# ESB: The Battle of Hoth **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 14, 2005, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173 "2005-06-14T02:52:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/21 "2005-06-14T14:34:14Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > 1. And what’s with the on-the-fly improvisational tactics? Shouldn’t there already be a standard counter to walker attacks (trip 'em up!)? Not necessarily. Standard counter by who? If the walkers were standard issue weapons, and had been around for a long time, and they had been used in many battles against groups now comprising the Rebellion, and these battles had been won by tripping tactics, and the survivors of these battles had made it home to share this information…maybe. ---
**Author:** ![HPL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3da27b/32.png) [@HPL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HPL)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/22 "2005-06-14T17:12:57Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > A related question on the Battle of Hoth - did those rebel ground forces actually do anything? Because from the looks of it, they didn’t even slow those AT-ATs down, let alone take any of them out. What was all of that infantry doing there when it didn’t have a single weapon that could deal with enemy armor? They didn’t even make effective speed-bumps. The normal reasoning is the keep the walkers busy until everyone else could get away. Not that it helped. The Battle of Hoth seemed to be an almost total disaster from the rebels point of view. Their defenses were usless againest a mere 4 or 5 walkers until luke came up with the tow cable idea. By the end, the rebels wre protecting two transports at a time and even then it wasn’t going fast enough. Remember, they even got an hour or so of warning before the Imperials even arrived. Wikipedia mentions 90% of the rebel spacecraft being shot down leaving the planet, but I’m not sure where that comes from. I did get the impression that they hadn’t been on hoth long though. Han mentions very early about placing sensors, which seems like it should be one of the first things you do. The Falcon is still under repair, the rebels are having trouble adapting the speeders to the cold. It’s like they just moved in. If they had an heavy guns, they probably haven’t had time to unpack them. ---
**Author:** ![Neurotik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Neurotik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neurotik)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/23 "2005-06-14T17:22:38Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > What was all of that infantry doing there when it didn’t have a single weapon that could deal with enemy armor? Well, Luke seems pretty surprised that his blasters aren’t doing any damage to the walkers, so they may have thought they had sufficient weapons. ---
**Author:** ![sturmhauke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/24 "2005-06-14T17:34:29Z")
I’ve come to realize that Star Wars doesn’t stand up to scrutiny very well. When I was a kid I didn’t care about that stuff. These days I care more, but I’m willing to give Star Wars a pass - well, to an extent. Ep I still sucked bantha poodoo. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/25 "2005-06-14T17:55:06Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > Why wouldn’t they? Because _no-one_ expects the… …never mind. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/26 "2005-06-14T18:43:21Z")
**RickJay** : Okay, slight modification, then. Vader wanted the ships to come out of hyperspace outside of the system, and move in on a vector that would sweep up any fleeing transports. This was especially important since they didn’t know specifically which planet they’d find the base on (remember, Han destroyed the probe before it could finish it’s transmission, and part of the message might have been lost across interstellar distances.) By dropping right in on top of the system, they might have ended up behind the Rebel’s escape vector, instead of in front of it, meaning they’d have to chase the (smaller, faster) transports instead of blockading them and shooting them down as they tried to get past. As for why the Rebels didn’t have any weapons to stop the Walkers… maybe it’s because they didn’t have any weapons to stop the Walkers. The Alliance is fighting a guerilla war. They aren’t trying to invade and conquer planets. Most of their military is fleet-based, not infantry. This is why their bases are always secret: they simply don’t have the resources to defend a ground target against a concentrated infantry assault. The only defence they had available to stop the Walkers was the tow-cables, which I do not think were a spur-of-the-moment improvisation, but an established (if untried) battle plan that didn’t quite work. The entire ground battle on Hoth was a holding action to keep the faster infantry units out of the base until it could be evacuated. Once the walkers got within range, everyone on both sides knew it was going to be over. And to everyone saying “Lucas was winging it,” or “It’s not that kind of movie,” y’all are just completely missing the point of this thread. ---
**Author:** ![Jurph](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/50afbb/32.png) [@Jurph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jurph)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/27 "2005-06-14T18:50:00Z")
There’s a relatively academic [dissection](http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=542596) of the Battle of Hoth on [Everything2.com](http://Everything2.com), where the author notes that Hoth was unique in that both the Empire and the Rebellion considered the battle a failure. Vader’s promotion of Captain Piett is based on his _mistaken_ belief that if they had come in from farther out, they would have taken the rebels unawares. Vader does not know that the probe droid self-destructed, or that it took blaster fire – only that the footage from the probe droid tipped him off to the location of the rebels. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/28 "2005-06-14T19:43:21Z")
> [@](#): > > (remember, Han destroyed the probe before it could finish it’s transmission, and part of the message might have been lost across interstellar distances.) But it still managed to transmit video which one would think requires a lot more data than “Hey guys! I’m on the sixth planet in the Hoth system!” ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/29 "2005-06-14T19:54:11Z")
> [@bienville](#): > > I would just like to point out that I as a poster who get _very_ upset with myself when I do stupid shit like using an apostrophe to form a plural. > ☹ I find your lack of proper pronunciation… disturbing. ---
**Author:** ![lno](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a8b319/32.png) [@lno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lno)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/30 "2005-06-14T19:56:50Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > And to everyone saying “Lucas was winging it,” or “It’s not that kind of movie,” y’all are just completely missing the point of this thread. I assume you mean me, as both those quotes came from my post. I get the point of the thread. As I said, > [@](#): > > About four or five years ago I asked the same question in this forum. I got about the same answers, but the best one overall can really be applied to a lot of other questions about Star Wars: Unfortunately, that must have been in the Winter of Missed Content, and I can’t find it in a search anywhere. ---
**Author:** ![Rodd\_Hill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/3ab097/32.png) [@Rodd\_Hill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodd_Hill)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/31 "2005-06-14T20:01:41Z")
> [@](#): > > bienville: I would just like to point out that I as a poster who get very upset with myself when I do stupid shit like using an apostrophe to form a plural. You are as clumsy as you are stupid. Prepare the “_Eats, shoots, and leaves._” 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/32 "2005-06-14T20:19:31Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > But it still managed to transmit video which one would think requires a lot more data than “Hey guys! I’m on the sixth planet in the Hoth system!” I assume that it did send that information, but part of it was lost or garbled in the transmission. Normally it would send a continuous loop of information, but Han blasted it before it could re-transmit. What got through was almost entirely useless, except that Vader happened to be looking over the officer’s shoulder and it tickled his Force-sense. Otherwise, that probe’s entire mission woul have been a failure. **lno** , no offence, but I really don’t think that you do. This thread is about suspension of disbelief, not authorial intent. As such, George Lucas, Mark Hamill, and Harrison Ford have next to nothing to do with it. The OP isn’t looking for factual answers, he’s looking for answers that work within the context of the story being told. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Scrivener](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@The\_Scrivener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Scrivener)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/33 "2005-06-14T23:03:51Z")
I remember a lengthy discussion of the military impracticalities of the Imperial AT-AT Walkers from several years ago on, I’m pretty sure, these boards. Easily one of the funniest things I’ve ever read on the internet. What I’d like to know is why Luke & co. pressed forward in a suicidal frontal assault, against the AT-ATs only discernible weapons systems, when they could have mounted attacks from the flanks or rear, and been shielded by the Walkers’ relative lack of mobility? Didn’t they teach rudimentary tactics at Rebel Alliance Military School? As for the rebels’ weapon: the tow-cable trick shouldn’t have worked for two reasons. First, there wasn’t enough length for enough passes (and the cables wouldn’t have gripped the legs anyway), so what cable might’ve remained around the legs wouldn’t have posed much of a barrier. Second, the Walkers didn’t appear to be extending their center of gravity with any one forward step, so even if a front leg was halted in mid-step, there’s no compelling reason why the whole thing would lose its balance and crash. IRL, a leg-mounted cable sensor would trigger a halt to attempted forward motion, the leg would return to a standing position, and a grunt would descend with a tow-cable-cutter to clear away the rebel’s spider-thread of a weapon. And what possessed the Empire to attack a rebel base of unknown size and defense strength with a handful of Walkers and no air support? Did they forget the basic principles of combined warfare (which they practiced pretty well in the Battle of Geonosis in AOTC). Given their predilection for total warfare, I’m surprised they didn’t just nuke Hoth from orbit… \*“it’s the only way to be sure…”. \* BTW, does anybody happen to know if the name “Hoth” was intended as an allusion to [General Hoth](http://historynet.com/wwii/blkursk/), leader of the 4th Panzer Army at Stalingrad in WWII? 'Cause, as fate would have it, it proved to be anything but a cakewalk for the Germans… ---
**Author:** ![fiddlesticks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddlesticks/32/18129_2.png) [@fiddlesticks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fiddlesticks)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/34 "2005-06-14T23:40:51Z")
> [@The Scrivener](#): > > And what possessed the Empire to attack a rebel base of unknown size and defense strength with a handful of Walkers and no air support? Did they forget the basic principles of combined warfare (which they practiced pretty well in the Battle of Geonosis in AOTC). Given their predilection for total warfare, I’m surprised they didn’t just nuke Hoth from orbit… \*“it’s the only way to be sure…”. \* The energy shield prevented an “aerial bombardment”. The rules of Star Wars energy shields seem to be that they can only be penetrated by “walking” through them, thus TIE fighters would have been no help to the walkers in the attack until the shield was disabled. As for nuking from orbit, it seems like that could have been an option. Even if you can’t blow up the base itself, a well placed spread of atomic weapons around the edges of the energy shield would likely make for a bad time for the Rebels, either sending a flood of radioactive dust and/or water towards them and destabilizing the glaciers/ice pack that the base is built on. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hook](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@The\_Hook](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hook)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/35 "2005-06-14T23:45:56Z")
What I don’t get from the battle sequence is the destruction of one of the walkers. After it has been thrown down by use of tow cables, a single speeder comes in and shoots a couple blasts and BAM! the AT-AT implodes. The hell was that? > [@The Scrivener](#): > > And what possessed the Empire to attack a rebel base of unknown size and defense strength with a handful of Walkers and no air support? Did they forget the basic principles of combined warfare (which they practiced pretty well in the Battle of Geonosis in AOTC). Given their predilection for total warfare, I’m surprised they didn’t just nuke Hoth from orbit… \*“it’s the only way to be sure…”. \* Vader was searching for Luke. “And endanger his army?”. Well, yes, he is Darth Vader. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2005, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/36 "2005-06-14T23:56:33Z")
> [@The Hook](#): > > What I don’t get from the battle sequence is the destruction of one of the walkers. After it has been thrown down by use of tow cables, a single speeder comes in and shoots a couple blasts and BAM! the AT-AT implodes. The hell was that? My only explanation for that is that the shots from the speeder were incidental. The walker damaged its power source when it fell, and that’s what made it explode. The speeder firing on it was co-incidental. (Yeah, I know, I’m reeeeeally stretching on that one. It’s the best I can do.) ---
**Author:** ![Soapbox\_Monkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ed655f/32.png) [@Soapbox\_Monkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soapbox_Monkey)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2005, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/37 "2005-06-15T00:06:17Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > My only explanation for that is that the shots from the speeder were incidental. The walker damaged its power source when it fell, and that’s what made it explode. The speeder firing on it was co-incidental. > > (Yeah, I know, I’m reeeeeally stretching on that one. It’s the best I can do.) The walkers’ shields were too strong for blasters to do any damage. But the way I see it, the fall knocked out the walker’s shield system and then a few blaster shots were enough to take it out. ---
**Author:** ![fiddlesticks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddlesticks/32/18129_2.png) [@fiddlesticks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fiddlesticks)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2005, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/38 "2005-06-15T00:13:35Z")
> [@The Hook](#): > > Vader was searching for Luke. But at that point in the movie, the goal is to find and kill the boy who blew up the Death Star, along with as many of his cohorts as possible. If the goal had been to nab Skywalker a more surgical option would have been needed. The Emperor assigns Vader the finding Luke _alive_ task after the Hoth battle is over (the Executor has to move out of the asteroid field so that the apparently high bandwidth holographic transmission can be made). ---
**Author:** ![The\_Scrivener](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@The\_Scrivener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Scrivener)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2005, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/39 "2005-06-15T00:15:59Z")
> [@fiddlesticks](#): > > The energy shield prevented an “aerial bombardment”. The rules of Star Wars energy shields seem to be that they can only be penetrated by “walking” through them, thus TIE fighters would have been no help to the walkers in the attack until the shield was disabled. Absolutely. I should’ve been more specific – I meant air support _to protect the Walkers_ from a rebel aerial attack. They should’ve had a squadron of Tie Fighters to pick off the Rebel Snow Speeders. (BTW, how could Darth Vader, of all peop… er, entities, forget about air support? Dogfighting was his particular battlefield specialty when he was a Jedi!) One more nitpick with the Hoth sequence: Luke says, “Watch that crossfire, boys”. WTH? It’s a frontal assault and the AT-ATs weren’t mounting any “crossfire” whatsoever! The only time you see a Walker depart from straight-ahead, “clearing the road” fire is when one stops, pivots a bit, cranes its head, and miraculously picks off a Speeder late in the battle. (Granted, that was a cute maneuver; next thing you know they’ll be dancing the cha-cha!) ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2005, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173/40 "2005-06-15T00:24:19Z")
> [@The Hook](#): > > What I don’t get from the battle sequence is the destruction of one of the walkers. After it has been thrown down by use of tow cables, a single speeder comes in and shoots a couple blasts and BAM! the AT-AT implodes. The hell was that? Simple: He hit the colored pixels. 😉 Your ability to understand that joke is highly dependent upon your age. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/esb-the-battle-of-hoth/308173.md?page=3)