Why don't Narns and Centauri like each other?

[RoJoHen]

I can't remember if it was ever really talked about in the show, but what initially started the conflict between Centuari and Narns?

I know that the Narn used to be an agricultural people until the Centauri came along.

I also remember Londo talking about how the Centauri have a Manifest Destiny. Was it just a matter of the Centauri encountering the Native Americans of Narn and deciding to take over their land? Or was there something more?

 

[Temis the Vorta]

I always got the impression the Centauri were imperialistic, arrogant jerks - maybe racist (or speciesist?) too - who basically wouldn't get along with their neighbors unless their neighbors were belligerent and heavily armed.

 

[Leroy]

Why didn't the Centauri try to conquer earth if they are so warlike?

 

[RoJoHen]

Why didn't the Centauri try to conquer earth if they are so warlike?

That's kind of the point I'm trying to make.

Why is all of their aggression directed at Narn?

Yes, during the war they were attacking some of the lesser worlds, like the Drazi, to create a "buffer zone," but their primary concern has always been the Narn.

 

[Blamo]

Why didn't the Centauri try to conquer earth if they are so warlike?

By the time the Centauri found Earth they were no longer following an expansionist policy and their empire was in decline.

The more "recent" aggression towards the Narn was because they successfully fought back the Centauri and began their own empire building.

 

[MarianLH]

Londo said--in "The Gathering", if I remember correctly--that the Republic had become decadent and lost the will to conquer by the time they encountered Earth. Londo's driving motivation, and downfall, was the desire to return to those "glory days" when the Centauri were still conquerers. Step one, regain control over their former subjects, the Narn.


Marian

 

[Reverend]

Why didn't the Centauri try to conquer earth if they are so warlike?

Earth had no military or strategic value and by the time they met us, they were already on the slide toward decadence. Like the latter days of the British Empire when we'd gotten bored of nicking countries, stopped squabbling with France and Spain over who gets to keep what part of Asian and just got to the part where all the barons and merchants get all fat and blustery.
Narn being almost smack in the middle of the League and presumably having exploitable resources combined with a Centauri Republic at the height of it's expansion all contributed to what happened. By comparison, Earth is out in the sticks.

To answer the original question though, Narns don't like Centauri because they turned up and enslaved them for a century, until they were driven off. As for why the feeling is mutual, I think it's more a matter of wounded pride and false nostalgia for a time no living centauri was even around to see.

 

[scorpius1701]

Bear in mind as well that literally the minute the Centauri started gaining strength again, they attacked Babylon 5 in "The Fall Of Night." They didnt attack Earth because they couldnt but later opened up the war on 11 fronts.

 

[Orintho]

The Centauri conquered and enslaved the Narns - twice.

 

[RoJoHen]

^Thanks for that insight.

I'm trying to get an idea of why they became enemies in the first place. If the Narn did something to warrant being conquered...or if the Centauri were just dickheads that enslaved them because they could.

 

[Skywalker]

The latter. The Centauri were empire-building when they first encountered the Narn. At that time the Centauri Republic was "the Lion of the Galaxy." The only thing the Narn did wrong was get in the Centauri's way.

 

[Reverend]

A couple quotes that seam pertinent:-
G'Kar about the occupation.

"Why does any advanced civilization seek to destroy a less advanced one? Because the land is strategically valuable, because there are resources that can be cultivated and exploited, but most of all - simply because they can. You have experienced much the same on your own world. There are humans for whom the words "never again" carry special meaning. As they do for us."

Sinclair to G'Kar

"In order to be free you had to learn to fight. No one questions that. But you've overcompensated. You are like abused children who have grown big enough to do the same thing to someone else as if it would somehow balance the scales. It won't. If you let the anger cloud your judgement, it will destroy you."

Londo's version of events.

Londo: When we first met the Narn they were, what, a primitive people. We gave them technology centuries ahead of their own, took them with us to the stars, taught them laws, civilized them. They repaid us with terror and death.
Torqueman : So you're saying that the Centauri originally came to help the Narns?
Londo Of course. And at considerable expense, I might add. Which is why we finally left. We wished them well, but the cost, you've seen.
Torqueman: Then you weren't driven off the Narn homeworld?
Londo: Please. The Narn have rewritten history enough, don't you think? If they wanted us gone, we were hardly going to force the issue. But ever since, they have grown more and more irrational, have gone out of their way to harm us, to seize Centauri territory. Finally, we had to take a stand. They were the ones who declared war. Not us. We want only peace.

It's worth noting that neither Londo nor G'Kar were alive when the occupation started. G'Kar actually grew up in a Centauri household and was still very young when the occupation ended. Londo Was on Centauri Prime, at the Royal palace and probably didn't even see a Narn until he was an adult.
Oh and of course there's the Vorlon perspective.

Kosh: They are alone. They are a dying people; we should let them pass.
Sinclair: Who, the Narn or the Centauri?
Kosh: Yes.

 

[Sean_McCormick]

One thing that is amiss with Centauri-backstory is, that we get told, that they had a huge empire in the past, but the only former subject-race we meet are the Narn, which at that time didn't have space flight capability, so what we "get" of the huge empire is Centauri Prime, Narn and some centauri planets without intelligent life, which are still in centauri possesion

What is missing here are other former subject-races of the Centauri, or planets, that were abandoned by the Centauri and then taken over by other races.

 

[Cary L. Brown]

I can't remember if it was ever really talked about in the show, but what initially started the conflict between Centuari and Narns?

I know that the Narn used to be an agricultural people until the Centauri came along.

I also remember Londo talking about how the Centauri have a Manifest Destiny. Was it just a matter of the Centauri encountering the Native Americans of Narn and deciding to take over their land? Or was there something more?

The Centauri were an imperialist power, in their decline by the time they invaded Narn.

Once upon a time, the Centauri had been a powerful force in the galaxy. And they probably focused mainly on powers worthy of their notice while ignoring the "little fish."

Something between 100 and 200 years prior to B5, the Narn homeworld was invaded by the Centauri. The Centauri treated this as "liberation" and as "civilizing" them (think about the European colonial activities of the past centuries).

Narn were taken off-world to serve as servants and so forth, and turned into a "cheap labor force" to help support the Centauri "Republic" (which was never a republic at all... Republics don't have Emperors!). It's easy to do when the people you're subjugating aren't "really human" like you are (as our own history shows!)

The Narns were a pre-industrial, agrarian society. Probably close to what we were like from the 14th to the 17th centuries? They originally welcomed the Centauri (heck, the Centauri would've been accepted as almost being GODS at first!), but eventually (after a generation or two) I'm sure that the luster was lost. Technology doesn't impress if you've grown up seeing it your whole life, does it?

The discontent increased... and I'm sure that the repression increased accordingly. Who knows, the original "visitation" may have literally had good motives... but after 100 years of occupation, it had become a clear situation of MASTERS and SLAVES.

The Centauri, still watching their influence decline throughout the galaxy, were loath to let go of ANYTHING that they had their hands on... and jealously so, I'm sure.

So it eventually led to a civil insurrection, and undoubtedly a fairly violent one. The Narns "forced" the Centauri off their world, remember... and while the Centauri could've just bombed it back into the stone age (something that they actually DID do, though much later!), they chose to cut their losses and retreat.

Of course, the Narns had been doing all the "heavy lifting" of that society for a long time and had become technologically knowledgeable as a result. And I'm sure that the Centauri left not only their knowledge and some facilities, but probably a fair amount of technology (though not the really sensitive stuff) behind.

So, the Narns hate their prior "masters" and the Centauri resent their prior "servants" (and all the moreso because that was the last hint of the prior glory of a vast, conquering interstellar empire once held by the Centauri).

That pretty much explains everything...

 

[David cgc]

Why didn't the Centauri try to conquer earth if they are so warlike?

By the time the Centauri found Earth they were no longer following an expansionist policy and their empire was in decline.

I remember one of the B5 reference books pointed out that if the Centauri had found Earth even 25 or 50 years earlier, they would've been conquered just as the Narn were.

 

[Meredith]

Narns were like the Native Americans and the Centari moved in and took over the planet from a bunch of Farmers and you don't piss off Farmers.

 

[Sean_McCormick]

[...] Centauri "Republic" (which was never a republic at all... Republics don't have Emperors!)
[...]

That we don't know. They might have been a real republic, which then was reformed into an monarchy by some strong historic figure. The Roman Empire, which AFAIK the Centauri were modeled one, was a republic for ca 450 years (510 to 44 BC), before Caesar overthrew the goverment and made himself dictator, which led to the imperial period.

 

[MarianLH]

And IIRC they still called themselves a republic after the Caesars took over. I recall the legion banners still said SPQR right up until the end.


Marian

 

[Cary L. Brown]

And IIRC they still called themselves a republic after the Caesars took over. I recall the legion banners still said SPQR right up until the end.

Interesting... I wasn't aware of that. I did get the the Centauris were, in part, based upon the Roman Empire (with quite a bit of French in there as well, I think!). But I've learned something new today... cool.

 

[Reverend]

In terms of costume design I always got more of an Austro-Hungarian/Tzarist Russia vibe than flat out Roman. Though Rome was of course very influential on both of those Empires (Tzar being a corruption of Caesar and all.)

As for being a Republic. I wouldn't put too much stock in what a government calls itself. Half the cesspit, corrupt countries in the world call themselves "the free republic of such-and-such" or the "people's democracy of whatyou'm'callit". Dosen't been there's isn't a psychotic bastard and a bunch of thugs with machettes running the joint.
Also I get the impression the balance of power in the Centauri Republic is weighed against the Centaurum. If I recall the Emperor can be legally overridden with a 3/4 vote. The reason Cartagia was allowed to go all Caligula was probably due to Londo knocking off Reffa. Without him there was a power vacum and the Centaurm became factionalised allowing Cartagia free roam, with a little help from Morden I belive.

Hey, even my country calls itself the "United Kingdom". We havn't had a king for half a century and a country with three separate parliaments isn't exactly united.