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ljwritesPart 1 of this essay on Avatar as a political story talked mainly about the Earth Kingdom and its political attempts to end the war, and the root causes of that failure. Here in Part 2 I will discuss another effort to end the war unilaterally from the outside, specifically the coalition invasion in "The Day of Black Sun." Then I will discuss the Fire Nation's internal anti-war movement and how it was suppressed ("The Avatar and the Fire Lord," "The Headband," and even brief mentions of Book 1 episodes like "The Storm"). Based on that, I will discuss how internal regime change was the only real solution to the war from the start. I will also ramble on about Zuko again, so brace yourselves for that.
Coalition of the Quirky: The Invasion Must Go Through. Or Should It?
The weirdest fighting force the world has ever seen.
So I discussed in Part 1 how the Earth Kingdom first ignored the war for most part, then tried to end it by invasion on a grand scale on the day of tho solar eclipse. That plan failed due to a coup d'etat engineered by Azula and carried out by the Dai Li. So bye-bye invasion?
Not so fast. Our steadfast, plucky heroes and especially Sokka were determined to stick with the original plan. They still had the advantage of the eclipse and the Fire Nation's lack of firebending for eight minutes. Besides, it wasn't like they had a lot of choices left at this point. Left to their own devices, the Fire Nation would only grow stronger. Our heroes had to check their power somehow.
The invasion failed, as we all know, and there are a number of reasons why. The Coalition had lost their element of surprise when Azula had infiltrated the city, and the might of the Earth Kingdom never materialized to support the invasion. Still, the oddball characters from the Earth Kingdom fought bravely and well and got tantalizingly close. But they were ultimately defeated, and most of them had to surrender. With a smaller invasion force that didn't even have the advantage of surprise, the deck was stacked against them.
And you know what? I don't think that was necessarily a bad thing. Sokka had tactical brilliance, but not the big picture view. And the big picture tells me the invasion would have failed even if it had succeeded. Wha? In other words, the coalition might have made military gains, but they wouldn't have been able to hold onto those gains. They might even have made matters worse.
To prove I'm not completely crazy, let's try a thought experiment. What if the invasion had succeeded? If Aang had confronted and captured/killed Ozai (capture being more likely, since he didn't have his bending at the time), and there were a forcible regime change? Maybe they would have busted Iroh out of jail to put him on the throne, maybe Zuko. What then?
Let's take this step by step, stacking the deck progressively against the bad guys. If Azula and Zuko had escaped and Zuko hadn't had his epiphany, they would have become a resistance force against the invaders who held the capital. And they would have taken it back, too, because the Fire Nation would have risen up like nobody's business against the occupation and Iroh, if he stayed behind and became Fire Lord. The Fire Nation may have both pro-war and anti-war elements (more on that later), but they would have united in the cause of getting the invaders out of their capital off their soil. This cause was one of the few things that could unite the rival siblings, and they'd work together to devastating effect as they did in "The Crossroads of Destiny." The coalition forces, small as they were, would not stand a chance.
Now to make things worse for the other side, let's say Zuko still has his Heel Face Turn on schedule and turns against Azula and to the Avatar. He still stands no chance. He can't go to war against his own people and become an accepted ruler. At best he can hope to be a tyrant ruling with repression and violence, which is no real improvement over his father's rein and he was too soft-hearted to pull it off anyway. He would have been labeled a traitor, a foreign agent with good reason, and Azula would kick his ass with her Nation united behind her, rescue Ozai, and war would roll right on. Or, the country would have gone to civil war with Zuko's forces on one side and Azula's on the other. That might have stopped the war, but could very well give rise to something even more dangerous--anarchy. For that, see the next paragraph.
To stack the deck some more, now let's say Zuko and Azula don't unite, either because Zuko's a good guy now or because they are fighting for the prize. Either they keep each other busy this way, or they even manage to destroy each other, leaving no direct heirs to the throne. To make things even bleaker for the Fire Nation, let's kill off Ozai in this scenario, too. Now the occupation is permanent, right? Wrong. The Fire Nation capital was penetrable because most of its forces are outside the country and all over the world. Now that there is a vacuum of power at the capital, more distant heirs to the throne pop up to declare themselves the new Firelord and the warlords with their own forces and power bases either support these claimants or put forth their own claims. The country fragments, the world fragments into squabbling feudal estates fighting each other. The occupation could maybe hold onto the capital, but couldn't hold onto the rest of the country and would find even the capital hard pressed. Either someone does unite the Fire Nation and kicks out the occupiers, or the power vacuum continues and the Fire Nation tears itself apart fighting. And all the fighting factions would hate the occupation. Congratulations, occupation forces. You're either defeated, or you became the nominal masters of hell on earth. A fiery hell at that.
Of course, an outside occupation can sometimes end a world-wide war. Germany and Japan after World War II are prime examples. But in both those cases a sizable military force went into the countries, and while the military kept order an internal coalition was built for peace and democracy. The occupation of the Fire Nation capital might have been like this if Ba Sing Se had not fallen and they had the full Earth Kingdom support. As it was, the force was too small to control more than the capital, especially once the eclipse ended, and had no allies in the Fire Nation.
So not only did the invasion fail, it might have been for the best that it failed. Invasion or no invasion, in order to end the war they would have needed an internal coalition within the Fire Nation willing to support the cause of peace. The country had to change from the inside if outside intervention was going to be effective. It was the only way the war could end justly, and peacefully
What the occupation really accomplished was that it provided the distraction for two Fire Nation leaders to escape: Iroh from jail*, and Zuko from the palace. And it is they, the leadership of the Fire Nation, were the ones who would be key to ending the war.This internal Fire Nation dissent is the next topic of discussion, and for that we first have to go back in time by a hundred years...
* Let me take a moment to squee about the awesome that is Iroh. He was buffing himself up in jail, remember, honing not his firebending but his strength and endurance. And he escaped during the eclipse, even warning a friendly guard to take a sick leave that afternoon. What does this tell you? My theory is that he knew the eclipse was coming, and was preparing to fight his way out against his guards who had lost their bending. Badass grandpa for the win!
Just as Fire Nation as Sozin: Roku and the Legacy of Dissent
Coalition of the Quirky: The Invasion Must Go Through. Or Should It?
The weirdest fighting force the world has ever seen.
So I discussed in Part 1 how the Earth Kingdom first ignored the war for most part, then tried to end it by invasion on a grand scale on the day of tho solar eclipse. That plan failed due to a coup d'etat engineered by Azula and carried out by the Dai Li. So bye-bye invasion?
Not so fast. Our steadfast, plucky heroes and especially Sokka were determined to stick with the original plan. They still had the advantage of the eclipse and the Fire Nation's lack of firebending for eight minutes. Besides, it wasn't like they had a lot of choices left at this point. Left to their own devices, the Fire Nation would only grow stronger. Our heroes had to check their power somehow.
The invasion failed, as we all know, and there are a number of reasons why. The Coalition had lost their element of surprise when Azula had infiltrated the city, and the might of the Earth Kingdom never materialized to support the invasion. Still, the oddball characters from the Earth Kingdom fought bravely and well and got tantalizingly close. But they were ultimately defeated, and most of them had to surrender. With a smaller invasion force that didn't even have the advantage of surprise, the deck was stacked against them.
And you know what? I don't think that was necessarily a bad thing. Sokka had tactical brilliance, but not the big picture view. And the big picture tells me the invasion would have failed even if it had succeeded. Wha? In other words, the coalition might have made military gains, but they wouldn't have been able to hold onto those gains. They might even have made matters worse.
To prove I'm not completely crazy, let's try a thought experiment. What if the invasion had succeeded? If Aang had confronted and captured/killed Ozai (capture being more likely, since he didn't have his bending at the time), and there were a forcible regime change? Maybe they would have busted Iroh out of jail to put him on the throne, maybe Zuko. What then?
Let's take this step by step, stacking the deck progressively against the bad guys. If Azula and Zuko had escaped and Zuko hadn't had his epiphany, they would have become a resistance force against the invaders who held the capital. And they would have taken it back, too, because the Fire Nation would have risen up like nobody's business against the occupation and Iroh, if he stayed behind and became Fire Lord. The Fire Nation may have both pro-war and anti-war elements (more on that later), but they would have united in the cause of getting the invaders out of their capital off their soil. This cause was one of the few things that could unite the rival siblings, and they'd work together to devastating effect as they did in "The Crossroads of Destiny." The coalition forces, small as they were, would not stand a chance.
Now to make things worse for the other side, let's say Zuko still has his Heel Face Turn on schedule and turns against Azula and to the Avatar. He still stands no chance. He can't go to war against his own people and become an accepted ruler. At best he can hope to be a tyrant ruling with repression and violence, which is no real improvement over his father's rein and he was too soft-hearted to pull it off anyway. He would have been labeled a traitor, a foreign agent with good reason, and Azula would kick his ass with her Nation united behind her, rescue Ozai, and war would roll right on. Or, the country would have gone to civil war with Zuko's forces on one side and Azula's on the other. That might have stopped the war, but could very well give rise to something even more dangerous--anarchy. For that, see the next paragraph.
To stack the deck some more, now let's say Zuko and Azula don't unite, either because Zuko's a good guy now or because they are fighting for the prize. Either they keep each other busy this way, or they even manage to destroy each other, leaving no direct heirs to the throne. To make things even bleaker for the Fire Nation, let's kill off Ozai in this scenario, too. Now the occupation is permanent, right? Wrong. The Fire Nation capital was penetrable because most of its forces are outside the country and all over the world. Now that there is a vacuum of power at the capital, more distant heirs to the throne pop up to declare themselves the new Firelord and the warlords with their own forces and power bases either support these claimants or put forth their own claims. The country fragments, the world fragments into squabbling feudal estates fighting each other. The occupation could maybe hold onto the capital, but couldn't hold onto the rest of the country and would find even the capital hard pressed. Either someone does unite the Fire Nation and kicks out the occupiers, or the power vacuum continues and the Fire Nation tears itself apart fighting. And all the fighting factions would hate the occupation. Congratulations, occupation forces. You're either defeated, or you became the nominal masters of hell on earth. A fiery hell at that.
Of course, an outside occupation can sometimes end a world-wide war. Germany and Japan after World War II are prime examples. But in both those cases a sizable military force went into the countries, and while the military kept order an internal coalition was built for peace and democracy. The occupation of the Fire Nation capital might have been like this if Ba Sing Se had not fallen and they had the full Earth Kingdom support. As it was, the force was too small to control more than the capital, especially once the eclipse ended, and had no allies in the Fire Nation.
So not only did the invasion fail, it might have been for the best that it failed. Invasion or no invasion, in order to end the war they would have needed an internal coalition within the Fire Nation willing to support the cause of peace. The country had to change from the inside if outside intervention was going to be effective. It was the only way the war could end justly, and peacefully
What the occupation really accomplished was that it provided the distraction for two Fire Nation leaders to escape: Iroh from jail*, and Zuko from the palace. And it is they, the leadership of the Fire Nation, were the ones who would be key to ending the war.This internal Fire Nation dissent is the next topic of discussion, and for that we first have to go back in time by a hundred years...
* Let me take a moment to squee about the awesome that is Iroh. He was buffing himself up in jail, remember, honing not his firebending but his strength and endurance. And he escaped during the eclipse, even warning a friendly guard to take a sick leave that afternoon. What does this tell you? My theory is that he knew the eclipse was coming, and was preparing to fight his way out against his guards who had lost their bending. Badass grandpa for the win!
Just as Fire Nation as Sozin: Roku and the Legacy of Dissent
"I dissent, bitch."
From an external point of view, it's easy to see the war as Fire Nation vs. The Rest of the Damn World. That's natural: From the outside a country can seem like a unified whole, as though everyone in it thought exactly the same and had some kind of hive mind.
That kind of unity is true for some species, like ants, bees, Cranium Rats, the Zerg, and others real or imagined. (Does anyone else find it sad that I gave as many fictional examples as real ones? *nerd*) The same, however, is not true of humans unless they have undergone some kind of radical transformation. We are individualistic to a fault, and for better or for worse we have interests and desires independent of our political affiliation.
The point being, the Fire Nation people do not all think alike and that is true of the war as well. In fact the Earth Kingdom had pro-war people, despite the fact that they were the ones being invaded, as discussed in the previous part of this essay. In the third essay about war in Avatar, when I identified a personification of the mindset of war, an avatar of war if you will, I chose one Earth Kingdom man (Gow the hammer Earthbender guy) and one Fire Nation girl (Azula).
From an external point of view, it's easy to see the war as Fire Nation vs. The Rest of the Damn World. That's natural: From the outside a country can seem like a unified whole, as though everyone in it thought exactly the same and had some kind of hive mind.
That kind of unity is true for some species, like ants, bees, Cranium Rats, the Zerg, and others real or imagined. (Does anyone else find it sad that I gave as many fictional examples as real ones? *nerd*) The same, however, is not true of humans unless they have undergone some kind of radical transformation. We are individualistic to a fault, and for better or for worse we have interests and desires independent of our political affiliation.
The point being, the Fire Nation people do not all think alike and that is true of the war as well. In fact the Earth Kingdom had pro-war people, despite the fact that they were the ones being invaded, as discussed in the previous part of this essay. In the third essay about war in Avatar, when I identified a personification of the mindset of war, an avatar of war if you will, I chose one Earth Kingdom man (Gow the hammer Earthbender guy) and one Fire Nation girl (Azula).
The exploration of the world's peoples through Books 1 to 3, and especially the early part of Book 3, humanized the Water Tribes, the Earth Kingdom, and even the Fire Nation. They all had good and bad in them, a multitude of opinions, interests, personalities, and voices. The Fire Nation especially in the first half of Book 3 was shown to be a human society with both good and bad in it, just like the other peoples. It was not beyond hope; in fact, the only real hope had to come from inside that Nation.
We start to see the human side of Zuko from early on, in "The Spirit World" for instance when he has a lead on Aang but chooses to rescue his abducted uncle instead. In "The Storm" we learn his background, and it is impossible not to sympathize with his reasons if not his actions. In the present day as well he shows his honor and humanity in putting his crew first, despite Aang being literally in sight. From there he becomes an increasingly sympathetic character until he blossoms, after a long and difficult physical and emotional journey, into a hero. But the seeds of what he could become had always been there from early on.
I talked about internal dissent against the war earlier, and it's interesting to note that the reason for his exile in "The Storm" are tied to dissent. Not to the war itself (if he'd done that, I don't think it would have ended with scarring and exile), but to the conduct of it in callously wasting Fire Nation lives. But it was still a dissenting opinion, spoken in violation of his place and protocol. And in a way it was dissent against the war as well. Sacrifices are inevitable in war after all, and speaking against such sacrifices was dangerously close to speaking out against the war. So from early on, whether he was aware of it or not, Zuko was punished for disagreeing with the war.
It may surprise some readers if I said Zuko showed his anti-war stripes long before "The Day of Black Sun," but it's true: As early as the Book 1 episode "The Southern Air Temple," he was already talking about the futility of the war, to his rival Zhao no less, calling his father a fool if he thought the rest of the world would follow him willingly even after he had Ba Sing Se. Really, Prince Zuko? Do you think that's wise? But of course, "wise" and Zuko inhabit pretty much two different universes. Wise or not, he opposed the policy of forcible conquest, even on practical grounds.
He continues in this vein for almost the whole series, caught between his own beliefs and his desperate thirst for his father's approval, until he finally decides to be himself in the middle of Book 3 as discussed in his character arc. A lot of different factors went into this transformation, as discussed in the character arc and relationship articles, but a growing knowledge of his country and himself was another catalyst. As previously discussed, he had everything he ever wished for only to find it all kind of sucked. Then he came to learn of the origin of Fire Nation dissent against the war in the story of Roku and Sozin, and then he learned that he had inherited both these conflicting legacies of war and peace ("The Avatar and the Firelord"). And you thought your teenage years were turbulent!
Once he awakens to his true self, Zuko puts together the two halves of his legacy into a harmonious whole. His maternal great-grandfather was anti-war, but he was speaking from the outside: As a dissenter, not a ruler.His paternal great-grandfather was a ruler of the Fire Nation, but had also passed down to him the sins of his line. Now Zuko could become the best of both men, a ruler who was devoted to the cause of a peaceful Fire Nation.
If this all sounds too deterministic for you, remember someone else who shared his legacy yet would never think to take on the same role. That's Azula, who had given herself wholly to the cause of her father's line. It was the person she was, the choices she made, and not her blood that differentiated her from Zuko. So Zuko wasn't simply born into his legacy, he also had to accept it. And accept it he did, after much grief and hardship, and overcoming the most difficult challenge of coming to grips with the shape of his own soul.
So now it was done, right? On the day of the eclipse, Zuko talked to his father alone when he had swords and his father had no firebending. Just two quick slashes, and regime change accomplished. The series could have ended ten episodes sooner! Ozai pretty much asked him why not, taunting him. Why not, indeed? Wouldn't that have been the easiest, quickest way?
For the answer to that question, we turn to another thread in this political discussion of Avatar, the issue of justice and legitimacy, the concept of the common good and how it is relevant not only to ending the war, but to the world after the war. That will be the subject of the final part of this way too long essay.
That hope, the anti-war dissent appeared even before the war started in earnest, in "The Avatar and The Firelord." It's in the title: Roku, an Avatar born in the Fire Nation, was adamantly against a war of conquest and in fact threatened the life of his friend if that meant ending the war as well. In the end, Firelord Sozin decided to put an end to the Avatar's dissent by leaving his best friend to die.
Now Roku might be a bit of a special case because he wasn't just a Fire Nation subject, but the freaking Avatar. And each Avatar, while born to specific affiliations, is above such divisions by virtue of being the (freaking) Avatar. It's why they cycle between the four peoples, why they wield all four elements, why they travel the world to get to know all the peoples, and why they even leave their possessions behind once they start on this journey. Let me repeat this, because it becomes important for the later discussion: The Avatar is above the peoples and their divisions. He or she represents the commonality, the general good that binds everyone together regardless of affiliation. The Avatar, in other words, stands for justice, not just one group.
And yet Aang points out that Roku was just as Fire Nation as Sozin, and he's right about that. Roku was born to Fire Nation nobility, and his native element was fire. He was steeped in the Fire Nation culture in his formative ears, and he embodied many of their cultural ideals like honor, energy, and focus. He opposed the war not only as a living embodiment of the common good, but also as a patriotic Fire Nation subject. There was no contradiction between the two.
Plenty of Fire Nation people were also anti-war without being in Roku's unique position as the Avatar. We know of Jeong Jeong, Iroh, and later Piandao, all ironically military or martial men who came around (Jeong Jeong and Iroh) or maybe always believed in a peaceful Fire Nation. Iroh was even royalty, and had much to gain from the war. Who knows what turned him against it? The sight of war up close in his military career, and in the 600-day siege at the walls of Ba Sing Se? The loss of his son to war? Similarly, Piandao seemed to prosper regardless of the war, yet acted to end it. Whatever their social station and private interests, these different men - a dishonored prince, an old deserter, and renowned swordsman - came together for the cause of peace.
What about the common citizens? While it was never made explicit, we know about potential or actual dissent to the war from efforts to prevent such dissent - from the Book 3 episode "The Headband." But wasn't that episode all about enforced propaganda and repressing individual expression? Exactly. It takes a lot of energy to enforce all that repressive education, including doctored histories and even a ban on dancing. The Fire Nation spends a lot of time and energy on making children think they are an apparatus of the state, pledging, "My life, I give to my country," as their Fire Nation Oath goes.
Why go to all that trouble? Because otherwise these kids, and later grownups, might get other ideas. They might think they have better things to do with their lives than lay it down for the Firelord. They might think that dancing and other individual expression was worth more. They might start thinking for themselves. They might, in other words, reject tho war and the Firelord's rule. The educational system of the Fire Nation and probably a whole system of oppressive state control were for the sole cause of suppressing dissent. And there's no reason to go through all that unless political dissent were a real threat.
Okay, so the Fire Nation has internal dissent. But there is also a repressive regime, much like in Ba Sing Se, that keeps a tight lid from that dissent becoming a coherent political action. Iroh might be a prince, but he was pushed out of the top spot long ago and he was labeled a traitor the moment he showed his true colors. Jeong Jeong and his merry band had been wandering as outcasts for who knows how long without threatening the regime. Piandao was lying low in his fancy mansion, though he was willing to help the Fire Nation's enemies like Sokka. All of them were working quietly in their transnational good-guy Illuminati, and maybe the domestic opposition operated in the shadows, but they lacked the spark, the catalyst that would bring them to decisive action.
Who was going to take the mantle of political leadership for the opposition and provide an alternative to Ozai and his even scarier successor Azula? Who would carry Roku's torch? Come on, you know it. Say it with me...
Zuko: From Outcast to Rebel to Leader
"You talk to me for the first time in months, and all I get is a hundred-year-old hairpiece?"
From the first, Avatar was unusual in treating the main antagonist, Zuko, on almost the same footing as the protagonist Aang and his group. In fact Wikipedia calls him the deuteragonist of the story, or joint protagonist with Aang. How could that be when Zuko seemed to play the classic villain role of making the protagonist's life miserable and hurting everyone around him?Now Roku might be a bit of a special case because he wasn't just a Fire Nation subject, but the freaking Avatar. And each Avatar, while born to specific affiliations, is above such divisions by virtue of being the (freaking) Avatar. It's why they cycle between the four peoples, why they wield all four elements, why they travel the world to get to know all the peoples, and why they even leave their possessions behind once they start on this journey. Let me repeat this, because it becomes important for the later discussion: The Avatar is above the peoples and their divisions. He or she represents the commonality, the general good that binds everyone together regardless of affiliation. The Avatar, in other words, stands for justice, not just one group.
And yet Aang points out that Roku was just as Fire Nation as Sozin, and he's right about that. Roku was born to Fire Nation nobility, and his native element was fire. He was steeped in the Fire Nation culture in his formative ears, and he embodied many of their cultural ideals like honor, energy, and focus. He opposed the war not only as a living embodiment of the common good, but also as a patriotic Fire Nation subject. There was no contradiction between the two.
Plenty of Fire Nation people were also anti-war without being in Roku's unique position as the Avatar. We know of Jeong Jeong, Iroh, and later Piandao, all ironically military or martial men who came around (Jeong Jeong and Iroh) or maybe always believed in a peaceful Fire Nation. Iroh was even royalty, and had much to gain from the war. Who knows what turned him against it? The sight of war up close in his military career, and in the 600-day siege at the walls of Ba Sing Se? The loss of his son to war? Similarly, Piandao seemed to prosper regardless of the war, yet acted to end it. Whatever their social station and private interests, these different men - a dishonored prince, an old deserter, and renowned swordsman - came together for the cause of peace.
What about the common citizens? While it was never made explicit, we know about potential or actual dissent to the war from efforts to prevent such dissent - from the Book 3 episode "The Headband." But wasn't that episode all about enforced propaganda and repressing individual expression? Exactly. It takes a lot of energy to enforce all that repressive education, including doctored histories and even a ban on dancing. The Fire Nation spends a lot of time and energy on making children think they are an apparatus of the state, pledging, "My life, I give to my country," as their Fire Nation Oath goes.
Why go to all that trouble? Because otherwise these kids, and later grownups, might get other ideas. They might think they have better things to do with their lives than lay it down for the Firelord. They might think that dancing and other individual expression was worth more. They might start thinking for themselves. They might, in other words, reject tho war and the Firelord's rule. The educational system of the Fire Nation and probably a whole system of oppressive state control were for the sole cause of suppressing dissent. And there's no reason to go through all that unless political dissent were a real threat.
Okay, so the Fire Nation has internal dissent. But there is also a repressive regime, much like in Ba Sing Se, that keeps a tight lid from that dissent becoming a coherent political action. Iroh might be a prince, but he was pushed out of the top spot long ago and he was labeled a traitor the moment he showed his true colors. Jeong Jeong and his merry band had been wandering as outcasts for who knows how long without threatening the regime. Piandao was lying low in his fancy mansion, though he was willing to help the Fire Nation's enemies like Sokka. All of them were working quietly in their transnational good-guy Illuminati, and maybe the domestic opposition operated in the shadows, but they lacked the spark, the catalyst that would bring them to decisive action.
Who was going to take the mantle of political leadership for the opposition and provide an alternative to Ozai and his even scarier successor Azula? Who would carry Roku's torch? Come on, you know it. Say it with me...
Zuko: From Outcast to Rebel to Leader
"You talk to me for the first time in months, and all I get is a hundred-year-old hairpiece?"
We start to see the human side of Zuko from early on, in "The Spirit World" for instance when he has a lead on Aang but chooses to rescue his abducted uncle instead. In "The Storm" we learn his background, and it is impossible not to sympathize with his reasons if not his actions. In the present day as well he shows his honor and humanity in putting his crew first, despite Aang being literally in sight. From there he becomes an increasingly sympathetic character until he blossoms, after a long and difficult physical and emotional journey, into a hero. But the seeds of what he could become had always been there from early on.
I talked about internal dissent against the war earlier, and it's interesting to note that the reason for his exile in "The Storm" are tied to dissent. Not to the war itself (if he'd done that, I don't think it would have ended with scarring and exile), but to the conduct of it in callously wasting Fire Nation lives. But it was still a dissenting opinion, spoken in violation of his place and protocol. And in a way it was dissent against the war as well. Sacrifices are inevitable in war after all, and speaking against such sacrifices was dangerously close to speaking out against the war. So from early on, whether he was aware of it or not, Zuko was punished for disagreeing with the war.
It may surprise some readers if I said Zuko showed his anti-war stripes long before "The Day of Black Sun," but it's true: As early as the Book 1 episode "The Southern Air Temple," he was already talking about the futility of the war, to his rival Zhao no less, calling his father a fool if he thought the rest of the world would follow him willingly even after he had Ba Sing Se. Really, Prince Zuko? Do you think that's wise? But of course, "wise" and Zuko inhabit pretty much two different universes. Wise or not, he opposed the policy of forcible conquest, even on practical grounds.
He continues in this vein for almost the whole series, caught between his own beliefs and his desperate thirst for his father's approval, until he finally decides to be himself in the middle of Book 3 as discussed in his character arc. A lot of different factors went into this transformation, as discussed in the character arc and relationship articles, but a growing knowledge of his country and himself was another catalyst. As previously discussed, he had everything he ever wished for only to find it all kind of sucked. Then he came to learn of the origin of Fire Nation dissent against the war in the story of Roku and Sozin, and then he learned that he had inherited both these conflicting legacies of war and peace ("The Avatar and the Firelord"). And you thought your teenage years were turbulent!
Once he awakens to his true self, Zuko puts together the two halves of his legacy into a harmonious whole. His maternal great-grandfather was anti-war, but he was speaking from the outside: As a dissenter, not a ruler.His paternal great-grandfather was a ruler of the Fire Nation, but had also passed down to him the sins of his line. Now Zuko could become the best of both men, a ruler who was devoted to the cause of a peaceful Fire Nation.
If this all sounds too deterministic for you, remember someone else who shared his legacy yet would never think to take on the same role. That's Azula, who had given herself wholly to the cause of her father's line. It was the person she was, the choices she made, and not her blood that differentiated her from Zuko. So Zuko wasn't simply born into his legacy, he also had to accept it. And accept it he did, after much grief and hardship, and overcoming the most difficult challenge of coming to grips with the shape of his own soul.
So now it was done, right? On the day of the eclipse, Zuko talked to his father alone when he had swords and his father had no firebending. Just two quick slashes, and regime change accomplished. The series could have ended ten episodes sooner! Ozai pretty much asked him why not, taunting him. Why not, indeed? Wouldn't that have been the easiest, quickest way?
For the answer to that question, we turn to another thread in this political discussion of Avatar, the issue of justice and legitimacy, the concept of the common good and how it is relevant not only to ending the war, but to the world after the war. That will be the subject of the final part of this way too long essay.
