How Mandalore’s Downfall Proves Satine Was Right

We know Satine Kryze from The Clone Wars series as the “pacifist ruler” of Mandalore during the final period of the Republic. Kryze attempted to move the Mandalorians past “their violent warrior history” and keep her home planet out of the wars. Fighting against “rising extremism and militarism”, she garnered opposition that ultimately deposed her. But was Satine ultimately right? Based on what happened to Mandalore, we can prove she was.

How Satine Was Right

As we can review in this discussion, we can make a strong case for Satine being right about keeping Mandalore neutral during the Clone Wars and trying to steer her people toward pacifism. The most compelling points include how “Mandalore was dragged into exactly the kind of conflict she was trying to avoid,” “Maul’s Shadow Collective plunged the planet into civil war,” and her home planet became “another pawn in a galactic power struggle.” 

In 19 BBY, the takeover of Mandalore occurred, with the Death Watch siding with Maul and Savage Opress to overthrow Satine. The Death Watch had already been trying to take over the government before teaming up with the Sith brothers. This development pulled Mandalore into the costly and divisive galactic war that Satine sought to avoid.

From there, the Shadow Collective worked against Pre Vizla’s idea of winning back his home planet. Vizsla wanted to restore “the warrior heritage of his people” by dethroning Satine. Even that course of action was destructive. We can see here how destabilizing his takeover was to Mandalore. And, the alliance between Maul and Vizla was doomed to failure. 

Maul envisioned a grander plan to enact revenge against Sidious. The two ended up dueling, and Maul grimly executed Vizsla. Once Maul took control of Mandalore, the planet fell into further disarray. 

Maul’s emergence over Vizla sparked the Mandalorian Civil War, with part of the Death Watch forces under Bo-Katan Kryze leading a resistance against Maul. Mandalore became a divided and conflict-ridden world. 

These events and the chaos produced reflect how Satine was right to pursue a neutral, pacifist course. Although she was criticized by those who desired a hard-line militaristic culture, her ideas and actions were meant to preserve Mandalore. 

The Republic/Empire and Afterward

Yet, there is more to the proof. Although the Republic and the Mandalorian resistance deposed Maul, their victory was short-lived. Bo-Katan won possession of the Darksaber and temporarily united the clans, but their resistance to the Empire meant more disaster would follow. 

Between 4 ABY and 5 ABY, the Great Purge brought the wrath of the Empire down on Mandalore, killing most of the population and pushing the remainder into hiding across the galaxy. Mandalore had sunk to the bottom of its existence. 

Through The Mandalorian, we saw the aftermath of the Purge. As “perhaps the greatest tragedy ever to befall this once-powerful world,” the Purge left the utter destruction and depletion of the Beskar mines. Star Destroyer fire and TIE bombers gutted the planet, leaving it as “a smoking ruin.”

We can rewatch a scene from the Book of Boba Fett episode, “Night of Thousand Tears,” to get a sense of the destruction and how they “lost their world.” Indeed, “the Imperial interloper destroyed all that [they] knew.” This clip resembles a nuclear bomb explosion, and only sparse remnants of Mandalorians survived. 

Satine Kryze Was Right

Taking this scale of events into consideration, we can see how Satine Kryze was right to try to steer away from the wars and warrior culture. The overthrow of her rule was destabilizing enough, but the compounding civil war and Great Purge left a devastated planet. Fortunately, we witnessed some revival in the Mandalorian years.