Uh oh! A problem with Clonetrooper numbers
Posted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 4:06 am
As we all know, the number of clonetroopers is a sensitive issue. AOTC gives us 1.2 million clones early on in the war, and a supplemental article has suggested that the GAR peaked at around 3 million clones.
There is, however, something that deserves attention in ROTS that has often been overlooked. The new governors are being deployed with a regiment of clone troops each (not troops in general, but clonetroopers specifically). Problem?
This stretches the limits of the clone army commonly described. If these are GAR regiments as described on Wookieepedia (2304 troops each; this is cited as being from the GAR supplemental), and each of the 100,000 worlds of the Republic have a new governor coming with a regiment of troops, that would be 230 million clonetroopers.
Now, this is the sector governance decree, and perhaps these are short regiments; if each sector governor, overseeing 50 worlds, is guarded by a short regiment of 500 troops, that would only be a million clonetroopers to oversee the Republic - but 500 troops is not, even in Star Wars, enough for military action against CIS forces. At this sort of "minimal" level it still represents a very significant fraction in the Grand Army's forces as described by the EU.
It does seem perfectly reasonable that in the OT era, each planetary governor is protected by a regiment of some kind of troops; that would suggest the overall forces of the Empire to include in the neighborhood of a billion garrison troops.
While the doctrine of garrisoning governors with regimental scale forces may not seem like an iron-fisted approach, it does imply a significant deployment of manpower on local security in the Empire compared with the initial numbers of clones in the Republic.
There is, however, something that deserves attention in ROTS that has often been overlooked. The new governors are being deployed with a regiment of clone troops each (not troops in general, but clonetroopers specifically). Problem?
This stretches the limits of the clone army commonly described. If these are GAR regiments as described on Wookieepedia (2304 troops each; this is cited as being from the GAR supplemental), and each of the 100,000 worlds of the Republic have a new governor coming with a regiment of troops, that would be 230 million clonetroopers.
Now, this is the sector governance decree, and perhaps these are short regiments; if each sector governor, overseeing 50 worlds, is guarded by a short regiment of 500 troops, that would only be a million clonetroopers to oversee the Republic - but 500 troops is not, even in Star Wars, enough for military action against CIS forces. At this sort of "minimal" level it still represents a very significant fraction in the Grand Army's forces as described by the EU.
It does seem perfectly reasonable that in the OT era, each planetary governor is protected by a regiment of some kind of troops; that would suggest the overall forces of the Empire to include in the neighborhood of a billion garrison troops.
While the doctrine of garrisoning governors with regimental scale forces may not seem like an iron-fisted approach, it does imply a significant deployment of manpower on local security in the Empire compared with the initial numbers of clones in the Republic.