereditary monarchy.  I'd hate to think that Martin is making the same points in these novels, but one can't rule it out.

[Rose of Red Lake]

11 hours ago, #1dolFAN said:

I’m sorry but completely destroying ones enemy has nothing to do with “U.S. policy”. Doesn’t matter if you’re American, Babylonian, Persian or Ghengis Khan, it’s just sound policy.

Check the 48 Laws of Power.

How very black and white. Flip this statement - its sound policy for Dany and her invading armies to be destroyed. But only one person has WMD. I guess the U.S. can bomb/fire/blood it’s way to sound foreign policy? 

[SeanF]

What one thinks of Daenerys depends a lot on what one thinks Martin wants to say about war.  If his argument is that war is never justified, regardless of cause, then Daenerys must have been wrong to fight against slavery, and will come to a bad end.  

If you take at face value, his statement that "some wars are worth fighting" then it is hard to see how her campaign in Slavers Bay can be anything other than just.

And, it would be hard to see how the Others could be defeated, in due course, without the use of force, and indeed, dragon fire. If dragons are WMD's, well, there are times WMD's need to be used.

One further point is that if it's wrong for Daenerys to wage war, then it must be just as wrong for Jon Snow, Robb Stark et al to wage war.  Which begs the question why she should be singled out as the bad guy?

[Rose of Red Lake]

7 hours ago, SeanF said:

If the argument is that killing is wrong, regardless of circumstance, then that needs to applied to all characters, not just Daenerys.

Power is unbalanced between characters though, and Dany has the most of anyone, so what she does isn’t really comparable. Killing people en masse, as a group, in an unprovoked war, with advanced weapons no one else has, all resting on one person’s responsibility, just isn’t good. Surely you’ve seen GRRM’s statements about swords vs. drone warfare? He’s troubled by the ability to kill masses of people easily, in a sanitized way, because of technology. What this kind of power does to one person’s psych, seems to be what he’s exploring with Dany. Or at least foiling in some way with the other characters.  

[SeanF]

8 minutes ago, Rose of Red Lake said:

Power is unbalanced between characters though, and Dany has the most of anyone, so what she does isn’t really comparable. Killing people en masse, as a group, in an unprovoked war, with advanced weapons no one else has, all resting on one person’s responsibility, just isn’t good. Surely you’ve seen GRRM’s statements about swords vs. drone warfare? He’s troubled by the ability to kill masses of people easily, in a sanitized way, because of technology. What this kind of power does to one person’s psych, seems to be what he’s exploring with Dany. Or at least foiling in some way with the other characters.  

If dragons are meant to be WMD's, Daenerys will only have one out of the three, because the rule is one dragon/one rider (in the books, not the show).  So, this power is going to be divided up.  And, Daenerys is certainly not the only major power-player in this series.  That said, by the end of TWOW, its possible she will have the largest army of all.

As to drones v swords, that paints a very romanticised picture of medieval warfare.  People are just as happy killing huge numbers of people up close and personal, as from the air, as the Mongol conquests, the Hundred Years War, the Taiping rebellion etc. all showed.  And if Martin believes that WWII was worth fighting, as he has claimed, then how else was it won, except by raining fire on the enemy from above, combined with brutal attacks on the ground?

[Rose of Red Lake]

2 hours ago, SeanF said:

What one thinks of Daenerys depends a lot on what one thinks Martin wants to say about war.  If his argument is that war is never justified, regardless of cause, then Daenerys must have been wrong to fight against slavery, and will come to a bad end.  

If you take at face value, his statement that "some wars are worth fighting" then it is hard to see how her campaign in Slavers Bay can be anything other than just.

And, it would be hard to see how the Others could be defeated, in due course, without the use of force, and indeed, dragon fire. If dragons are WMD's, well, there are times WMD's need to be used.

Like I mentioned, it doesn’t really matter if her war is just. The main concern is that she’s becoming detached from and emboldened by the violence she commits. And more of a concern than for someone like Arya, because Arya can’t wipe out entire cities. 

To the topic of the thread, I don’t think Dany will burn down cities in Essos. I think she will want to, but Tyrion will stop her. However even using dragons in a more limited way isn’t ruling, it’s just conquering again. Anywhere she goes, I think ruin will follow, either directly because of her actions, or indirectly through things she can’t solve, like famine, disease. I don’t think Dany is really reforming anything, otherwise she would have tried to build something in Meereen and wouldn’t have made the gigantic error of burning 200 people at a tourney just because her dragon got hurt.

Solving problems by taking the most brutal/violent action created the mess that we saw in ADWD where feeding people required subtle political skills so I’m not sure why being even more brutal/violent and burning all the bad men will now enable Dany to rule this time. If anything he seems like the type to have Dany repeat this excess brutality—>excess misery cycle.

2 hours ago, SeanF said:

And if Martin believes that WWII was worth fighting, as he has claimed, then how else was it won, except by raining fire on the enemy from above, combined with brutal attacks on the ground?

The war in Essos isn’t even a fully developed war for the novels. The author doesn’t have multiple viewpoints there. It honestly just seems like a plot device/side quest, that only matters in terms of what it means for the main setting (Westeros). Essos seems like a quagmire.

2 hours ago, SeanF said:

And, it would be hard to see how the Others could be defeated, in due course, without the use of force, and indeed, dragon fire. If dragons are WMD's, well, there are times WMD's need to be used.

I don’t think dragons will be all that important against the Others mainly because the set up seems too obvious. I’m expecting frustrated expectations on that score, it’s just too classically cardboard fantasy to have Dany be the hero. It’s also a lack of imagination if the fire monsters save the day against the ice monsters, I mean... how freaking basic.

2 hours ago, SeanF said:

If dragons are meant to be WMD's, Daenerys will only have one out of the three, because the rule is one dragon/one rider (in the books, not the show).  So, this power is going to be divided up.  And, Daenerys is certainly not the only major power-player in this series.  That said, by the end of TWOW, its possible she will have the largest army of all.

Daenerys is the most powerful person in the world, according to the author’s own interviews. If other people have dragons, that just means MAD like in the Dance. Divided WMD isn’t reassuring in the least. If Cersei or whoever kills Dany’s precious monster babies, good for her.

2 hours ago, SeanF said:

As to drones v swords, that paints a very romanticised picture of medieval warfare.  People are just as happy killing huge numbers of people up close and personal, as from the air, as the Mongol conquests, the Hundred Years War, the Taiping rebellion etc. all showed.  And if Martin believes that WWII was worth fighting, as he has claimed, then how else was it won, except by raining fire on the enemy from above, combined with brutal attacks on the ground?

Well what do you think he meant by that? I don’t think he’s saying that medieval warfare was happier, it’s that it took more effort, and soldiers saw what violence did, up close and personal, while push-button bombing removes the gruesome quality.Translating this to the story, my take is that while anyone can become damaged/detached about killing or glorification of war, having to take a person’s life with your own sword might lead some cultures to take killing/execution more seriously and respectfully, than people who fly around on magical reptiles making split second decisions, never having to hear people’s screams.