If we go by a Lego minifigure book, perhaps this one, the Clone Wars lasted 300 years. Yet, if we go by the Star Wars timeline, these wars were carried out over the course of 3 years. Then again, there are other ways of framing the Clone Wars that make the conflict longer. If we include our perception and the practicality of the Clone Wars, we walk away with a longer time period.
The Time of the Clone Wars
If we refer to the timeline of galactic history, the Clone Wars occur from 22 to 19 BBY. In contrast to the 300 years discussed here, the wars thus only lasted 3 years, if we don’t count the year 22 BBY. Yet, if we include the surrounding interval of the Fall of the Republic and the Prelude to Galactic War from 32 to 22 BBY, we can add another 10 years.
These reference points provide two main ways to specify the length of the Clone Wars. On the one hand, we could say that the actual fighting began with the First Battle of Geonosis in 22 BBY. This Wookieepedia page specifies that the Clone Wars lasted only 3 years. Yet, if we are including the year 22 BBY, the length of time would be 4 years.
On the other hand, if we include the Fall and Prelude, we have a longer conflict of 13 or 14 years. This inclusion may make sense because we have the aggressive action by the Trade Federation, as directed by Palpatine, to blockade Naboo. In 32 BBY, we also have the resulting invasion and then Battle of Naboo, which was outright warfare.
Of course, we don’t have the clones yet, so we may prefer to keep the timeline to the years with the army deployed and in action. Going by the movies, we refer to Attack of the Clones to Revenge of the Sith as the time of the Clone Wars. And, we have a definitive endpoint with Order 66 in 19 BBY.
Articles like this one that comment on the Clone Wars series likewise prefer the tighter timeline. In a mere 3 years, the Clone Wars resulted in “the deaths of billions across the galaxy, including Jedi, Separatists, and civilians.” We also witnessed planets like Kashyyyk and Mandalore get “torn apart” from the conflict.
This sense of devastation and the downfall of the Jedi contribute to an audience perception that the Clone Wars lasted much longer.
A Longer Clone Wars
Because of the combination of the movies and the 7 seasons of the Clone Wars series, we may conjure an image of the wars lasting for a longer time, perhaps even 100 to 300 years.
As this article conveys, “when factoring the long-running animated series” into the rapid action of Attack of the Clones to Revenge of the Sith, “it felt as though the war took longer than three years.” We may agree that the quick denouement of the fighting reflected “how strained the Republic and Jedi were,” poised for downfall, but we could also argue that a longer timeline makes more sense.
Previous fan discussions conveyed incredulity about the short timeline. The lead post argues that 3 years was too short to cram in the events, such as the rise of General Grievous, Anakin’s main trajectory, “thousands of battles and hundreds of planetary sieges,” and the resurgence of Darth Maul. We may agree that 10 to 14 years would have been appropriate, at the minimum.
Not only based on our perceptions, but also intergalactic travel, we could state the wars should have been longer. We could agree that even with advanced technology like hyperdrives, “space travel is long and complicated.” So too would be mobilizing forces across vast distances.
With the tight 3 to 4-year timeline, we are left with the impression that everything was “crammed” in by the creators or compressed too tightly. Perhaps the Lego minifigure book was not too far off the mark after all.
The Length of the Clone Wars
Although officially the Clone Wars only lasted 3 to 4 years, we get the impression that they should have lasted longer. Just the extent of events presses onto our perceptions a longer time frame of at least 10 years. If we add in the practical nature of galactic fighting, we may even think it should be 100 to 300 years.