Divide and Conquer: Difference between revisions

On the opposite side, it's the usual hero tactic when [[Legion of Doom|their enemies try working together]]. Of course, they're usually much easier to divide, since not only they lack [[The Power of Friendship]], but they're probably already planning to double-cross each other anyway. By contrast, when the villain sets two groups of heroes against each other, they're much more likely to figure it out and team up.

 

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== Films -- Live-Action ==

** The same plot was used in the western ''[[Django]]'' and ''[[Last Man Standing]]''.

* Used in ''[[Serenity (Film)|Serenity]]'', where Mal pits {{spoiler|the Alliance and the Reavers}} against each other to buy enough time to {{spoiler|broadcast the secret of Miranda to the entire verse}}.

 

== Real Life ==

** This was the favorite tactic of Julius Caesar, arguably the [[Trope Namer]]. His motto was Divide et Impera, which translates to "Divide and Rule"<ref>or "Divide and Order", but that makes significantly less sense</ref> . Caesar would ally with one tribe in Gaul (modern France) and pit them against others to win. This was the reason the Gauls lost, or at least it sure helped.

*** This has always been characteristic of Roman conquest, since their early wars within Italy. Once conquered or "allied" a city-state would be bound by contract to Rome and forbidden to form any kind of alliance (including marriage) with their former allies. By the time Rome controlled the whole of Italy, they had over 150 contracts with various states, none of which had any formal links to one another other than as allies of Rome.

** The Soviets tried to do this throughout their history (and started before the Soviet Union even existed yet) by trying to drive wedges between their enemies, whoever they might be at the time. In [[World War One]], they tried to pull Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and the various White Factions apart and incite revolution in at least one of them. Before, [[False Friend|during]], and after [[World War Two]], they believed that pitting the West against the Germans would leave a power vaccum that would effectively cement Soviet dominance ([[Nice Job Fixing It, Villain|which was thwarted by Hitler's paranoia and decision to strike at the USSR first]]). And in the Cold War they generally tried to keep the West and the Chinese from coming to any kind of agreement while trying to undermine the solidarity of the Western powers themselves.

*** This was countered by United States opening up (relatively) friendly relations with China despite their ideological incompatibility, as each considered the Soviets to be the greater threat (America seeing them as such because the USSR was simply more powerful than China, and China because the USSR was literally right next door to them).

* In recent years, divide-and-conquer has been used in [[Culture War]] politics by [[Propaganda Machine|spin doctors]] such as Karl Rove and Lynton Crosby, in the form of 'wedge politics' (or dog-whistle politics in Australia).

 

[[Category:Plots]]

[[Category:Divide And Conquer]]