Quote:
Originally Posted by Rhun charioteer
Sauron now has total dominion over Middle Earth.
There is no last refuge, no place to hide-maybe some holdouts in the mountains remain, or refugee camps but they can be destroyed at his leisure.
In this scenario-the valar have two choices-intervene directly and decisively or let Sauron rule indefinitely. Maybe nurturing every flower that grows and every hope of a whipped slave or dreaming child. But it will take eons in this scenario for this little resistance to coalesce into something that could defeat Sauron.
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I think that's the point though. No matter how outwardly absolute his rule is in the immediate aftermath, it is not quite as absolute and unchangeable as he thinks. Pockets of free people would remain hidden away, and in far away lands people may live free from his rule. Yes, it may take a long time to see Sauron's rule erode enough to crumble down, and it may take another (or the very same) Gandalf to find and rouse these people, and maybe his rule would collapse from within rather than from external frontal attacks... But I think that would be the choice of intervention. This is the way the Valar were headed since the beginning of Arda - from the "gardners" of the world, actively weeding and planting, to onlookers, allowing the Children to exercise their own will. They let the Children, in particular the Men, take responsibility for their world. I think that shift in particular was evident in LOTR. They can nudge and guide, but they would not bring in an army with trumpets blaring and sink another continent in another war of the Ainur.