Was rebellion inevitable?

[Azurine]

 

In the 'First Heretic' a demon makes it quite clear that the Emperor had sought assistance from the Chaos gods in order to make the Primarchs. The Chaos gods regard the Primarchs as theirs as much as the Emperor does.

 

Now, it was a demon, but Chaos doesn't necessarily lie outright. Rather, they tend to distort the truth only revealing aspects of it piece meal as suits their ends.

 

If we take the demon at face value Chaos is intrinsically bound to the Primarchs in a way that precludes virtually any other outcome.

 

[Corsair]

I believe it was inevitable and intended by the Emperor besides.

 

Imagine, if you will, peace. Total, galactic, alien and Chaos free, peace. Humanity ascendent, and a few million Space Marines told to disband and stand down, get a job, or maybe act as galactic police. How well would the more "savage" Legions handle this? How would fundamentally different viewpoints between Primarchs be handled with no common enemy to united them?

 

The Night Lords were already flying off the handle, and would have been swiftly hunted down and annihilated. Then, after a year or two, maybe Angron just can't handle not slaughtering people, and needs to be sanctioned too. A decade later, maybe the Space Wolves tensions with the Thousand Sons boil over, and the White Scars join the Wolves as both soon realise they kind of miss fighting. Maybe the Iron Hands and Sallamanders come to blows over the flesh being weak versus humanity uber alles.

 

After constant conflict, the Loyalists would keep winning due to weight of numbers, but attrition would whittle them down all the while. Eventually, the Emperor winds up with only those sons and Legions best suited to the new Imperium, while the rest are expunged from the records and forgotten.

[Olis]

In the 'First Heretic' a demon makes it quite clear that the Emperor had sought assistance from the Chaos gods in order to make the Primarchs. The Chaos gods regard the Primarchs as theirs as much as the Emperor does.

 

Now, it was a demon, but Chaos doesn't necessarily lie outright. Rather, they tend to distort the truth only revealing aspects of it piece meal as suits their ends.

 

If we take the demon at face value Chaos is intrinsically bound to the Primarchs in a way that precludes virtually any other outcome.

 

Ah yes, but who in their right mind believes what a daemon says? Oh, wait... :rolleyes:

[facmanpob]

I believe that Big E had a plan for each of his gene sons both during and after the conquest of the galaxy, his mistake was not telling them ANYTHING. The secrets he kept were his downfall and the way he handled his sons as tools and weapons rather than as the individuals they were what caused the heresy. If he had told his sons that he was quitting the crusade to work on the next phase, the webway and the dangers of the warp would be gone forever, they would have been fine, keeping all those secrets meant that one way or the other, Horus or another Primarch would rebel, realising that soon his legion of warriors and himself would be redundant.

 

Paradill

I think this is the most significant post in the entire thread! :)

 

The Emperor basically screwed up as a single parent! I tend to think of the Primarchs as being pretty emotionally immature (if you get lauded too much by your minions you tend to start believing all of the hype!), so the Emp needed to deal with them as a parent deals with individual children....

 

e.g. Magnus - put his hand in the sweetie jar and messed around with powers too great for him to handle.....Dad's response: Council of Nikea (i.e. "Don't do it again!!") - Any parent knows that telling a child not to do something without either explanation or sanction has no effect! E should have taken Magnus on a trip into the warp and shown him the dangers there.

 

e.g. Lorgar - "Dad, I worship you as a God!", "Son, prepare to be humiliated in front of the entire Imperium!", muttering under breath "Dad you're an arse, I hate you!" - Excellent parental skills there big E! ;)

 

But imho the biggest failing was not giving them the benefit of the doubt as to their intelligence. All it would have taken was for him to say at Ullanor "Kids, I'm off back to Terra", "No, Dad don't go....or at the least tell us why?". "Well kids, let me tell you about the warp and all of the nasties therein, and let me tell you about the webway and how this might solve all of our problems! By the way Horus, let all of your other brothers who aren't here know too!"

 

 

When Loken is talking to the Interex bodyguard in Horus Rising or whichever of the first 2 or 3 HH books it is, the Interex guy is horrified (and I think that is the exact word used) that Humanity could have come this far into the galaxy and be ignorant of Chaos and its dangers - this implies that the Interex view is that if you have important information then disseminate it!! I seem to remember that Farseer Ulthran has the same shocked response when he talks to Fulgrim.

 

 

Now, even with all of that said, rebellion might still have happened anyway, or at least further slappings to Angron etc in the same vein as what happened to the 2 missing primarchs, but all in all I think that the Emperor made it inevitable through mishandling and lack of understanding of the individual personalities of his kids.

 

 

 

...Although, there is the possiblity that the Emperor knew what was going on all along, and let it happen for some long term goal that we don't yet know about!! ;)

 

Anyway, that's my tuppence :D

[DarKnight]

Alot of you have mentioned the tried and true idea that if the Emperor had informed the Primarchs of the warp, Chaos, and Daemonkind, they would have left it alone. A good point, on I've often echoed, but let me ask: what the hell is wrong with loyalty for loyalty's sake? That's where I was going with my original post saying that the same qualities the Emperor instilled in them would be the same ones to lead to civil war.