He certainly didn’t ask the Warsong to invade and conquer and pillage the Night Elves.
And most likely he wouldn’t have done that from Vanilla to Cataclysm either.
But alright, if you want to hold him guilty for that, sure.
Officially yes, yet he was still the Archdruid of Darnassus and a legendary war hero to the Night Elves. His station commanded a great deal of authority, as we see him issue requests to the Sentinels across the world. And the Sentinels obey.
Such as in Alterac, where he asks to kill all the Darkspear combatants because they claim that the Night Elves descended from Trolls.
So ultimately, he could have very much been the guiding hand for the attacks on Quel’Thalas. It’s obviously more in-character for him than it would be for Tyrande to randomly start assassinating Blood Elves, the very same people she helped survive, the very same people she claims she’s indebted to.
During BC because they needed the Forsaken to stabilize their lands and now out of loyality and what the others said.
I mean why does everyone fight for one Faction instead of going solo?
You mean she sent troops to their homeland because they joined the enemy faction and started sniffing fel you forgot to mention that part.
Very valid.
No one has authority over the Sentinels other than Tyrande/Shandris, she sent them and clearly she had very valid reasons.
Tyrande was the head of the government, she was the Leader it was not a co-leadership like the one we have now with Malfurion. The novel ‘‘Stormrage’’ explains that. Fandral commanded the Druids and was second in command if you will. He had no authority over the Sentinels while Tyrande had no authority over the druids or the Cenarion Circle.
Not guilty, responsible.
He knew what the warsong were like, and send them on a scouting mission with the full knowledge that if they would meet some kind of resistance, they were not the ones to try diplomacy.
The Troops are there before they join the Horde lorewise. They are in fact one of the reasons they do.
And why would it be her business what they sniffle? She exiled them, and after the sunwell they had to survive.
It’s none of her business what the Thalassian elves do.
No, not quite, the Sentinel spies began their attacks before the Blood Elves joined the Horde.
Now, I know that game mechanics already has the Blood Elves tagged as Horde, but that wasn’t the case in lore yet.
Fandral Staghelm does.
"Staghelm has given the order. All trolls on the field of battle must be exterminated."
And so too does Malfurion, when he has awakened.
But this is the exact opposite of his intention, Aethil.
He sent the Warsong into what he thought was an abandoned forest, to stay away from the fighting and instead focus on something more productive, wood gathering.
Thrall hadn’t anticipated any of the Warsong’s subsequent actions and I have my doubts he sanctioned the Warsong when, again, they went pillaging in Ashenvale in Vanilla.
For these reasons, I can’t hold Thrall personally responsible for these aggressions he did not condone. Sure, the Horde may still be found accountable as a faction, and Thrall would have been asked to answer for it, but again, I wouldn’t say that Thrall was personally responsible.
I see a clear difference between guilt and responsibility. He was without guilt there, because he didn’t intent the outcome, but as a leader you are responsible for the actions of your troops.
He send them into unknown land, without considering that there may be people living there. Normally you don’t send your most agressive and stubborn soldiers to scout. And if you do and it goes wrong you’re responsible in my oppinion.
The Long Vigil? The War of the Ancients? The return of the Legion in WC3? The Night Elves took it upon themselves to fight the Legion,they got scorned by them so many times, they were their sworn enemies before Blizzard forgotten that in the Legion expansion.
To be fair he sent them away because he knew they would not cooperate with humans and thought by chopping wood nothing bad can happen. I think it was a lack of foresight.
But if your troops go against your orders, or your wishes, or take it upon themselves to overcarry out those orders. Is he still personally responsible?
First contact with the Horde is the end of the Ghostlands storyline. Start of the “Start-experience” is finding out an Alliance diplomat who undercover tries to sabotage some magical buildings.
Yes. As long as he doesn’t punish the culprit he is.
I also hold Anduin responsible for the Attack in Stormheim.
Genn may have acted against orders, but there was no punishment, so Anduin indirectly approved after the fact.
The institution is neutral yes,but most of the druids there are Night Elves so Tyrande could have ordered them in the Novel but stopped out of fear of dividing her people. Fandral ordered them to heal Teldrassil.
We’ll agree to disagree then. Anduin is definitely at fault for neglicence, but the minds responsible for the attack were Roger and Greymane.
That acted outside their orders and by all means, went on a rogue operation.
This was a bit of a tangent anyway, since we are not even certain that it was Tyrande who directed the Sentinels anywhere in the first place. Which is a tad different from the Thrall case, where he did send the Warsong in Ashenvale, and the Anduin one, where he did send the 7th Legion in Stormheim.
Unless we want to go by the approach that the leaders of a faction are personally responsible for every action of the individuals within it. And if that is the case, we’ll agree to disagree as well.
Then he should have punished them, or he condones their actions after the fact.
But yeah, we can agree to disagree on that one
ps. a good case where such punishment happened is the Horde Questline in Stonetalon mountains (that unfortunately was forgotten by later writers responsible for the Garrosh-story) where a general goes completely overboard, and Garrosh throws him off a cliff for dishonoring the Horde and him with his actions.
Unlike the Horde, Anduin can not punish the King of a independant nation(-in-exile).
The Horde was a military dictatorship until BfA and the Warchief held absolute authority but gave the nations under his/her reign alot of freedom.
Anduin is only the Commander of Alliance troops that are given to him, and it is unknown what position King Genn Greymane holds in the Alliance military structure.
Atleast he should’ve punished Rogers, admittedly.
As a example it would be comparable to the boss of NATO punishing the Dutch PM for acting without his permission.
Well in a Good War it is mentioned that Anduin did in fact not condone or punish them as far as saurfang knows. It is never even mentioned that punishing Genn is outside of his authority. I guess since Genn was on an Alliance mission and Anduin was the de facto leader of the alliance he could have said something.
and started sniffing fel you forgot to mention that part.