The Cull of Stratholme: Was Arthas actually right?

Lore Story Forum
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One of my favorite WC3 missions was the Cull of Stratholme because it suddenly presented us with a moral quandary that had no easy answer.

Arthas realized that Stratholme had already been largely infected by the plagued grain and, in a moment that defined his character forever more, decided to conduct a callous purge of the entire city to include even the living. Uther, horrified at such a suggestion, refused to commit to what he saw as genocide and tried to convince Arthas to look for another solution. His mind made up however, Arthas ordered Uther to purge the city to which he refused. Outraged, Arthas called them traitors and disbanded the Silver Hand before going on to purge the city with those of his forces that stood by him.

Now from a moral standpoint, yes, what Arthas did was wrong because he killed innocent men, women, and even children, some of whom may not have been infected. But I submit the following question: did he actually have any other choice?

No, he didn’t. Let me explain why…

First, he simply didn’t have the forces much less the resources to quarantine such a large city. As WC3 and WoW showed us, it essentially boiled down to smaller forces moving from section to section as quickly as they could.

Had they decided to attempt to quarantine the entrance, it wouldn’t have been long before a flood of refugees they had no idea were infected or not started streaming out of the city en masse in a desperate attempt to get away from the undead howling at their heels.

And as his previous experience with the infected in Stranbrade, he knew it would not take long for them to turn and begin wreaking havoc. And with the sheer number of people in the city of Stratholme, it could turn into a veritable army all on its own and present a dire threat to the rest of Lordaeron were it to escape.

And without the numbers or time to process them, it would have quickly devolved into absolute chaos as fear of their lives would push the refugees to attack his forces in sheer desperation, weakening them to the breaking point and leaving them vulnerable when the Scourge showed up close behind them.

At this point, the quarantine would quickly fall apart and the infected would start streaming in all directions along with the Scourge, making the attempt far more damaging to Lordaeron than his original plan.

And secondly, Mal’ganis was in Stratholme. Granted, Uther very well could not have known this. However, this is critical as Mal’ganis was greatly speeding up the process of infection and conversion of Scourge within the city.

Left unchecked, he would have quickly turned almost the entire city before turning them against the now horrifically outnumbered defenders who would have been literally swamped under waves of Scourge. And afterwards, they would have quickly spread across Lordaeron as an ever growing mass that might have become unstoppable.

So in conclusion, while I believe Arthas’ decision was morally wrong, it was in fact the best choice he had from the very few available to him.

Deep down, I think Uther and Jaina knew it as well but they lacked the will to take such an unpalatable step. There was simply not enough time to gather reinforcements or realistically quarantine the city. To me, this was Arthas’ only option.

Terrible? Yes. Callous? Of course. Necessary? Absolutely.

Arthas’ only mistake in this regard was in letting his anger and arrogance get the better of him and drive away those who could and should have helped him. Had he calmed himself and explained the stark reality of the situation to the two of them, I think he could have reluctantly convinced them that this was a terrible but necessary action.

There was just no way to save the citizens of Stratholme, and this was really the only merciful end for them. Even if they were not initially infected, Mal’ganis would absolutely have made sure of it.

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I don’t think you’ll find anyone who thinks that Arthas was in the wrong RE the COTS.

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No, he didn’t. Uther saw it as a slaughter. The word, ‘Genocide,’ was not invoked. I understand you might be aiming for hyperbole, but don’t misrepresent the facts.

Of course he did. He could’ve quarantined the city and tried to find a way to save them, and wasted time, failing, leading to the entire city becoming a Scourge Bastion of power, thus drastically increasing the rate at which Lordaeron would have fallen.

It was a no-win situation.

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He wasn’t wrong in what he did, yeah. In the 15+ years that the mission has been out, nobody’s presented a good alternative out of ‘quarantine’, which in itself would have have nigh impossible to pull off before Arthas and his men were overwhelmed. Where he went wrong was trying to explain it to Uther, and then maybe pursuing Mal’ganis and of course taking up Frostmourne.

It was a true moral gray situation.

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Not exactly as cut and dry as that. It just depends on how one judges the situation. Some utilitarians might view the moral choice as killing the innocents for the greater good.

Sure, depending on how one views the specifics.

Debatable. Disorganized peasantry trying to bypass an armored unit, let alone a powerful mage who can summon blizzards. Not too sure on that. Seems like he could have made more of an effort to save anyone during his purge instead of wholesale killing.

Seems like if you think it was the best choice, then you wouldn’t call it morally wrong.

Don’t really buy the argument they couldn’t realistically save some people out of the entire city.

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I disagree with his choice entirely. Especially in hindsight. I don’t see what good it did. Stratholm is still a flaming wreck teeming with Undead, and the Scourge destroyed Lordaeron and Quelthalas afterwards, under Arthas’s command. The Culling of Stratholm seems pointless in hindsight.

Arthas: “Lets kill everyone before they become an endless Zombie city … which it will be anyway. And then the whole land will too. Because of me.”

I can look at his choice and consider it the wrong choice in hindsight and in real time. If I were there, I would have left with Jaina and Uther.

It seems rather dumb to kill people before they are set to die. Tiring your soldiers by making them fight needlessly, and having them lose morale over killing their own people.

Using the Paladins and Mages and enlisting the Elves of Quelthalas - in fact, spreading the word to everyone - could have helped contain the spread.

I just don’t see the point. A quarantine and public awareness campaign would have been better.

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But then a quarantine becomes an outbreak, Cult of the Damned sneaking in to build Abominations, yadda yadda, Racoon City.

If mana-bombs were a thing back in W3, I think Stratholme would have been an acceptable target, especially if Mal’ganis was in the blast zone before he could start tricking Arthas into becoming the Lich King.

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Well we know that the Outbreak happened even with the Culling. The Culling did not stop the Outbreak.

Quarantine might have minimized the Outbreak and kept it isolated. Destroying all the grain in Lordaeron, once the grain was found to be the culprit, could have helped.

That would have been a more interesting dilemma than the Culling, and would have made more sense, imo (though it leaves out Arthas going to Northrend and becoming the Lich King, which was a major plot point of WC 3 anyway… But we are discussing alternatives) :

If we destroy our food, we can end the plague. Many of us will die of starvation. But the plague will be stemmed and the number of zombies would be reduced.

Better to have a chance at survival and stop the spread, than certain death.

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Yeah… I believe any question of whether what Arthas did was right or wrong can be answered when Arthas didn’t even try to save a single person. If he had, THEN if becomes morally gray.

He could of Quarantined the City, Evacuated the Populous, THEN raze the city.
Sure, it would of taken time and coordination but it was the RIGHT thing to do.

But what he did was not only the wrong thing, it was the WORST Option because all he did was FUEL the Scourge by given it more Dead to turn. His efforts were short-sighted, callous and ultimately all in vain.

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Yes, culling Strat was 100% the right call. Notice that despite their objections, Jaina and Uther never try to stop Arthas, they knew the plague had no cure (at the time) and such the city was doomed.

Now, where Arthas messed up was allienating his allies by not taking five minutes of his time to explain the necessity of his actions. But even that could have been fixed… eventually.

The BIGGEST mistake Arthas made was following Mal’ganis to Northrend, he was clearly being baited and he fell for it hook, line and sinker. What he should have done is remain in Strat to ensure every corpse was properly reduced to ashes. Then, either start hunting down members of the cult of the dammed while Mal’ganis twiddles his thumbs up north and/or return to the capital to explain the situation to his father.

At that point it pretty much depends of how Terenas reacts to the situation. I can eleborate, if asked, about I think the situation would go down but i think i have made my point here.

In the time it would have taken him to do that ppl would have started to turn undead, not to mention Mal’ganis himself shows up to start **** up during the quest.

Stratholme was doomed in every possible scenario.

You cant run a kingdom/country/whatever without getting your hands dirty.

Hell, even Anduin now has skeletons in his closet. From the spies he sent to their sure deaths despite being advised not to, to releasing Saurfang despite the backlash he may get once that comes out.

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Have any of you guys watched 28 Weeks Later? Even in a quarantine situation people are morons. It won’t matter to them that their family is sick with a highly contagious plague, they’ll still try to escape. Or even in the movie Resident Evil the Red Queen used brutal containment methods that were actually effective until, surprise, stupid people cracked open that tomb and let it out again leading to the entire city being destroyed.

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It was a no win scenario meant to test and showcase Arthas’ willingness to be decisive and drastic. Character traits the Legion knew they could use to lead him however they saw fit. Whether Arthas was right or wrong isn’t so much the question at the end of the day. I don’t think. What mattered was he was different. He could be goaded into making decisions that isolated him from his peers. And isolated he could be more easily steered.

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Indeed: Following Mal’Ganis to Northrend was the biggest mistake and could have been salvaged if Uther wasn’t whispering into Terenas’s ear.

Uther was corrupted by a belief system that didn’t accept a no win scenario and that was due to Faol’s teachings. If Xe’ra or some other Naaru were present their agreements with Arthas would have overridden any of Faol’s teachings to the point where Faol might as well have found himself excommunicated by the Church of the Light.

Faol corrupted the Alliance and the only thing that fixed his world view in any way was probably being killed, reanimated and given Velen’s lectures on Shadow Priests among other things.

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No, he was wrong.

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I’m not one to usually defend the needs of the many/utilitarian philosophy but what was the alternative here? There wasn’t a cure for the plague. Should they have erected a giant Dalaran style bubble over Stratholme and left them there until they could figure things out? They were pretty short on options at that point. You can say it was wrong but what else could they have done?

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This has nothing to do with this thread but i wanted to tell you your transmog is pretty damn good.

You kinda look like a lord of the rings character

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Culling of Stratholme is an actual example of moral grayness. Personally, as horrific as it was, I struggle to find where he was wrong. The plague was entirely an unknown to them; the symptoms weren’t entirely pinned down, so they had no way of knowing who had it or how it could spread.

In terms of it turning into Raccoon City afterwards anyway? Well, I’d imagine it wouldn’t turn into that had Arthas not come back with his mega zombie hordes of darkness.

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And said horde of darkness wouldn’t have been created if Terenas didn’t withhold the necessary backup on Uther’s words. Uther destroyed the Alliance due to Faol’s teachings.

All this makes one wonder where Faol got his teachings from… Clearly it couldn’t have come from the Naaru since they use the exact same extremist methods Arthas himself used so where?

Faol’s teachings seem suspiciously like Eonar’s teachings and her known proteges are the Wild Gods, Ysera and Alexstrasza yet none of these 3 seem likely to teach the Alliance’s Church of the Light so who is responsible for the Church’s teachings?

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I was gonna counter argue your comment, but then I got here and realized it would be an endless black hole of theories.

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Whatever it takes to try to cure the people, and not outright discard them like they’re rotten fruit. Pragmatism isn’t always the best option as it doesn’t take into account the consequences that occur with in the individual that takes such terrible actions. I think you see this with Arthas, and in some way you see it in the actions Sylvanas is taking now…

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