Insider #84's Guide to the Grand Army of the Republic

[Stravo]

As to the Jedi making a dent in the ratios that's complete and utter bullshit since the Battle of Geonosis proves beyond any doubt that the Jedi would have LESS than a 300 to 1 effect since about a thousand battledroids nearly killed 200 of the best Jedi in the Order. Only a handful survived the arena and that was an enclosed space without heavy weapons and even larger numbers on the droid side.

This also discounts the obvious quantitative difference in droids fielded as the war rages. Look at the Invisible Hand's crew complement alone to see that Super battledroids make up a far larger portion of the droid armies than at Geonosis. Destroyers were also quite plentiful.

And frankly the Jedi that we do see are the creme de la creme of the Order and they don't score any where near those kind of kill ratios.

The Jedi canonically have a lesser kill ratio than the Clone Army so the Republic is no more well off if you add the Jedi into the mix as these assclowns are trying to say. As if 10,000 Jedi alone is going to make up for the BILLIONS in the ratio imbalance.

[Master of Ossus]

MoO, all the furious backpedalling and ass-covering I've seen from TFn suggests to me that THEY KNOW. They know it's stupid. You can hear it in al of their replies - plaintive 'aww, c'mon, it's only SW! You didn't expect me to... shit... research? C'mon! Star Wars! Fellas!'.

More like, "Shit... um... pocket calculator?"

[Stark]

More like, "Shit... um... pocket calculator?"

Low blow! They're WRITERS! Try and keep it clean! Calculators... lol

[Jim Raynor]

Did that guy just claim that one clone can stand up to two legions of droids? Did he just claim that a single clone can stand up to the equivalent of a modern division of droids? Am I reading this wrong?

You're not. Kudzu is a minimalist EU fanwhore. The fact that even he had trouble swallowing 3 million clones at first shows just how utterly ridiculous that number is.

[Adrian Laguna]

1. There's no reason to believe that the Clone Army was trained and grown entirely on Kamino: the Kaminoans had industrial facilities elsewhere and made virtually none of the equipment for the clones themselves.
2. Remember the level of technology on SW planets: Coruscant's population is measured in the trillions, and the ITW shows that massive facilities were actually constructed on the sea-bed and under the rock, with only towers rising above the waves.
3. Clone production takes time, as Lama-Su pointed out. By comparison, the droid army was able to manufacture thousands of battle droids every single second even when not at full-production.

Shit, I forgot to account for the Kaminoans having production facilities off-world and didn't know that the structures on Kamino were a lot bigger than shown. It has taken a while, but I'm starting to get a better grasp of things (like I said, big numbers -> not my thing, I'm working on it though). Turns out that what I was going to post originally makes more sense. Your absolute credibility-defying bare mininum of Unit = Acclamator full of troops (16,000 men) actually falls within the range of troop numbers with which I originally intended to run with as my guess. It's interesting that as I was thinking "This can't be right, it is way too high" I was really dealing with the lower end of the spectrum of posibilities. I added the following to my post, but the original content remains unchanged.

EDIT aprox. 4 hours after original post (which remains unedited) -
Originally my post was going to suggest Unit = Regiment to Corps.
So 2,304 men to 36,864 men x 1.2 million units = 11,059.2 million men to 44,236.8 million men. However, I made a stupid mistake (thinking that the Clone production was restricted to Kamino proper and underestimanting the extent of the Kaminoan structures) and downsized my estimate to Unit = Platoon. Master of Ossus's bare credibility-defying minimum of how many troops a "Unit" equals (an Acclamator's worth, or 16,000) falls somewhere in this range.

BTW - How does one reconcile the sheer numbers of troops and ships used in the Clone Wars with what we see in the Civil War (OT) era? For example, the Battle of Endor was supposed to be this giant climatic all-or-nothing battle in which it would be decided if the Rebellion was to survive. How can a battle consisting of several dozen ships be compared to the massive scale of what we see in the Clone Wars? How many sources support that the CIS had "quadrillions of droids"?

I'm begining to think that maybe the number of droids is overstated. Revisionist history perhaps, "The Republic was in such trouble that you really can't blame the people for letting Palpatine turn it into the Empire". An out of universe explanation, someone with a grasp of the inherent numbers of a Galactic-scale conflic got a little too carried away.

What do you guys think? The in universe explanation I don't really buy, seeing as when revisionist historians try to overstate army sizes to make someone look more glorious (ie one million man Persian Army vs. Alexander the Great and his 50,000 Greeks and Macedonians, when reality points to a quarter million Persians, a large quantity of them peasant levies, as the absolute upper limit) tend to fall flat upon closer examination. The explanation that a quadrillion is plain and symply wrong (a typo of sorts) depends on how many sources exist that support it and contradict it.

If someone can give me a good explanation as to why the Battle of Endor isn't some minor skirmish I would really appreciate it. Clearly that the Emperor died (sort-of) is a good reason. I mean, the battle itself, it doesn't seem like an, "All-or-nothing! This is going to be settled once and for all!" on either side. At least not when compared to the numbers thrown around during the Clone Wars.

[Connor MacLeod]

IIRC WOTC mentioned in the Acclamator entry in the revised 2nd edition rulebook/sourcebook the Republic was purchasing 1000 more Acclamators.. which suggests they had at least 16 million clone troopers ready or close to being ready at some point (to say nothing of the vehicle crews and whatnot.)

The Clone Wars micro series implied much larger scale in some cases (Obi-Wan and Anakin lead what looked like 30-some Acclamators to Muunilist. Even if only 1/3 of those were carrying clone troops, that's 160,000 troops for a Jedi and his Padawan.)

Considering in most engagements I am aware of (IE something like Praestlyin - which IIRC had only "available" clones deployed) Also we saw in the Clone Wars, which in all cases usually involved at least several acclamators) they typically deployed tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of troops (IIRC "Hard contact" suggested similar distributions) Even assuming a few hundred such simultaneous engagements, and disregarding clones deployed in other ways (in small numbers like Shatterpoint.) You're still getting 4-6 million clones.. and that's disrgarding the idea that in other cases they had HUNDREDS of thousands of troops (Geonosis, Muunilist, IIRC Kit Fisto had around 5-10 Acclamators..)

There's also the fact that in the ROTS novelization that Palpy dispatched his new "Moffs" (governors) to every system/sector with at least one or two regiments of clone troopers (at least 2000 troops per regiment, right?)

Even with a few thousand sectors (they had at least 2,000 senators in opposition, and given that Palpy held a super-majority, he had at least 4,000 on his side.) easily gives Clone figures in excess of the 3 million figure... and that's just from available reserves, not from active combatants.

[Spanky The Dolphin]

Have they started accusing you guys of taking this all too seriously yet? That's usually one of the standard responces when someone's lacking an actual counter-argument.

[Connor MacLeod]

That said, I am going to play devil's advocate for a moment (and forgo repeating my idea that using clone troops alone is a dumb-ass idea and that I am tired of the clone wanking.. )

1.) Clones unlike droids seem to possess qualitatively superior vehicles than the separatists. Compare Juggernauts,SPHA-Ts, AT-TEs, and gunships to what the Separatists have (Tank droids, ,Spider droids, Hailfires, Trade Fed battle taks, etc.) - it doesn't really even compare. The only *good* offensive droid vehicle they seem to have is the droid gunship (which packs serious firepower!) but that looks to be as large as or effecitvely a starfighter in the atmosphere.

The Republic, in this case, seems to have a much better developed "combined arms" doctrine, and generally accecss to heavier firepower than the droids. Not a decisive factor in and of itself, but it plays a huge role (Geonosis is a prime example - just how heavily did gunship and AT-TE attacks factor into their victory? Praestlin is perhaps a more extreme example 20-30,000 clone troops + the native military forces and the Freedom's Sons dudes, plus their blatantly superior military equipment, vs 1 million battle droids.)

Related to this is the obviosu and intrinsic qualitative superiority of Republic Starships compared to their Separatist counterparts. Obviously, the edge in Naval forces also translates into far better orbital support (as well as a definite guarantee of holding the high ground given equivalent forces.) Which would also help grgeatly in such situations.


2.) In alot of cases, the Clones are not the SOLE offensive force employed. AGain, Praestlyin comes to mind, but so does Kashhyyk, ,Mon Calamari, Utapau, etc. In many cases, the REpublic seems to have relied on the support of or coordination with local forces (be they acutal military, rebel insurrectionist/terrorists, ro whatnot.) to support their fighting.

Generally, this would tend to argue the Clones were used not as the SOLE offensive ground force in the War (at least not once it got started), but they were used to bolster and assist worlds (like Kashyyk) under attack by the Separatists. Arguably, a larger proportion of the Republic's "Army" would have remained under local/Sector control (kinda like with the Navy..) See below for further explanation.

3.) The Republic clearly does not completely trust nor worship Palpatine. They retain their own sizable (individual) navies and presumably at this point also have sizable militias/armies as well. If the Senate (and the member worlds it represents) and its naval power represented a challenge to Palpy's authority (hence why he went with the Death Star), then it also stands to reason the Senate (and the member worlds) would want to limit the Army under the direct, personal control of the Supreme Chancellor/Emperor as well. (This coincides as well with the furor over Palpatine's establishment of the Red Guard, ,as well as the reactions to Palpatine dispatching regiments to support planetary governers he appointed.)

Consider: Assume that the GAR represents 1/1000th the total number of the Separatist Battle Droid army- something in the quadrillions I would figure. All under Palpatine's direct, personal control. That's at least 2e15 troops... enough to place 2 billion soldiers on each and every member world in the Empire... or hundreds of thousands or millions of troops per (inhabited?) World in the Empire, easily (unless you believe the Empire actually OWNS the enitre galaxy, that is... )

If he had quadrillions of troops (or more) as Supreme Chancellor (a figure which would grow substantially once he became the Emperor - if for no other reason the addition of the Army and other non-clone recruits..) he should be able to far more easily (and getting back to the "planetary governers" - why isn't Palpy dispatching more than a couple of Regiments? Why not a full hundreds of thousands or millions of troops? IF the Republic isn't objecting to Palpy having enough ground and space forces to subjugate virtually any Member world (or a group of them), why aren't they objecting to THAT as well?)

So while 3 million for the total army is still excessively tiny, I also question the idea that the clone army needs to be EXCESSIVELY large. (And you can add to the above reasons my aforementione distaste for the clone wanking, period.)

[Noble Ire]

BTW - How does one reconcile the sheer numbers of troops and ships used in the Clone Wars with what we see in the Civil War (OT) era? For example, the Battle of Endor was supposed to be this giant climatic all-or-nothing battle in which it would be decided if the Rebellion was to survive. How can a battle consisting of several dozen ships be compared to the massive scale of what we see in the Clone Wars? How many sources support that the CIS had "quadrillions of droids"?

I'm begining to think that maybe the number of droids is overstated. Revisionist history perhaps, "The Republic was in such trouble that you really can't blame the people for letting Palpatine turn it into the Empire". An out of universe explanation, someone with a grasp of the inherent numbers of a Galactic-scale conflic got a little too carried away.

What do you guys think? The in universe explanation I don't really buy, seeing as when revisionist historians try to overstate army sizes to make someone look more glorious (ie one million man Persian Army vs. Alexander the Great and his 50,000 Greeks and Macedonians, when reality points to a quarter million Persians, a large quantity of them peasant levies, as the absolute upper limit) tend to fall flat upon closer examination. The explanation that a quadrillion is plain and symply wrong (a typo of sorts) depends on how many sources exist that support it and contradict it.

If someone can give me a good explanation as to why the Battle of Endor isn't some minor skirmish I would really appreciate it. Clearly that the Emperor died (sort-of) is a good reason. I mean, the battle itself, it doesn't seem like an, "All-or-nothing! This is going to be settled once and for all!" on either side. At least not when compared to the numbers thrown around during the Clone Wars.

All things considered, the Battle of Endor was a minor skirmish, at least compared to Clone Wars engagements. The only thing that distinguished it was the presence of the DS2, and more importantly, the Emperor. The Alliance knew that simply destroying an Imperial fleet (or battle group as it may be) or even the destruction of the Death Star would not be a death blow to the Empire. The only thing that made Endor anything more than a propaganda victory (like Yavin) was the fact that with their victory, the Imperial leadership was completely decapitated (both Palpatine and his only established successor Vader were killed.)

Without a strong leader, the Empire would and did tear itself apart, with a thousand Moffs, admirals and warlords all fighting over the top spot or carving out their own autonomous little dictatorships. The Alliance knew this would happen, and it was likely their only chance to attack Palpatine, considering almost all his time is spent on virtually unassailable Coruscant, so they threw every ship they had into the fray (which wasn't much.) Palpatine could have easily brought a fleet of a thousand ISDs with him to close the trap, but he is overconfident to the point of insanity.

In short, it was an all or nothing battle, just of a different type.

[ntstlkr]

Roger that, if taken purely in a tactical sense where only the number of combatants involved are counted (in terms of relating importance of engagement) , the Battle of Endor would certainly rank as a minor "action" compared to previous engagements in Republic/Imperial history. However the battle's importance lies along other lines as mentioned.

For the Empire it marked the best opportunity to force a "decisive engagement" from their enemy, something they have probably been wanting to do for some time. After probably being on the ass end of Alliance operations for so long (a necessity for the Alliance for obvious reasons) that being able to come to grips with the enemy at a place of their choosing and being able to bring to bear all of the advantages the Imperial Fleet had (numbers and firepower) for once was probably seen as a helluva windfall.

For the Alliance, the need to commit such a large portion of their admitedly limited resources to this fight could only be reconciled with the objective they sought to gain, destruction of the DSII AND death of the Emperor. It was probably the presence of the Emperor that clinched the "go".

Historically, the significance of the battle is marked purely because of the consequences of the engagement, death of the Emperor, death of Darth Vader, destruction of the DSII, mauling of an Imperial Fleet, in that order.

[ntstlkr]

Cheers All,

Ok plowed through a little more of the thread, , and it's pretty obvious that some folks have gotten their panties in a twist .

The thing to do, as it is when discussing anything in these parts, is to begin quantifying. Let's start putting together the perameters, sources, and so forth to begin cobbling together a better picture not only of the GAR, CIS, but by extension Imperial and Alliance forces to come.

Maybe this should be broken off into another thread? Each encompassing a different faction, filled firstly with observations and statistics, then analysis and summarizations, and finally conclusions.

Well anyways, the overall numbers given (and I HAVEN't read the article, but I am waiting for it to show up on the shelves) do seem a tad on the low side. However I do not expect it to go up as far as some might expect.

One thing I noticed is, besides the absence of logistical and technical support personnel, is the total lack of any administrative support too. Surely having automated systems to the degree the Republic enjoys is a factor in that, however it does raise interesting questions of the "nature" of a clone military. Pay issues not withstanding (no need to pay a clone army?). Is there such a thing as promotions? Awards? Are command positions filled by clones made specifically for the job slot they occupy (sergeants, lieutenants, captains, etc..) or are clones able to fill vacancies as needed? The importance of administrative personnel lies not just in the "paperwork" they push but the tedious things they relieve commanders from having to do. Keeping track of troopers status, injuries, replacements, unit manning, etc. Unit statistics can be included as well, number of casualties, losses, equipment destroyed or damaged, supplies required, etc. What is the "tooth-to-tail" ratio for the GAR?

For all intents and purposes, the CIS may treat combat droids as "rounds of ammunition", completely expendable, not even worth the trouble to repair since a new droid can be put in with less effort.

Are the clones regarded the same? Certainly we have seen clones going to the aid of the wounded, and reading the literature, we see that the clones (while regarding themselves in a "unique" light) certainly don't see their own value as little more than the weapons they bear ('a blaster with legs" like a droid might be likened too).

The numbers cited seem to only show trigger pullers, but as has been cited elsewhere, armies aren't filled with just the folks who carry the sticks. Using the resources available, can we come up with a better picture?

[ntstlkr]

One point in particular with the organization make-up as numbered is that it treats all Clone Troopers as functionally the same, which shouldn't be true. The GAR is made up of more than just infantry. Leaving aside depiction in the video games, we are quite certain by EPIII of different types of Clones, which is to be expected. Scout Troopers, for example, would be assigned to recon units whose size and composition can be expected to differ according to the level of organization that are at. I.E. a scout platoon which is part of an infantry battalion is organized and manned differently than a Reconniasance Squadron attached to a Division (or Legion/Brigade). We aren't even talking "slice" elements as part of TFs here, just standard TO&E.

We also see other troops like "assault troopers" (the rocket launcher guys in-game) which posits support weapons/functions. Do they have things like a heavy weapons squad assigned to a platoon? Or a weapons platoon assigned to companies?

Going by the break down in numbers everything is based of the same 9 man squad, the exception being the Commandos Organization.

Just some questions to throw in there...

[000]

Just a minor nitpick-- the green 'scout troopers' on Kashyyyk are regular infantry dressed in different armor. You can see the very same troops wearing standard CT armor (with grey markings) on the Coruscant landing area when Yoda boards the Venator.

[ntstlkr]

That raises the question of whether or not there are even more varieties of clone troops than supposed. After all, why the differing armor if they were standard infantry?

Since we only have what we see to go on, are all different classes of troops differentiated by different sets of armor? Or even modifications to what would otherwise be standard armor?

Take Commander Cody for instance. The modifications we see to what is otherwise a standard Clone Trooper kit is the addition of the comms attachment to his left shoulder and the visor on his helmet (don't know if you can include the wrist holoprojector of the novelization in this). Do all commanders get this or just those who need it? I don't recall Gree having those things on Kashyyk.

The different markings are just that, markings which seem to follow unit affiliation lines and ranking rather than denotation of "branch" (like in earlier armor sets where yellow markings adorned clone pilots armor sets).

[Connor MacLeod]

Some additional thoughts:

1.) According to the ROTS: VD Dooku and Sidious/Palpatine were actively regulating/balancing the exact "level of power" each side in the galaxy possessed, so for one reason or another (and there could be others than JUST troop numbers.) neither side ever had an actual "advantage" at any one point. Conceivably, there's alot of different ways Sidious and Dooku could have influenced either side's advantages.

In fact, even if we accepted the notion that there were TRILLIONS or quadrillions of clone troops, the sheer lopsided disparity in production rates (a decade fro the Kaminoan method, or the approximate 1 year minimum for the Spaarti method) is unlikely to have been sufficient to counter the likely rate of production the droids could produce (at least from what I understand.) I don't think its quite possible to expect a clone forcec to even come close to matching up number-for-number.

Thus it does seem likely that behind the scenes manipulation by Dooku and Sidious could be factored into this, as well as an innate qualitative superiority of Clone grround forces due to inherently better and more powerful vehicles with better orbital support. A larger section of "non-clone" troops filling out the ranks of the clone forcees would also help. (Although arguably the clone forces still have to be more numerous - as I said, there's evidence that at some point they had far more than 3 million, so that figure may not be a hard-and-fast absolute across the board, especially later on.)

2.) The term "Battle droid" tends to encompass alot mor than just the standard battle droid (whatever the variants.) IT also seemingly applies to Droidekas, SBDs, and possibly the other "droid" forms (tank droids, crab droids, hailfires, Spider droids, etc.) in various sourcs (particularily the DK books.)

Moreover, we know that even standard battle droids are utilized in alot of other ways than just as ground forces or security troops. They're used extensively onboard starships as naval crews, as vehicle crews, and possibly in other (support?) roles as well.

3.) Another possibility is that the 3 million figure represents the forcecs DIRECTLY under the command of the Supreme chancellor (at the time) - as I mentioned, the Senate has no reason to allow Palpatine to amass his a military large or powerful enough to challenge a single member system (or a group of them, for that matter.) Not everyone trusts Palpatine, remember, and even Palpatine realized he had to keep up his pretenses and illusions in order to stay in power. (IF he quadrillions or quintillions of ground troops, or millions/billions of starships directly responding to his authority, he COULD just steamroll the Senate, pure and simple. Particularily if the clones did indeed represent the largest military force available to the Republic.)

I doubt the 3 million figure includes clones from other "branches" like the Naval forcecs, the clone pilots and artillerists (ground and space) , and possibly other branches of thew military (perhaps some clones were more for "security" or onboard use, ,like the OT stormtroopers.) The problem with this would be whose authority were they under, if not Palpatines (they may have been under the Senate's, but at some later date they came directly under Palpatine's control.)

[Connor MacLeod]

Oh yeah, someone mentioned that there was "no evidencec" of non-clone Forces operating.. I beg to differ. According to the ROTS visual dictionary, there are TWO explicit references to non-clone military forces (one of them indicates that the members of Palpatine's Red Guard are drawn directly from non-clone military units.)

So it would make sense for there to be a larger (but less skilled) contingent of forces utilized to supplement and support the Clone armies (probably utilized to "take and hold' worlds conquered by the clones.)

[Darth Wong]

Did these imbeciles completely miss the part of ROTS where Order 66 is issued and it's painfully obvious that the Grand Army of the Republic is simultaneously fighting the CIS on multiple fronts, scattered across the galaxy?

All we've established here is that the lower-tier SW published material is worthless junk written by idiots.

[Master of Ossus]

[snip]So while 3 million for the total army is still excessively tiny, I also question the idea that the clone army needs to be EXCESSIVELY large. (And you can add to the above reasons my aforementione distaste for the clone wanking, period.)

Connor, I'm not arguing that the clone army needs numerical parity with the droid army to be successful or even during the war. I think that a reasonable number is 30,000,000 divisions of clones--they would still be hugely outnumbered, but that is enough for the clones to be able to defend and support a significant amount of territory while launching large offensive operations. Defenses would consist primarily of indigenous soldiers (the clones would be outnumbered by thousands, but not tens of thousands, to one), but a clone army of that size would allow them to spearhead major campaigns themselves with only support from other forces.

[Connor MacLeod]

Did these imbeciles completely miss the part of ROTS where Order 66 is issued and it's painfully obvious that the Grand Army of the Republic is simultaneously fighting the CIS on multiple fronts, scattered across the galaxy?

They would probably counter by claiming we dont know how many "fronts" exactly (I vaguely recall mention of "hundreds") or how many clones were dispatched to a given "front".) and I'm rather hard pressed to come up with any direct "rebuttal" to that.

Of course, there's the fact that there were thousands fo clone Regiments dispatched along with Planetary governers in the ROTS novelization (remember there's at least 6,000 senators in the Republic, so there's probably around that many Sectors) suggests the 3 million figure is difficult to reconcile by the time of ROTS.

Like I siad, I simply prefer the idea of letting them wank off to the clones all they want, and then quietly go with the idea that there were simply alot more non-clone forces involved in the war (which we can derive some evidence for.) At the very least they haven't fucked up THAT possibility for us yet.

[Connor MacLeod]

Connor, I'm not arguing that the clone army needs numerical parity with the droid army to be successful or even during the war. I think that a reasonable number is 30,000,000 divisions of clones--they would still be hugely outnumbered, but that is enough for the clones to be able to defend and support a significant amount of territory while launching large offensive operations. Defenses would consist primarily of indigenous soldiers (the clones would be outnumbered by thousands, but not tens of thousands, to one), but a clone army of that size would allow them to spearhead major campaigns themselves with only support from other forces.

Well yeah I know that, I'm mostly just playing devil's advocate, even though the 3 million figure is ridiculously low. I mainly dislike the notion that the GAR has to consist of JUST clones, no matter what the "intentions' seem to be or not.

[ntstlkr]

Well, right from the SW website itself is the following...

The Republic attack cruiser, or Star Destroyer, gave this new starfleet its considerable teeth. The wedge-shaped warship was not primarily a cargo transport, troop carrier or other replenishment or supply vessel; it was developed and honed for ship-to-ship combat. Its huge armored shape had an aggressive, dagger-like profile, studded with heavy weapons emplacements capable of punching through powerful shields and sturdy armor. From its twin elevated conning towers, the crew of clones and other Republic military officers oversaw the craft's operations.

The last specifically states "other Republic military officers".

http://www.starwars.com/databank/starsh ... ckcruiser/

So that puts paid to any argument that there were no other personnel besides clones, for the fleet at least. Officers too as opposed to just technical and support personnel to run the ships.

[Noble Ire]

Of course, the entire Medstar series also effectively dispells the notion that there are no non-clones working with the GAR; both non-clone ground personel and fleet staff are shown.

[Master of Ossus]

Well yeah I know that, I'm mostly just playing devil's advocate, even though the 3 million figure is ridiculously low. I mainly dislike the notion that the GAR has to consist of JUST clones, no matter what the "intentions' seem to be or not.

Out of curiosity, what sort of numbers would you expect? I said earlier that 30,000,000 divisions might be able to do it. Maybe a few hundred million divisions would be a realistic figure, to my eyes, but that could also shift downwards if the Republic had massive numbers of non-clones, too (and I know they must've had significant numbers of those).

[ntstlkr]

We're back to establishing the perameters of the question.

Production facilities available.
Production rates (I think there was mentioned somewhere a rate of "reconditioning" ? for those clones that emerge with defects)
Types of clones produced (I think it is also mentioned that as the war progressed more sources of genetic material were used to produce clones with differing characteristics, to fill an increasing number of specialised tasks, maybe like to fill specific MOS's)
Training and indoctrination (did it change during the course of the war?)
TO&E, breakdown of organizational structure (in addition to my questions about things like weapons squads/platoons/companies, CAV or Recon units and subunits, Armor units, ARTY, and the rest, just what are the numbers needed to crew a Acclamator and how is that number derived?)

Numbers and composition of non-clone forces/personnel available and in use.

Transpose this against the GAR's opposition, what they are expected to face.

What does it really take to field a BD Army?
What kind of production facilities are needed and what in the area of materials and resources are required to keep a BD production factory running? (yes we take it for granted that unit for unit BD can be stamped out in numbers far exceeding the same for clones, but that doesn't neccessarily mean its truly limitless, what are the limitations if any? How many production facilities are available to the CIS at any given time. How many new ones coming online and how many destroyed by the Republic?)
Do all BDs require a control facility?
What are the logistical requirements and limitations involved in fielding a BD army?
What (if any) non-mechanical personnel are required for the CIS to keep their army going? I.E are there greater or lessor needs for technical support personnel? (lol, just thinking they obviously don't load them up with xx iteration of windows otherwise half of the droids might "crash" at any given time, <jk>)

Lastly, the Darth Sidious factor. No matter how many BDs are produced, no matter how astoundingly UNDER sized the GAR, the controlling factor for both is Sidious. In that respect you can say the size of either army is irrelevant because the truth of the matter is neither army was truly meant to "win" this war. The true purpose of each army was to serve as the means to set the political conditions for Sidious's elevation to Emperorship. When you look at it in that respect, the exact correlation of forces means nothing when the chief decision maker for both is the same person. This last is the reason why the true numbers for the GAR will never reach anything large enough to "realistically" face and defeat the CIS. There's no need to.

This does lead me off on a tangent thought though. In having a consistantly numerically inferior army, always short of manpower, always short of everything (I've been there in the 'ol "do more with less" days, hell look at the US military today, always more things to do than men and time to do them) you ensure the maximum participation of the Jedi. Those that are weak or cannot adjust from keeper of the peace to war fighter fall by the wayside (Geonosis). You also keep the Jedi stretched thin, a rather insidious way (no pun intended) of slowly cutting their numbers down, readying them for the BIG FALL. Just a thought.

[Connor MacLeod]

Out of curiosity, what sort of numbers would you expect? I said earlier that 30,000,000 divisions might be able to do it. Maybe a few hundred million divisions would be a realistic figure, to my eyes, but that could also shift downwards if the Republic had massive numbers of non-clones, too (and I know they must've had significant numbers of those).

Numbers for just clones, or for the entire army? The former, at least just after Geonosis (a few months) has to be around tens of millions minimum(recall the 16 million troopers for 1000 Acclamators.. that would have to be well within a year or less of AOTC)

Around the time of the Clone Wars Cartoons towards ROTS era, you're talking at least billions or maybe trillions of clones (we see in the CW cartoons that most Jedi seem to be leading at least half a dozen to a dozen Acclamators in a given "assault", whereas larger ones might use several dozen. By the time of ROTS, they have enough "spare" clones lying around that Palpy can be sending off whole regiments with each of his "Moffs" - which is easily many millions or billions by itself.) Keep in mind this figure is for just the ground troops - vehicle and fighter pilots, naval crews, security forcees, etc. aren't included.

Also, the above figures are based on the reasoning I have provided before (the "clone" army is only a small fraction of the overall Republican ground forces, alot of the REpublic's offensive capabvility/firepower edge comes from having superior/heavier vehicles and warships than the Seppies, The Senate isn't gonna trust the Jedi or Palpy with their own massive army that might come back to threaten THEM later on, etc..)

In general, I see the Clone army as being those forcese directly under the control of the Jedi and Chancellor. They are the spear-head - they do the brunt of the fighting. Other non-clone forces can fight alongside them (and probably in most cases do) but they probably serve in other roles - defending their own Sectors/planets, occupying conquered territory (I'm sure they'd do that much, since it would be a form of sanctioned territorial expansion, increasing the member sector's own personal power.) In that context, you really don't NEED massive numbers of clones - billions (hundreds of thousands to millions of troops per Jedi) would easily suffice with sufficient heavy armor support. Afterwards, the clones move on, leaving other Republic forcecs to occupy it (if its a defended Republic world like Kashyyk, you leave it in the defender's hands. In the case of a Separatist stronghold like Geonosis or Cato Neimodia, you bring in "peacekeeping" militia troops to occupy the planet.)

In short, I'm not opposed to the idea of a large Republican army per se, I'm just opposed to the idea of a MASSIVE "clone only" Republican (or Imperial) army (as I've already outlined before.) Basically, the whole "Clone" concept spawned by the prequels borders on the absurd, no matter HOW numerically large you make them - its quite simply absurd to assume that clones that take years or a decade to develop could possibly match mass-produced armies that can be produced in a fraction of the time. It maybe would have made more sense if both sides were tossing clones at one another (it is supposed to be the CLONE WARS after all, not the CLONE AND DROID WARs.) but that's plainly not what happens.