So we all know about the controversy of the Spartan-II program. We all know how John and 74 other children were abducted from their homes at the age of six and forced to endure the augmentations in order to fight effectively against the insurrection. We’ve gone over the morality of the program in several pieces of fiction, especially after 343 took over and started to have a more in depth look into the Chief’s character. Yet, when looking upon the Spartan-III program, we’ve have barely had anything going over the morality of the program, besides Halo: Last Light. In fact, it almost feels like the S-IIIs are ignored (I’d at almost because, again, Halo: Last Light) in favour of the S-IIs.
I’ll just put this out there, but the Spartan-III program is by orders of magnitude worse than the S-II program, and far more into the black end of the morality spectrum. The only thing you could really say the S-IIIs are better than the S-IIs is the fact that they were made to avoid extinction, that’s it. Now how are the S-IIIs worse off compared to the S-IIs? Well, let’s have a look. The S-IIIs candidates were extracted from vengeful children from glassed colonies who seek to take vengeance on the aliens that killed their families. This is the equivalent to offering candy to children, and taking them away with you. The S-IIIs weren’t just 6 year olds, but within the range of 4-11 years of age, and it wasn’t just a simple 75 children being taken away, but over 900 children, after losing their homes, were taken aware, experimented on and intentionally made to die in droves. Over 900 children and if the the Covenant War had drawn out for longer, this would easily go into the thousands, with the Spartans being sent to the battlefield at the ages of 5-15 years of age. Thousands of children purposefully built to die.
Then there’s the S-IIs who are given advance technology such as the MJORNIR powered assault armour which could take up a great deal of protection, especially with the introduction of energy shields. What do the S-IIIs get? Beside a select few such as noble team, the S-IIIs are given the greatly inferior Semi Powered Infiltration armour that could barely take a plasma bolt. Doesn’t help they the S-IIIs are purposely sent to die in droves.
The last major offender is the fact that, throughout the fiction and the community, the S-IIIs have been greatly ignored with very little exploration into the morality of the program. Yes, we have Last Light going into the morality of the program from an outsider’s perspective, along with some stuff in Ghosts of Onyx, but with the S-IIs, we’ve had both an outsiders and an insiders perspectives into the program, in depth looks into the S-IIs. This doesn’t help with the introduction of the Spartan-IV program and pieces of fiction such as Hunt the Truth season 1 (as much as I greatly enjoyed the series), much of the community has an incredibly large focus on either the S-IIs or the S-IVs, with barely anything going over the S-III program. We’ve seen people debating about the actions of Halsey, yet in comparison to Ackerson and Parangosky, she’s practically a Saint. I don’t get me started on Gamma Company.
I apologise the the long rant, but I can’t help but write this up as, while we do have a great insight into the S-II program and I do enjoy exploring the morality of it, I can’t shake the feeling that the S-IIIs, despite having similar origins, arguably superior training and have made significant impacts in the Covenant War, are being almost completely ignored in favour of the S-IIs and the Master Chief especially. The S-IIIs are a significant part in the fiction with an interesting backstory and it’ll be interesting to see the morality of the program explored further, instead of the constant focus on the S-II and S-IVs.