(no subject)

[hushpiper]

I have a lot of thoughts about the state of SNK right now (YOU DON’T SAY–this is what you get when you decide to marathon catchup on the manga and end on a bombshell chapter), and most of them start as a question. Here’s one:

Q: Why did Eren wait until practically the end of Willy’s speech, when all the damage was already done, before, ah, stopping him? If Willy’s PR move is successful, it could win allies for Marley, which could be a huge issue for Paradis.

A: He wasn’t waiting for the end of the speech. He was waiting for the declaration of war. This way, in the future they can assert, truthfully and with everyone in the audience as witnesses, that they didn’t fire the first shot. Marley kicked down their walls, Marley sent battleships to their coast, Marley declared war. Paradis is not the aggressor here. This is a purely defensive war, and they can hold onto that and point that out later on, as they move into more offensive actions. (Like, you know, having one of their titans rip a guy into three pieces in front of a crowd of reporters and diplomats.)

Incidentally, I should note that Marley’s casus belli here boils down to “we don’t like their new government”, which is a pretty common imperialist sort of reasoning, and would not be considered a just cause for war today. (He follows it up with “we’re afraid they might attack us”, but that is also no dice.) I wonder if the same body of international law that Gabi violated has opinions on just cause…?