Guilt-Free Extermination War: Difference between revisions

{{quote|''"Either we spread and wipe out the Bugs, or they spread and wipe us out - because both races are tough and smart and want the same real estate."''|'''Juan "Johnny" Rico''', ''[[Starship Troopers (novel)|Starship Troopers]]''}}

 

 

This is when ''both sides'' have '''no issues''' in trying to destroy the other side, and the only way that the war will end is with one side's destruction. Peace is not an option, and the only end is when the other side is destroyed entirely and there are no survivors. It may not even be a war: it may just be a natural enemy that is a constant danger to the [[Heroes]], like the [[Zombie Apocalypse]]. Don't expect [[An Aesop]] or musing about how war is terrible or [[The Hero]] is [[He Who Fights Monsters|becoming like their enemies]]. There won't be an [[Genocide Dilemma|agonizing decision about whether or not it's okay]] to [[Curb Stomp Battle|decimate enemy forces if the chance arises]]. These enemies aren't just okay to kill individually like [[What Measure Is a Mook?|Mooks]], these enemies are okay to '''exterminate''' in their entirety. However, one side keeping the other around as [[I'm a Humanitarian|food]] or [[Face Full of Alien Wingwong|nurseries]] fits in as well.

 

 

{{examples}}

* In the ''[[Codex Alera]]'', the conflict between the Alerans and [[Horde of Alien Locusts|the Vord]]. Most of the Vord are mindless beasts under the control of their Queens, which have a genetic imperative to wipe out any other species and expand to consume all. There is also the war between the Vord and {{spoiler|the Canim}}, which ultimately ended with {{spoiler|the Canim being almost exterminated}}, save for the ones that {{spoiler|Tavi and Varg were able to evacuate}}.

* Related to the [[Starfire]] example in Tabletop Games is the novels based off it by [[David Weber]] and Steve White. In addition to the war with the Rigellians as part of the back story there is the war with the Arachnids or Bugs. No attempt at communication succeeds and they view other sentient species as nothing more than food. The only world that is not subjected to massive orbital bombardment is the homeworld of one member of the Crucian Alliance which is liberated the hard way.

* ''[[Ender's Game]]:'' {{spoiler|Subverted with both sides due to a major misconception. The buggers, being a hive-mind, thought that individual humans were mindless drones and killing them was more or less a way of saying "Hi"; when they found out each human was sentient, they felt pretty bad. On the other hand, when Ender destroyed the bugger homeworld, he believed it was merely a simulation and so felt no guilt about his actions until after the xenocide}}. Card's later ''Ender'' books establish a scale of "alienness" between individuals and species, where on the farthest end of alienness it becomes possible to acknowledge that avoidance or xenocide are the only options for interaction between species because they simply cannot comprehend one another. The moral burden is upon the would-be exterminator to make certain there's no way to communicate with (or just avoid) the other species before committing to the extermination war, however.

* [[Star Wars Expanded Universe]]

** The Bothans have this as a little-used<ref>exactly three times in their entire recorded history</ref> cultural practice called ''ar'krai''. Every able Bothan is required to volunteer for military service in order to not only slay every last member of the offending group or species, but [[There Is No Kill Like Overkill|grind their homeworld to dust]]. They declare ''ar'krai'' against the [[New Jedi Order|Yuuzhan Vong]] after perennial [[Obstructive Bureaucrat]] Borsk Fey'lya pulls a [[Heroic Sacrifice]] during the fall of Coruscant.

* In ''[[Last and First Men]]'' the Fifth Men kill off the native Venusians without a second thought. Of course, by then earth was dying and Venus had to be [[Terraforming|terraformed]] to be inhabitable.

* ''[[Stargate Verse]]'':

** ''[[Stargate SG-1]]'': the replicators will consume anything and everything to replicate, and the only way to stop them for good is to wipe them out, so the war with them inevitably becomes this. A different type of replicators appear in ''[[Stargate Atlantis]]'', and this applies to them as well.

 

 

** The [[The Federation|Tau]] don't automatically exterminate every species they come across, preferring to integrate and "adopt" other species as they discover them. Still, when they do encounter a species that they determine unfit or unable to peacefully coexist, they will ruthlessly exterminate them. Considering [[Crapsack World|the]] [[Sick Sad World|galaxy]] they live in, this proabably happens pretty frequently.

** [[Our Elves Are Different|Eldar]] will usually avert this trope, since they tend to work more subtly, [[The Chessmaster|through subtly manipulating the galactic stage]] to keep themselves as far out of harm's way as they can manage. Played with, with the [[Evil Counterpart|Dark Eldar]], who [[Complete Monster|legitimately enjoy murder]] but actually prefer to abduct populations and capture their enemies. One of the taglines for their army list was "[[Fate Worse Than Death|Pray they don't take you alive]]."

** The Necrons serve beings that wish to annihilate everything related to the Warp. The Warp is sustained in part by the emotions of living beings. Nothing more needs to be said.

* ''[[Starfire]]'' by Task Force Games: The Third Interstellar War between the Alliance (Terrans and Khanate of Orion) vs. the fanatically racist and warlike Rigelian Protectorate. The Rigelians were determined to wipe out the Alliance, and the Alliance was forced to destroy the Rigelians completely to eliminate them as a threat.

* The Human-Covenant war starts out this way in [[Halo]], the covenant goes to far as to [[Apocalypse How|completely destroy]] each Human planet they encounter. That is, until the Elites get {{spoiler|betrayed by the prophets. And it later gets revealed the war was a cover up.}} Played thoroughly straight with [[Zombie Apocalypse|the Flood.]]

* In ''[[Perfect Dark]]'', [[Action Girl|Joanna]] teams up with the [[The Greys|Maians]] in the last two levels to exterminate all the [[The Reptilians|Skedar fanatics]]. This is not remotely depicted as a bad thing, because they have a [[Hive Mind]] and can't be reasoned with.

* The war against the Kreegan in [[Heroes of Might and Magic]] III: Armageddon's Blade becomes this after Erathia drops out. The remaining anti-Kreegan forces are well aware that the 'Devils' are a severe threat to the world (even if they aren't aware of the full scope of the threat), and finishing the war to the bitter end is really the only long-term option, while the Kreegans built the titular Armageddon's Blade to burn the world. Even before Erathia dropped out, the problems the nobles had with a campaign of extermination wasn't the extermination, but rather the cost in troops and gold.

* In ''[[Wing Commander (video game)|Wing Commander]]'', the war between the Kilrathi and humans was this for the Kilrathi from the start, and for the humans it became so after [[I Surrender, Suckers|faking a desire for peace to build up a massive fleet that was used to completely sterilize several planets]], with Earth on the list for the same treatment before being interrupted as shown in the novel ''[[Wing Commander (novel)|Fleet Action]]''.