Just a backup in advance of the detumblring
Depends what you mean by cruelty. Surprise attacks, taking no prisoners on the field? Probably needed to correct the huge decline in the authority of the Lord Paramount. Having all of the Reynes and Tarbecks murdered? Not necessary.
He could have very easily disinherited both families, and sent the survivors to the Wall and/or the Silent Sisters, without killing hundreds and hundreds of noncombatants.
I think he would have indeed been more cautious…although, given the way the timeline works, he must have been sending out the letters to set this all up before Jaime was released.
Chapter-by-Chapter Analysis: Jon IX
“My place is here…where is yours, boy?” Synopsis: Jon Snow tries to run away from the Night’s Watch and his friends bring him back. He talks with Commander Mormont about priorities and makes a choice about whether he’s going to ride south or north. SPOILER WARNING: This chapter analysis, and all following, will contain spoilers for all Song of Ice and Fire novels and Game of Thrones episodes.…
Sorry, for some reason WordPress cross-posts when I update things on my main site. Nothing new here folks, just fixed a typo.
Chapter-by-Chapter Analysis: Jon IX
“My place is here…where is yours, boy?” Synopsis: Jon Snow tries to run away from the Night’s Watch and his friends bring him back. He talks with Commander Mormont about priorities and makes a choice about whether he’s going to ride south or north. SPOILER WARNING: This chapter analysis, and all following, will contain spoilers for all Song of Ice and Fire novels and Game of Thrones episodes.…
Yeah, probably. Especially from the WOIAF, their total and combined forces were quite substantial compared to the forces that House Lannister could throw together – especially if you remove Tywin’s contributions from the picture.
If I recall correctly from the extended Westerlands section, Tywin could pull together 3,500 men to fight the Reynes and Tarbecks, but the full might of House Reyne and their allies was more than 8,000 men.
So potentially, I could see a scenario where the Reynes are able to crush the Lannisters in the field and force Tytos to abdicate. The more difficult question is what they would have done after – governing after such a coup is a lot more difficult than most schemers realize.
Oh, I absolutely think he went overboard. As I discuss in my essay in Hymn for Spring, both Jon Snow and Dany in ADWD fit the profile of reformers who push too fast, too hard to change the system, while neglecting the vital task of building up a solid constituency behind their reforms.
In Jon’s case, he really should have been selling his plans to the leadership and the rank-and-file from the very beginning, whereas in OTL he only started to explain himself after the fact, and he should have been cultivating a base of support among Castle Black men who had served under him during the siege.
As for Hardhome, that was a classic case of mission creep – yes, in the best of all possible worlds, it would be good to rescue those people. But Jon risked a lot of manpower and precious assets to do it, and then when it all went wrong, he wanted to throw even more manpower and assets at it.
No. Ramsay got delayed by Theon and “Arya” jumping over the walls.
My thinking, and really this is the only thing that makes sense to me, is that the Disputed Lands are disputed precisely because they are extremely fertile and act as the bread-basket for the three city states, much like the rural areas around the Italian city-states fed the urban centers.
Control over the Disputed Lands means that (in addition to having your armies right outside your neighbors’ gates) you’ve got all of the food, whereas your rivals don’t, forcing them to spend precious cash on importing it, which means they’ve got less money to compete with you for more valuable trade commodities. The flip side is that cheaper grain for your own city means that there’s more demand in the domestic economy for non-essentials – which is great for the largely luxury-based import trade – and the city’s reliance on Westeros for staple crops goes down, which improves your trade balance with that region.
Hello everyone! Sorry for the lack of updates – the ongoing (and hopefully soon to be concluded) saga of my screwed-up foot has put me majorly behind on things, although thankfully since I have the week off that should be improving shortly. At the moment, I’m 2600 words into Jon V, and that should be going up sometime this week. In the meantime, here’s some tidbits to tide you over: what limits…
As with many political matters in a pre-institutional state, it depends on the King. Aenys, for example, initially pursued a hands-off approach when it came to the Vulture King and other rebels to local authority, whereas Aegon V’s intervention in the Westerlands may well have been motivated both by necessity and his overall agenda of trying to strengthen the central government vs. the great lords.
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