Some truths revealed by GL in AOTC

[Illuminatus Primus]

I like how you cut out most of post to make your point. While under the knowledge THAT THIER FAMILIES AND PLANETS are going to be harmed. That is mentioned all of the time in the EU. So I ask again.

One fucking example. Kyp Durron's brother. No evidence that that is the SOP for the Empire's recruitment practices, in fact, Felth was just a washed out AT-AT commander, and the people in The Last Command just wanted to know whether their men were going to have to serve in the Empire's military again. No reference to them going to blast their planet to hell if they didn't cooperate etc. Certainly if a newly assimilated planet refused Imperial taxes and conscription, they'd likely be punished, but they didn't go down to Chandrilla and say, "We'll DBZ you if all your male citizens don't enlist as stormies." Overgeneralization, strawman.

I think you answered your own question. But you made that one hell of a confusing line there. Why would Thrawn choose some stormies and not others? Hmm let's think. Oh yes because some suck?

Are you a fucking idiot? If you have a set of clones, and they're all identical, and some perform better then others, there would be no reason to choose that individual to clone since obviously whatever made that one better isn't genetic. If they were all clones (which I was refuting since that's what HDS and Stravo seemed to be pushing) then why would you evaluate who you were going to clone if say 1/5 of your stormies had the same DNA as that particular trooper? Why would evaluate by personal performance? You wouldn't: you'd compare the statistical performance of the various clone lines. It's not hard to understand.

Not all of the stormtroopers are clones if we follow the EU. In fact I can see some troopers and personell not being clones if there is peolpe like Luke, or Han trying to join the Academy.

That's not what HDS was saying, and he was offering that they were enlisting as something other than stormies, and I was refuting him without attacking that assumption because its logical. Please read his post where he refutes that idea.

Hyporcrite? Watch the movie again. Jango is all bad ass through the movie then suddenly he just stands there while Mace charges him.

Precisely my point. Jango was brought back IMHO because everyone thought Boba was so "badass and kewl."

Then his head is lopped off. That and he probably knew of the origin created for Boba Fett. Seems more like a slap in the face to his officials who okay the books. Not only that it gives it an ironic twist now.

Huh? How is it a slap in the face? Because he overrode someone story in the marginal Tales of the Bounty Hunters so he could bring back Boba from the original trilogy as Jango and try and up the popularity of his movie? Maybe you're behind here, but George contradicts himself.

Here's a gem:

"For a thousand generations the Jedi were the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic." - Obi-Wan Kenobi, A New Hope (emphasis mine)

"I will not allow this Republic which has stood for a thousand years be split in two." - Supreme Chancellor Palpatine, Attack of the Clones (emphasis mine)

generation

The average interval of time between the birth of parents and the birth of their offspring.

This is generally said to be 25 years from our perspective. Hence the dating of the Old Republic's age as 25,000 years. Now, if you'd like to argue one-year-olds in the GFFA on average are having children, I'll concede, otherwise shut the fuck up.

These error was retroactively explained away by the continuity editors you insult, but forget that shit. It's all a scheme to subvert the EU by George.

(note: for the interested parties, continuity editors have inserted references to the reformation of the Republic at the end of the last Sith War that allows for Palpatine's 1000 years and the Obi-Wan 25,000 years to stand without contradiction)

No it can't. The movies, novelisations, the scripts and the radio dramas form a huge fucking umbrella. I've been rereading my books again and I'm catching things constantly. I know you can't have 100%, but still, there are some glarin errors.

Name one and I'll provide a fix, you're right, its not perfect, but its not that fucked up either. Many mistakes are percieved and the product of a DarkStar-esque belief that one's personal interpretation of canon is absolute.

Take the NJO. They are amazed that something can come INTO the galaxy. Had the officials at lucasfilms that head the book department even remotely researched the radio dramas (cannon mind you) they would have found that the Rebels went outside the outter rim to hide. No surprise there. In fact I need to look over, but the novelisation might say something about that too.

You can't be telling me about the retarded end scene of ESB. Saxton already debunked the retarded "galaxy" myth. What's more, they were suprised that a hyperdrive could penetrate the rim of the galactic halo, as they'd gone outside the Outer Rim many times, it's called the Unknown Regions, and it was invented by the EU.

No numb nuts. Read my post, and if you quote it, quote the whole thing. The radio drama has it in there. Also for your information, the 'Unknown Regions' are not beyond the outer rim. It would be wild space anyways seeing how that beyond the rim is OPEN SPACE.

Saxton disproved this horseshit. If we apply common sense and practicality to our calcs, but not to this, then we're being hypocritical.

Clearly, by their name and by the explicit graphics of Behind the Magic, the "Outer Rim Territories" are the margins of the Galactic Empire and the Old and New Republics, and the physical edge of the galactic disk. It is also clear that the Outer Rim encompasses the entire circumferential egde. The Corporate Sector, an anomalously rich region in the Outer Rim, is explicitly placed on the far tip of a spiral arm in Han Solo at Star's End. Therefore the Unknown Regions are not part of the galactic disk.

However a spiral galaxy doesn't end abruptly, and there is diffuse formless material and occasional stars, stellar remnants and globular star clusters scattered in a spherical halo of space surrounding the disk, even above the main galactic plane. Dark matter in the halo constitutes most of the galactic mass; although mysterious to our science, it should be innocuous old knowledge to a galactic civilisation. Few of the complacent people of the greater galaxy would bother to stray from their tens-of-millennia-old trade routes to visit these spaces beyond the disk, because the distances are so vast and the destinations so scarce. Chemical considerations make planets unlikely or uncommon in globular clusters, even though these associations of millions of stars must have high abundances of interesting power sources like exotic stellar corpses. In total the halo would still contain millions of interesting destinations but because they're spread across space much larger than the disk, it wouldn't be economical to establish trade routes so far out. This zone is probably what constitutes the Unknown Regions and Wild Space. These regions may have an unusually large concentration of naval and military power, (in the hands of secretive rogue species like the Nagai, Tofs, Ssi-Ruuk and Chiss) but very few inhabited systems compared to the galaxy at large. Indeed the conditions of these sparse interstellar badlands might actually encourage spacefaring locals towards aggression.

Percieved error by you.

Here is a passage from Vector Prime

p34 hardcover

Before this moment, no one had ever witnessed evidence of, let alone the actual event of, and extragalactic breach. Many scientists argued that such a breach could not even be accomplished. Certainly several brave explorers, and a couple of desperate outlaws being chased by the authorities, had gone inot the turbulence of the galactic rim over the last few decades, but none had ever been heard from again.

The Outer Rim Territories and the phrase "galactic rim" are not syonymous. They can't be: we'd be manufacturing contradictions where there would be none. The obvious fix is that by the "galactic rim" they mean the edge of the galactic halo where the stellar matter associated with a given galaxy ends, and extragalactic space begins. This way, the Rebels travel outside the galactic disk, into Wild Space (which is addressed in the EU) in the galactic halo, but does not travel outside the rim of the galatic halo. Fixed.

You don't know how much that saddens me.

I'm sick of purist thought police shit, that where if you disagree with Lucas you're betraying SW, and you can't like the EU or you're a heathen...shut the fuck up. I like Zahn's Thrawn Trilogy better then TPM. I think TPM was an abominable digital uberwank by George. I have the right to that opinion. You can kindly shut the fuck up and stop trying taint the debate by trying to percieve errors where there doesn't have to be any.

But by the time Thrawn comes to take over who says he still has all of those clones. In AotC novelisation it's stated they prefer samples from the original 'Jango Fett'. This could mean that the original samples deteriorate or become rather useless after a while. Therefore Thrawn needs new templates.

You're truly stupid. Ok, if you have a set of stormtroopers who are clones, and you have say...five templates. Then each 1/5 of the stormies will be identical to each other. The intelligent way to determine which template is worth continued manufacturing would be to compare the efficiency and performance statistics for each of the 5 clone lines and the duplicating the line which showed the highest performance. You wouldn't pick individual stormtroopers from each line because if they were better then their particular clone line, then it must be something other then genetics because they'd be identical already. You'd only choose the best individual troopers if all or nearly all your troops had unique genes.

Maybe because he operates differently than Palpatine. Would you want Jango clones running around all dumbfounded or clones that match your tactical genius?

You obviously didn't read the book or can't understand what they said. That experiment was a failure and he created only one such trooper.

Furthermore, same as above, Thrawn chose individual soldiers because each soldier had unique genes. The point is why choose Major Tierce for his performance if 1/6 of his comrades were genetically identical and didn't show the performance he did? You wouldn't determine by individual performance good genes to duplicate when you're already dealing with clones, you'd measure average performace of each clone line.

Why would they still be the same clones? In ANH they'd have newer clones. Make the old ones go out on deadly missions and poof, problem solved.

If you take the quote literally, the clones are the stormtroopers, is my point. If the stormies in ANH are a whole different group of clones anyway, then we're already not taking Lucas' quote literally, so why not go all out and make a decent compromise theory? And the old clones would be 50-60 years old biologically by now because their rate of aging was doubled, remember?

Are you sure. The Geonosians were going to help with the Death Star and thier fucking grasshoppers. Why can't Q-Tips supply the Empire with clones. What if they find a way to grow them quicker.

Meaningless analogy. The Geonosians were planning to build the DS someday. If you can show me that the Geonosians were, all by themselves, on the verge of building the Death Star in their system, then you're right. Otherwise, all we know is they drew up some blueprints. My point is, there's hardly the infrastructure and shipping capabilities to produce billions or trillions of stormtroopers on Kamino and somehow secretly modify them and secretly disperse them so no one would notice which is what you're suggesting if you're buying into HDS' theory and thinking they built them all on Kamino. (not challenging you, HDS, I don't think you thought the ludicrious suggestion all the stormies were being made on Kamino). What's more, a comic called "Attack on Kamino" is being released soon, and they consult GL on continuity issues that large. Additionally, GL has been personally involved in Star Wars comics with both Marvel and Dark Horse several times before. He has warm relations with them.

So now your reasons override Lucas' statements. I'll mark that down.

Strawman. Since we're not saying that the Kamino Jango clones are the stormtroopers, then we're already not taking Lucas' quote literally anyway. That's what I said. I'm only calling for a degree of interpretation to be made, and I'm not saying by belief in how it went down is correct. And personally, I don't care what George says unless its in SW media, that's a personal view, but when I see SW, I see stormies w/ different heights and voices, and I see clones that have the same voices and heights. Furthermore, George Lucas has contradicted himself on several occasions, a couple of time in the movies, and several times in interviews. Excuse my non-worship of a man and my taking his thoughts with a grain of salt.

What the fuck? Kyp's brother, Zahn, what the hell are you going on about? Kyp's brother was conscripted harshly. That's more in support of what I said, that you can't have troopers like him. KJA tried to rationalize that he was brainwashed. Either way. Why would you not choose an individual based on performance? What would you choose them on otherwise?

Kyp Durron's brother was an exception to the norm and the addressment of this point was already made in the first refutation above.

Because varying performance when dealing with a group of genetically identical individuals is obviously not genetic. Since they are clones, they are already genetically identical and how one does better then the other wouldn't matter. Would you determine one identical twin's musical ability over the other to be genetic? Of course not. Why would you assume a particular clone's superior skill had to do with his genes if his other, shittier companions were identical to him? Obviously the performance would have nothing to do with genetics. Is the recording hitting home yet?

Who's coming up with bizarre fixes, besides yourself? Stormtroopers are clones. CLONES. C-L-O-N-E-S. You can toss in conscripts and willing joiners all day long. There are CLONES among them. If not the majority.

I have no problem with some of them being clones. I do have a problem with them all being clones as that's simply retarded in the extreme and blatently contradictory. I offered my prefered view, but by no means must it be correct. I think making the stormies clones is stupid, and GL is being retarded for that.

Only you cannot take Lucas' quote at 100% because it doesn't support you. Who says they were confused to thinking they were normal. They're fucking clones. The Kaminoans fucked with thier genetic template. They don't have to think about anything except following orders.

I already explained how we already were interpreting Lucas' quote, which IN MY HUMBLE OPINION isn't movie canon since it isn't in the movie anyway. HDS made it seem like there was a conspiracy to hide the cloning, and I explained problems with this. Hence why he is quoted before that quote of mine and throughout my post, but you can't read, now can you?

[His Divine Shadow]

Well the cloning things layed out by me and Stravo can work, plus, they could possibly recruit the better perfoming(and fanatical) soldiers from the Imperial Army into the trooper corps.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Difference of opinion. I guess it can, thought I think the senario is kind of messy, and I think its better to take Lucas with a grain of salt and compromise.

I could be wrong.

[Admiral Piett]

Why not? People are conscripted all the time in real life. The Soviet Union did not have mass-mutinies. I think a lot of people have some severe misunderstandings of how hard it is to create a half-way decent army. And where have we seen the Army troopers?

Have you ever asked yourself how was that accomplished?
First of all in WW2 they were fighting against an enemy that would have reduced them to slaves(or worse).Then they kept discipline with iron fist.Probably an officer would have higher chances of survival with Vader around than with the NKVD.Even after ther war they kept political officers everywhere.Despite this some pilots deserted (I do not know how many from the URSS however, but certailny several if you count all the communist bloc).If I recall correctly one of their destroyers tried also to desert.
The point however is not if a conscripts army is bad or good.The point is what is the army supposed to do?
If the goal is to defend the country from an external threat even a conscripts army can do the job,like the Red army did.But if the purpose is to repress internal turmoil then the conscripts are the worst possible choice.
You need loyal soldiers that will obey without question,not unwilling conscripts that can be kept online only thanks to fear of the force,that maybe will betray you or desert at the first occasion etc.For this purpose you need professional soldiers,recruited from volounteers and brainwashed by your propaganda.And that possibly have the best interest in the survival of the political regime.Clones would be even better (and droids would be the best but this is an other history).
The Empire does not have any external threat to speak of but has a lot of internal problems.Thus the emperor would probably choose the second option,like would do every other dictator at his place.
For example what do you think the iraqui republican guard is about? Saddam needs an èlite corp to protect his power.Since there are also external threats he keeps even concripts but I bet that if these were lacking he would go for an all professional army.

[Illuminatus Primus]

You have some serious misconceptions about conscripted armies. Contrary to popular belief, it was not as if the NKVD's descendants were gassing villages who's men refused to join, it isn't as if any of the WWI powers or WWII or America pre-Vietnam had any problem with the draft. You're selecting the worst examples to prove your point. Throughout history, the draft was usually seen as simply another duty for the state. Surely with COMPNOR's indoctrination, "encouraging" young men to except the draft (though it may have been retroactively derided or derided on planets with formerly very free and liberal traditions) shouldn't have been hard. I think Durron would've been an exception, as punishment for traitors, their sons would been brainwashed and reformed and drafted into the near-indentity-less stormtrooper corps, but probably the vast majority of this elite corps were clones in some regiments (known as GeNodes according to Pax Emperica) and dedicated enlisted men such as Davin Felth and Brenn Tantor in other regiments.

[Admiral Piett]

You have some serious misconceptions about conscripted armies. Contrary to popular belief, it was not as if the NKVD's descendants were gassing villages who's men refused to join, it isn't as if any of the WWI powers or WWII or America pre-Vietnam had any problem with the draft.

All the examples you have listed are about states defending themselves from others states or attacking them.The USA,imperial Germany,France or the Austro Hungarian empire were dealing with external threats.For that purpose conscripts were a good choice,defending the country is an enough good motivation for conscripts.However they were not using their army to wipe out internal rebels.For that purpose a professional army (or clones or droids) is much better.You need people who will not hesitate to shoot on a mob of protestors.You may use even conscripts for that but you will face a relatively high rate of desertions,mutinies etc.Professional soldiers are much better for that type of job.Besides I do not think that the empire would really need the obscenely high number of people that conscription would make available.
And do not forget that iron fist discipline was not a prerogative of the Soviet Union.The majority of WW1 era armies were kept on line by the generous use of the decimation.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Most EU material hints that the Core World and Colonies human Imperial citizens generally prospered under the Empire and enjoyed a quality of life basically identical to that under the Republic. The Empire had not yet begin the transition to Palpatine's vision of a new Sith Empire, so they had not yet suffered the excesses that would have been to come under the oppressive rule of the Dark Side despots trained by Palpatine to be his proxies in a Dark Side-ruling galaxy.

If it wasn't the citizens, it was likely the old aristocracies and corperations and local governments who were marginalized and purged by the centralized Empire and their often nationalized industries that produced the threat of revolt or at least political opposition. The Empire isn't controlled by pure police-state military might now; human life in the more densely populated regions of the galaxy was standard and not unenjoyable. The Empire is known to have raised conscripts for a small part of their militaries and probably that included a percentage of the stormtrooper corps, that's all that matters. The clones and the recruits made up the majority, IMHO.

[Raptor 597]

Despite this some pilots deserted (I do not know how many from the URSS however, but certailny several if you count all the communist bloc).If I recall correctly one of their destroyers tried also to desert.

Is that the Destroyer that deserted on May Day in the 1970s, which was the history based on "Hunt for Red October"?

[Illuminatus Primus]

Obscenely high numbers of men from conscription? ....wouldn't you set the draft to provide you the right number of troops from the regions that were politicially insignificant (ie. Outer Rim).

[Admiral Piett]

If it wasn't the citizens, it was likely the old aristocracies and corperations and local governments who were marginalized and purged by the centralized Empire and their often nationalized industries that produced the threat of revolt or at least political opposition. The Empire isn't controlled by pure police-state military might now; human life in the more densely populated regions of the galaxy was standard and not unenjoyable. The Empire is known to have raised conscripts for a small part of their militaries and probably that included a percentage of the stormtrooper corps, that's all that matters. The clones and the recruits made up the majority, IMHO.

I do not know and I do not care about the EU.Imperial citizens may have the same quality of life they enjoyed under the republic,but conscripts are a poor choice when you have to deal with repression of internal rebellions.The empire can certainly find enough pro empire volounteers among the population and clones can satisfy the remaining needs of personnel.There is no need to use conscripts many of which may be politically unreliable.

[His Divine Shadow]

I do not know and I do not care about the EU.

Thats a misstake, without the EU you won't get lightsecond ranges, 50 million planets for the empire, doubling the armed forces in 2-3 years, a warlord with 13 planets having enough resources to build a mini-DS and many more examples that proves the Empires greatness.

The EU contains so much that is good, so much that supports the SW as envisioned in ANH.

[SirNitram]

Well the cloning things layed out by me and Stravo can work, plus, they could possibly recruit the better perfoming(and fanatical) soldiers from the Imperial Army into the trooper corps.

After careful review of ANH and the Ep II audio commentary, I conclude they began mass conscription shortly after Yavin, because all their clones had inherited Jango's tendency to smack his head onto overhangs.

[Vympel]

After careful review of ANH and the Ep II audio commentary, I conclude they began mass conscription shortly after Yavin, because all their clones had inherited Jango's tendency to smack his head onto overhangs.

"Open the blast door, open the blast door!" THUNK.

[SPOOFE]

Proposal for alternate theory:

The primary chunk of Stormies are clones. However, as Palpatine's Empire grows and progresses, he decides to forcing the population into line isn't enough, and decides to "endear" the population to the New Order. To this end, he opens up the ranks of his military to the population, allowing non-clones to join up. The purpose of this is to tone down the dissent amongs the populace... it's harder to hate the Empire if you know that your brother Fred is among its ranks. That explains the discrepancy between mentionings of "academies" and "stormtrooper training facilities" without contradicting what Lucas said and/or presented in his movies.

Explanation for the Force discrepancy in Thrawn's clones:

CW-era clones were grown while exposed to the Force. Thrawn-era clones were not. This growth in the absence of the Force is adequate to explain the "quirkiness" that Force-users sensed. But why didn't the Emperor implement the Ysalimiri-bran clones? Perhaps Palpy wasn't able put his Superfast Growth version of the stormtrooper into circulation before he bit the dust, but the fact remains that canonically, the fastest a clone can be grown (so far) is a decade. The EU says otherwise, BUT offers an explanation for the discrepancy... ergo, there is no discrepancy between Lucas's comments and the Thrawn trilogy.

[His Divine Shadow]

The primary chunk of Stormies are clones. However, as Palpatine's Empire grows and progresses, he decides to forcing the population into line isn't enough, and decides to "endear" the population to the New Order. To this end, he opens up the ranks of his military to the population, allowing non-clones to join up. The purpose of this is to tone down the dissent amongs the populace... it's harder to hate the Empire if you know that your brother Fred is among its ranks. That explains the discrepancy between mentionings of "academies" and "stormtrooper training facilities" without contradicting what Lucas said and/or presented in his movies.

What about the already existing Imperial Army(black-clad guys with big helmets) that is way way larger than the Stormtroper corps and which has no clones?
The Stormies seems like a small elite group in comparison to me and the Imperial Army is the main force.
To take a 40k analogy, the Army is the Imperial Guard and the troopers are Space Marines.

Ofcourse not to that degree exactly, since there are assloads more stormies than there are Space Marines.

[Vympel]

Those black-suited guys with the big helmets are Naval Trooper IIRC

[His Divine Shadow]

Those black-suited guys with the big helmets are Naval Trooper IIRC

I thought they where army too, anyways the Imperial Sourcebook speaks on the Imperial Army and Stormtroopers:

"Stormtroopers are the Empire's calling card. Wherever the Empire goes, stormtroopers will be found, acting as ship's troops aboard Star Destroyers, accompanying visiting dignitaries to outlying worlds, and maintaining garrisons on trouble-torn worlds. Working in conjunction with the Imperial fleets, stormtroopers enforce the Emperor's will in an effective and brutal manner.

Unlike the Imperial Army, which is entirely geared toward ground operations, stormtroopers function equally well in space and on the ground. Trained to quickly seize ground installations during planetary assaults and to act as security troops on starships and battle stations, stormtroopers are far more flexible than regular army units.

As assault troops working in conjunction with Imperial Navy and Imperial Army armored units, stormtroopers are second to none. Their ability to rapidly overwhelm and capture enemy positions makes them the first choice for leading assaults on important worlds. Often stormtroopers are used to clear away the enemy's first line of defense and establish a ground base to allow the unopposed landing of transports carrying regular Army units. The Army, in these situations, is used to mop up resistance and maintain an Imperial presence.

Except in systems where prolonged struggles threaten to disrupt the Empire's industrial capacity or weaken its strategic positions, stormtroopers will be withdrawn once they have secured a landing zone. The complete subjugation of a world is left to the Imperial Army. Where a quick victory is essential, large numbers of stormtroopers will be deployed to crush the opposition as quickly as possible. On worlds where the Empire has established important military bases or research establishments, units of stormtroopers are used to stiffen regular Army units."

(ref: Imperial Sourcebook)

"Stormtroopers are the elite of the Empire's military machine. Trained in a wide variety of roles, stormtroopers carry out any task quickly and effectively. They provide support for the two arms of the Empire's military establishment - the ground forces and the Imperial Fleet.

Stormtroopers are highly trained and highly motivated. Knowing no fear, they surrender only when faced with impossible odds, and then only once they have secured their primary objective. If ordered to hold at all costs, stormtroopers will willingly give their lives rather than fail in their task. And yet they are not suicidal, because they know that to die without due cause is to betray the Empire. A dead stormtrooper is of no use to the Empire, unless he dies in furthering the Emperor's wishes.

While members of the Imperial Army and Navy have been known to accept bribes, or even defect to the Rebel Alliance, no stormtrooper has ever done so. They live only to serve, and nothing can ever cause them to do otherwise. It is no wonder that the Emperor trusts his stormtroopers implicitly, and that they look only to their superiors for direction. To die for the Empire is the highest honor they seek, and they do so without hesitation.

The white and black armored forms of Imperial stormtroopers strike fear into all who face them. Stormtroopers lie at the core of the Emperor's aggressive policies. Without his legions of stormtroopers, the Emperor would not be able to maintain his firm grip on the Empire. While stormtroopers continue to do his bidding, no decree passed by the Emperor will ever fail to be implemented. Contingents of stormtroopers aboard Imperial Navy vessels ensure that no Navy captain or admiral will actively disobey the Emperor's wishes."

(ref: Imperial Sourcebook)

[His Divine Shadow]

More:

Pg. 28: "The stormtrooper developed into the mainstay of the Imperial military. Considered seperate from both the Imperial army and the Imperial navy, stormtrooper legions augumented both branches for the glory of the Emporer. Trained apart from the typical Imperial soldier, a stormtrooper is disciplined, obedient, and built for combat. Stormtroopers help keep Imperial ships loyal, since they follow a [sperate] chain of command that answers directly to the Emporer. they also serve as elite shock troops, routinely used to crush opposition and neutralize resistance to the new order."

(ref: Rebellion Era Sourcebook)

Imperial command assigns stormtroopers wherever they are needed to crush resistance and neutralize opposition to the will of the Emperor. They are totally loyal and cannot be bribed, seduced or blackmailed into betraying the New Order. They live in a totally disciplined militaristic world where obedience is paramount and the will of the Empire is unquestioned.

Where the men who wear the armor of the stormtroopers are recruited from is unknown, just another part of the mystery that adds to the aura of fear and secrecy that surrounds these soldiers.

(ref: Imperial Sourcebook)

[Knife]

The primary chunk of Stormies are clones. However, as Palpatine's Empire grows and progresses, he decides to forcing the population into line isn't enough, and decides to "endear" the population to the New Order. To this end, he opens up the ranks of his military to the population, allowing non-clones to join up. The purpose of this is to tone down the dissent amongs the populace... it's harder to hate the Empire if you know that your brother Fred is among its ranks. That explains the discrepancy between mentionings of "academies" and "stormtrooper training facilities" without contradicting what Lucas said and/or presented in his movies.

What about the already existing Imperial Army(black-clad guys with big helmets) that is way way larger than the Stormtroper corps and which has no clones?
The Stormies seems like a small elite group in comparison to me and the Imperial Army is the main force.
To take a 40k analogy, the Army is the Imperial Guard and the troopers are Space Marines.

Ofcourse not to that degree exactly, since there are assloads more stormies than there are Space Marines.

Another thought:

After the Clone Wars the powers that be decide to diversify the clone troopers. A regular army is comissioned and the brightest and most loyal are selected to be templets for new clone troopers and later stormtroopers. Only the best are selected and a "batch" or so is made using the cream of the crop. This way the stormtrooper ranks have some diversity and flexibility while still being disposable and unquestioningly loyal.

This would also explain the different voices, heigths, and the fact that there was no surprise by Luke or Han when they stole the armor from the two stormtroopers who where guarding the Falcon. For every one template there are a thousand or ten thousand clones that are spread out over the galaxy.

[Oberleutnant]

I've always thought that the AT-AT/ST crewmembers we saw in OT were Army personnell, as well as General Veers, of course.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Proposal for alternate theory:

The primary chunk of Stormies are clones. However, as Palpatine's Empire grows and progresses, he decides to forcing the population into line isn't enough, and decides to "endear" the population to the New Order. To this end, he opens up the ranks of his military to the population, allowing non-clones to join up. The purpose of this is to tone down the dissent amongs the populace... it's harder to hate the Empire if you know that your brother Fred is among its ranks. That explains the discrepancy between mentionings of "academies" and "stormtrooper training facilities" without contradicting what Lucas said and/or presented in his movies.

Explanation for the Force discrepancy in Thrawn's clones:

CW-era clones were grown while exposed to the Force. Thrawn-era clones were not. This growth in the absence of the Force is adequate to explain the "quirkiness" that Force-users sensed. But why didn't the Emperor implement the Ysalimiri-bran clones? Perhaps Palpy wasn't able put his Superfast Growth version of the stormtrooper into circulation before he bit the dust, but the fact remains that canonically, the fastest a clone can be grown (so far) is a decade. The EU says otherwise, BUT offers an explanation for the discrepancy... ergo, there is no discrepancy between Lucas's comments and the Thrawn trilogy.

No fix needed for Thrawn trilogy. It was the flash memory imprinting which caused the problem. Leia realized that each clone in the tube was surrounded by thousands of exact duplicates of its mind all resonating in the Force. She and Thrawn both had realized these patterns all resonating together placed pressure on the clones' minds that drove them insane. The old solution was to slow the process, to give the mind time to adjust to the pressures. The other was to place Ysalamiri in the cloning facilities to prevent the telepathic pressure caused by the identical mind patterns from reaching the clones by nullifying the Force.

It wasn't the cloning, it was the memory copying thing. Kaminoan methods raise and educate their troops the old fashioned way, so there's no risk.

[Illuminatus Primus]

Thrawn's clones appeared so odd in Luke's mind because they were grown in the absence of the Force and/or due to the flash-memory imprinting, I think. This wouldn't be a problem with GeNode clones nor with Kaminoan clones.

It simply appears that the best fix is that the Clone War clone veterans became the first stormies when the branch was originally formed. They were gradually phased out in favor of both GeNode clone troops (Pax Emperica short story) and fanatical recruits (multiple sources) who had to go through rigorious testing and training to become stormies. It seems likely that the GeNodes would be utilized in "black" operations and such things where stormies would never be given leave nor expected to have families. Facilities such as the Death Stars, Maw Installation, etc would likely have been equipped with GeNode stormies rather then recruit stormies. Also most of GeNodes may likely have been transported to Thrawn's completely black campiagn in the Unknown Regions. Hence a large number might have ended up left in the Unknown Regions when Thrawn returned, just because he had clone stormies in his campiagn didn't mean he had the facilities.'

Due to the fact they're much less replaceable and far more convienent for black campiagns and assignments, it stands to reason that the GeNodes would've been the type of stormies with the greatest losses after Endor. Not to mention the loss of GeNodes aboard elite commands like Death Squadron, and the loss they would've suffered at the frontlines of the civil wars raging among Imperial factions. Imperial commanders may have utilized the elite troops firstly, leaving all but none left when Thrawn returned.

It is likely that most of the GeNodes lost were aboard ships, or were in the Unknown Regions or withdrawn to it, or were covertly liquidated, and withdrawn to the Deep Core (keep in mind Palpatine's agents recalled much of the fleet to the Deep Core secretly and in small amounts according the Dark Empire Sourcebook) apon Palpatine's resurrection which took place one year after Endor and before the beginning of the New Republic's first true Coruscant-ward thrust. Any troops left among the cracks could've been redestributed among recruit units, erasing nearly all-traces.

It is likely that Palpatine's agents disbanded the GeNode armies they couldn't liquidate by engineering their destruction in the warlord infighting or hide, and simply integrated these few remaining among newly forming conscript regiments and recruit armies

It is possible that the GeNodes were therefore sufficiently covered-up even in the aftermath of Endor to prevent realization of mass-use of clones in the stormtroopers. With the destruction of Byss and the infighted following Onderon, it is likely any and all GeNode facilities (and likely any of those clones) have been destroyed by now.

FYI: GeNodes are grown in similar to Spaarti cylinder apparti. They emurge from tubes as full-grown adults and are subplanted with falsified albeit murky memories and basic education--they think they're not clones. However, then they are trained and refined just like standard recruits, albeit much more expertly, on par with stormtrooper recruits. Some of them realize that some of their comrades are clones, but they themselves are programmed not to realize it. There are only a small number of seperate clone lines, but each clone belonging to a particular line, while they look similar, they all have altered/randomized features and are placed in diversified units to minimize the number of similar-looking troops. The GeNodes are organized into GeNode-only armies, at least during the OT. Source - speculation, allusion, and fact from the short story Pax Emperica.

Verdict:

Stormtroopers originally all Jango clones. This is eventually phased out. Stormtroopers by OT are recruits and GeNode clones. Stormtroopers in the Empire proper by Thrawn's resurgence are for all basic purposes entirely recruits, and increasingly also post-Endor conscripts. All GeNode clones were likely destroyed by the time of the treaty with the Empire.

Interesting Coincidence: The GeNode cloning process seems to be a convienent marriage between Kaminoan cloning (trained and taught to be soldiers, secret production) and Spaarti cloning (grown to adulthood in tube, standard aging cycle unlike 2x cycle used for Kaminoan cloning w/ Jango, memory manipulation, education via memory manipulation) and even some new factors (appearance randomization, brainwashing to prevent clones from realizing what they are, etc).

[Illuminatus Primus]

That the clonetroopers are the stormtroopers merely means that the clonetroopers are the conceptual and inspirational parent of the stormtrooper corps and that the stormtroopers were originally clones of Jango as well.

[His Divine Shadow]

I don't think stormies where phased out at all myself, because of them being in critically short supply during the Thrawn triology, now we know why, and that of their true origins being a complete mystery.

[Illuminatus Primus]

I meant that the Jango clones were phased out in favor of GeNode clones and recruits; they had to be anyway, with a 2x aging cycle, we're talking clones that are 50-60 years old by ANH. And that after Endor Palpy's agents probably dispersed and liquidated the GeNode clones so people wouldn't have figured out what Palpy did.