What Would Baltar Do?
Kevin D.
I like Battlestar Galactica too so Dean doesn’t get to bogart all the BSG posts.
After thinking on the awesomeness that was the last episode a question came to me: What would Baltar do? Or, perhaps, what should he have done?
Then it came to me: Would I have done any differently?
I think we can all agree Baltar was well on his way to becoming Caligula and probably would have been voted out of office when his term ended. But then the Cylons arrived and occupied New Caprica. First thing first – The Cylon occupation of New Caprica was not a metaphor of the U.S. in Iraq. Ron Moore said so himself. It’s an allegory of the Nazi occupation of France. We need to get the context straight before we continue.
Baltar obviously had no choice but to surrender to Cylon forces. The Galactica and Pegasus jumped away and no standing military was on the ground to repel an invasion. From the webisodes we learned it took a couple of months for the resistance to organize and by that time the Cylons had already cemented their power base.
Right now Baltar is seen as a villain by the Colonists. And maybe that isn’t a strong enough word – collaborator. He’s seen as someone actively working with the Cylons to aid their cause. Well, we know differently. But, now I wonder, would I have done any differently? The Cylons didn’t need Baltar’s assistance to do anything and he lived simply to rubber stamp their orders to his people. As we saw, they were more than willing to put a bullet in him if he didn't do what they wanted. At that point they would have simply installed a shill as President to do what Baltar didn’t.
Perhaps that is where Baltar failed. Had he stood on principle, and been killed, he probably would have been largely remembered as a martyr in the fight against the Cylons. That his death wouldn’t have done a thing to stop, or even slow, the Cylons' plan is irrelevant. He would have died for his principles.
Instead he chose to sign a piece of paper that someone else would have signed anyway and now he's a villain. A collaborator.
In war people do what they must to survive. Is it fair to judge them under these circumstances as we judge those who never experience such horror in all their lives? Should the same standard of justice be applied to people who would do terrible things during terrible times that they would not have otherwise? Is Baltar so much worse for simply wanting to live than someone who'd take a bullet rather than go through the charade of applying a rubber stamp?
I’m not trying to make Baltar look like a hero or anything. He’s no Tigh, Anders, Roslin or anyone else. But does being a person with no moral spine make one a villain? Or, just someone to pity and avoid?
I’m sure a gun in most people's face would make them do things they never thought they'd do before. I’m sure a gun to a loved one would make them do even more horrible things. Did Baltar love the people who elected him? I doubt it. However, when push came to shove he did what he could to save lives. Too bad none of the Colonials saw it.
I think it is also a mistake to equate Balter with any citizen who didn't have the guts to stand up to the Cylons. Baltar was a leader, and thus had greater responsibilities. For example, we wouldn't fault an ordinary citizen from running away when an enemy army appeared, but a soldier that desserts is a different matter. The two have different responsibilities and have made different commitments.
Balter, had a larger responsibility than just to survive. He failed that responsibility, and deserves the scorn heaped upon him.
His suicide bombings accomplished precisely nothing, aside from killing some of the few remaining humans in the universe and escalating the confrontation with the Cylons... just as some of the Cylons wanted. All the bluster about "distracting" the Cylons doesn't seem to have come to anything. In short, he vastly increased the viciousness of the confrontation between the humans and Cylons, undermined the efforts of Cylons who were trying to get Cylons as a whole to reject genocide, and even indirectly created the situation that pushed Ellen into the betrayal that forced him to kill her.
If the humans hadn't openly resisted at all until Galactica returned there would be:
1) far fewer dead humans (which sort of seems like a priority at the moment.
2) far less brutality from the Cylons, including no death convoy
3) alot more chance that Caprica Six and Boomer would be able to convince the Cylons that exterminating the human race is a bad idea
4) the Cylons would be a lot more complacent (which is as good or better than them being distracted)
5) Tigh would probably have two eyes
6) Ellen would be alive and we'd still all hate her guts instead of vaguely feeling sorry for her
In short, Tigh's entire strategy was a tactical disaster.
Your tactics assumes knowledge Tigh couldn't have had. He had no idea when the Galactica was returning. He had no idea there were any Cylons that regretted killing humanity. All he knew was that the remnants of humanity were being occupied by a war-time enemy and he had to act. Would you have him to nothing and hope for the best? This was a man who fought the Cylons in two wars. Sitting still was not an option.
A detention center was already established before the resistance organized. More and more freedom was being taken from the Colonials. Would you sit idley by while your enemy occupied your home?
I think you blame Tigh for too much.
You're right. Baltar was their leader. I still cannot think of anything he could have done differently and not gotten himself killed only to have a puppet installed in his place.
'Course, some may argue he himself was a puppet.
Furthermore, Baltar was a traitor long, long before becoming President. He sold out the entire human race during the genocide, for nothing more than a sex fling. No human knows it, and only one (Roslyn) suspects it. To everyone else he was an honorable, charismatic, trustworthy individual.
In truth he should have been tried as a traitor and executed long before he became President. But no one knew. Which is how he became President instead.
Furthermore, you're right that Baltar had no choice but to surrender. Where his choice came in was when he learned just how evil the Cylons' intentions were, and at that point as President he should have refused to cooperate or, better yet, tried to escape and start a resistance movement himself.
Yet only now, when humanity sees him at his worse, do we start to see him as actually, for once, developing some redeeming personality traits: a conscience, a sense of guilt and shame, a desire to be redeemed. Indeed, at the end, he begged to be killed--because finally, after all this time, he realized he had something to be ashamed and guilty over. He'd never shown that in his entire life up until that moment.
This is why I find the writing on the series so powerful.
By the way, I think that the Nazi occupation of France is the perfect allegory here. Furthermore, I think it helps to think of Baltar as much like Phillipe Petain, and for much the same reason: surrendering is not dishonorable, but at some point when it becomes obvious that the invaders seek more than what should be reasonable, collaboration becomes simply deplorable.
As Vichy president, Baltar was in a good position to gather some good information to use against the Cylons. That's what his assistant did. Baltar didn't. He just sat around feeling sorry for himself, without even (Casablanca's) Renault's style or cleverness. Postmodern traitors are the worst.
He's a good actor, though.
As my favorite character said, you fight until you can't fight anymore. Hope she'll get to cap him.
One of those drawbacks is the willingness to take a bullet while doing the right thing. Junior officers are expected to lead from the front and set the example. CEOs get to take the blame when the company goes downhill and the praise when it does well.
If you're the elected leader when you're invaded it's your damned job to stand up and do the right thing.
It's not easy but there it is; sometimes your job is to take a bullet and die well.
He seems to me a very, very good example of what M. Scott Peck described in his book "People of the Lie, which is a psychiatric study of evil as a psychological personality type. Sometimes it expresses itself in brutes and sadists, but it probably more often looks like weasels like Gaius Baltar.
Honestly, if James Callis doesn't get at least one Emmy nomination it will be criminal. Criminal I tell ya!
Either it was, or the situation was hopeless anyway. Minus Galactica, the best they could have ever hoped for by resisting was to be hunked from orbit.
"He had no idea there were any Cylons that regretted killing humanity."
Debatable: it's not clear who told who what, when. Certainly the Cylons told the humans something akin to what we hear them talking about their new mission in the President's ship.
"A detention center was already established before the resistance organized. More and more freedom was being taken from the Colonials. Would you sit idley by while your enemy occupied your home?"
When the odds are completely overwhelming, I certainly wouldn't try to take on the larger power directly or even with suicide missions all to no tactical purpose, especially when the enemy has no particular reason to do anything when challenged other than uke us all. Infiltration, gathering intelligence, and trying to coordinate with Galactica is better than randomly blowing stuff up that the Cylons don't even really care about.
There is also the morale issue, where even small successes, especially when they highlight the courage and commitment of one's side is a huge benefit in keeping the force together.
I think it plausible to postulate that if Tigh hadn't embarked on the suicide campaign there would have been much less organization of the resistance, and therefore much less effectiveness in getting people off NEw Caprica. Additionally, it is likely that fewer humans would have wanted to go.
Whether this is 'worth it' or not probably depends on how likely you think Galactica and convoy will be at escaping the Cylons eventually and how valuable freedom is. Is it better to have twice as many humans alive, but only a quarter as many free or half as many humans alive, but all of them free? That is a philosophical, not strategic question, but it quite important in analyzing the strategy.
I was half expecting a surprise reveal that Baltar was the Resistance's contact, as opposed to the rather obvious suspect, Gaeta.
And that would've been an interesting development, I think.
David: We already saw that Gaeta was the contact, so I'm not sure how that would have been possible.
1. His fling with the 1st Number Six that led to the compromise of the Colonial Military and the destruction of the 12 Colonies.
2. Covering up GalacticaBoomer's Cylon status, allowing her to shoot Adama and frack up the fleet for a good half-season.
3. Backstabbing Laura Roslin after she had appointed him VP by running for president even though he knew it would put a Cylon-manipulated agent as head of the Colonies.
4. Finally, giving a fracking nuclear bomb to Gina, which she used to blow up Cloud Nine (the NICEST ship in the fleet), the detonation of which led the Cylons to New Caprica, to the occupation, to the deaths of thousands of the last remaining humans, and to the destruction of the Pegasus (the ship which, however much trouble it caused in the beginning, basically saved the fleet's ass.)
Spinelessness I can forgive. Treachery, ego, and lust for power, never. I hope the Cylons have some real fun with him.
Yeah, yeah, no drama without conflict. But anyone who sees Baltar as redeemable in any way needs to check their meds.
Right, I wasn't clear. I meant "It would've been interesting if they'd written it differently, with Baltar secretly working against the Cylons."
No way is Baltar a Cylon. Three reasons:
It would completely undermine so much of the story that's been told so far. Instead of Baltar succumbing to his own, very human, weakness, it would just be yet more Cylon cleverness and trickery, and that cheapens everything that's happened.
There's no dramatic purpose to it at this point.
And, what possible reason could the other Cylons have for not revealing it to him by the end of Exodus part 2, after all the humans have escaped, and it's just Three, Six, Baltar and the baby left behind on New Caprica?
They'd be pretty cheap and unbelievable at this point.