The Explanation Of How "Echo Base" Got Its Name Seems Kinda Lame
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 5 ก.พ. 2025
- I hate the story of how Echo Base was named.
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"Why is it called Echo Base?"
"Because it will make the Empire search the galaxy for Alpha through Delta bases."
Good one
Perfectly sensible from a counterintelligence perspective. "Why is it called SEAL Team Six?" "So the Soviets don't know we only have two SEAL teams."
Despite being a, from my eyes, joking suggestion, it is a logical one. And going off that, let's say the Rebels officially called Yavin Tango base. And maybe a third base they have lying somewhere Alpha-Charlie base - that way you can see a pattern, and now the empire's searching for bases that don't exist because the rebels choose their base names at random.
XD
👍🤣
When i was younger and before i had internet i actually imagined that the Rebel alliance had to flee multiple times because of the Empire. I think it's heavily suggested in the movie. So Echo base being the 5 times (at least) they had to flee actually makes sense.
It's not just suggested, the alliance fleeing a previous base was one of the finales of the Rebels cartoon.
I wouldn't say fleeing necessarily, but abandoning them once they outlive their utility or become potentially compromised, most certainly. Example: Leia discloses Dantooine as a rebel base location to Tarkin, and his subordinates confirm him that the Rebellion occupied the site for a while but left long ago.
Rian Johnson added Krayt to this list. And it's to be expected that the base on Yavin IV was abandoned shortly after blowing up the Death Star on orbit for obvious reasons. With Hoth, that's already at least four successive rebel bases disclosed on screen (to which we might as well add the Polis Massa outpost from Revenge of the Sith, considering it seems to be Organa's base of covert operations including jedi rescues).
@@lucofparis4819 I agree with you except on one point. In both Disney Canon and Legends the rebels, for the first time, stood their ground at Yavin lV. And the Empire did not attack them until the Executor was completed, for fear of the rebel propaganda gold mine that an Imperial defeat would be.
One of the Battlefront games had this as some of their primary missions in the campaign
The rebels tried to find a suitable replacement for Yavin, trying out places from Ord Mantell to Boz Pity
The great temple on Yavin IV is 👌. Especially because they’re reusing a Sith temple. Also I wish echo base was named so because of your numerical reason.
Hey, it's Get_Fla.... Wtf
And not any Temple. One equipped with life force harvester 😉
Honestly i like the idea that someone said “haha guys its echoing in here lets call it echo base” and then it just stuck in lieu of an official and not stupid name, since I don’t think the rebels were there for too long
I kinda love the reasoning for Echo Base, it’s the kind of bullshit stupidity that bored soldiers come up with in the real world
They're likely going insane too from being stationed there too long. Isolation and poor living conditions does that to ya.
@@theamazingwhaleshark4478 firstly, absolutely correct. Secondly, love your tags dude 😂
I'd like to think that it was specifically a _complaint,_ and it stuck because everyone (senators to latrine orderlies) got pissed off at the constant echoing.
Sometimes it's best to leave parts of canon a mystery. The explanation, is usually very mundane, much like in real life. Especially with names.
Kind of like Palpatine’s first name.
@@AncestorEmpire1 Yeah, I don't know what George was smoking when he came up with 'Sheev'
@@Tuskin38 but his real first name is Frank. Because he must be frank.
@@Tuskin38 "Sheev" is from disney canon though, not from George.
@@Tuskin38 Except he didn't though? "Sheev" comes from the Tarkin novel, one of the first books in the Disney canon. Typical to blame George for stuff he didn't even do lol
We actually don't need "Echo" to be the fifth rebel base for this theory to be the case.
We know from Leias interrogation in A New Hope that the rebels had had a base on Dantooine that had already been abandoned at this point, and the movie ends with the base at Yavin being attacked by the Empire. The same happens at Echo Base, and we see the same pattern iterate itself in Star Wars Rebels.
Your theory about how the galactic civil war was going is spot on.
Giving this kind of names to your bases would mean that the empire would know how many you have when they intercept your communications so I guess it's better to give random names to confuse them
Seal Team Six would like a word
Ever heard of the high school senior prank of letting loose five pigs numbered 1, 2, 3, 4, 6?
this is actually how real militaries do things. Names and callouts should be arbitrary and random such that the sequence can only be understood by someone who was informed prior to the event what the sequence was.
A great example for this would be for announcing what stage of an operation you're in you don't say "phase 1, 2 ect." you just come up with random words, like "stage carrot" followed by "stage printer". This ensures that even if your communications are compromised your chatter is still only understandable to people who already know the sequence.
That was actually my first thought with the name Echo base. It definitely sounds like a name that got it’s origin from a few rebel grunts stationed on Hoth who got irritated by the constant echos, and the name just stuck. You could also see it as a form of counterintelligence. The empire could make the same conclusion as you did. After discovering Echo Base, Imperial Command might think “There must be at least 4 other bases on this planet, or in this system”. This means the Empire would waste time resources hunting for bases that aren’t there while the rebels could focus on relocating and regrouping.
i always thought "it's an 'echo' of the base on Yavin." that it is the rebellion 'echoing' through the galaxy after having to evacuate.
I think Echo Base being named after a property some Rebel pioneer grunts came up with on a crude map is actually quite charming. Waterfall Cave is a name given to a place in my D&D campaign because the party found it while making a map of the region they were in. They labeled it Waterfall Cave because they were just throwing a quick label on a map, and that name stuck. So it feels quite real to me and gives the Rebels this explorer vibe, like they are scouting out places no one else ever went to in their desperation for a real base.
I've actually never known this until now. I always figured it was called Echo base because the mountainous environment created a lot of echos. So similar to the canon explanation, but applied to the whole area instead of just the cave.
02:12 - Have to say, counting the bases you had to abandon might not be the best way to keep your troops moral up...
It’s like the inverse of a kill count.
@@Jaydee8652 "Well, you beat us again. Jolly good show, mate!"
It actually happens a lot for propaganda purposes and later wheb they win they claim vengeance
Agehm taliban
I like the Canon answer because you’d be surprised by how most locations get there names for often silly and very mundane reasons . Example: Wall St. is named for the defensive wall that used to guard Manhattan.
I'm pretty sure there are dozens, if not hundreds, of rivers across the US and UK with names that roughly translate to "I don't know", "River", or "What are you saying" because of the language barrier between foreigners and natives.
That's a concept I wanna see used more in Sci-Fi
I grew up next to Westmoreland county in PA. I knew my county was named after the marquis De la Fayette. When I asked how Westmoreland got its name I was told back in Washington's days as a surveyor he wrote "west, more land" on the map he made of the region and it stuck.
Local folklore or lazy name convention, either seems right.
@@tTaseric Polish named Germans Niemcy because they are niemy, did not speak any understandable language for Polish back then.
I always assumed that Echo base was a code name, so that even intercepted intel would be less helpful in finding it, rather than lets say fort hoth
Redditors have speculated that Echo Base was named after Echo, the clone from the Bad Batch and TCW. If he survived long enough to become known to or involved with the Rebellion, it's possible they named their base on Hoth after him. Pretty big retcon, like Rex on Endor, but Star Wars does like stuff like this.
The whole Rex on Endor did happen, but the old guy during ROTJ isn’t Rex. Filoni wanted it to happen but he never did it and just established Rex and the old guy (Nik Saint) are two different people both on Endor.
That’s just an awful idea personally
That's a completely shitty idea, wtf lol
@@LordVader1094 It's not. Hoth base Echo being named after the clone Echo or after an echo in a cave works as counterinteligence to Empire inteligence. Empire would try to look for Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Detla bases that do not exist becaue of such name. Empire loves numbers, Rebels not much. Since The Rebels show we know they both have inteligences and it's something normal in real life. One would say through their radio "Stage Carrot" that would mean "Phase 1" and only people from both sides of the radio knowing the subject would understand it. Random names for various operations and projects in military and in entertainment industry are for a reason.
I like the echo in Echo Base being taken literally, I think it shows that even when they were being pounded into the dirt (or I guess snow, in this case) by the Empire, the Rebellion had a sense of humor about things. The rebels were making their home on a planet that was completely miserable to live on, and they had a bit of a laugh in doing so! That is the spirit of the Rebellion to me, at least. Pilots and soldiers joking in the face of overwhelming odds, then giving it their all to defend liberty and freedom from an evil empire led by an ancient evil.
Apologies for flying in the face of your blind rage, but I actually like the idea of "dumb" names sticking and ending up official. It feels realistic. Like how in Stargate the official name for the unstable wormhole vortex became the "kawhoosh", or the DHD is named that after "Dial-Home Device", or the radio code transmitter for opening the Iris is called the GDO ("Garage Door Opener").
I agree. People seem to think that everything has to have a grandiose, epic explanation behind it but something more simple, and even arguably silly, such as this makes it more realistic. After all, the Pacific Ocean is called that because it's calmer than the Atlantic. If somebody can see an ocean, see that it's calm, then name it a version of 'passive' and have the name stick, then it's certainly plausible that somebody can step into a cave in which they want to build a base, hear an echo, then name it Echo Base.
@@joshuachase9742 Also, soldier's nicknames, especially pilots and their callsigns, are *never* cool. They're always something goofy, or silly, or especially embarassing for the soldier so-named.
It's actually a *very* believable reason for the base to have that name.
You give the bases totally anecdotal codenames so there's no reference the empire can get from the name.
Like the one they set up in rebels was called Chopper Base just after their droid.
The names have no identifying traits, but those who *know* about the base, know what's being talked about. Operational Security.
as good as your interpretation would have been, even had this official explanation not come out it still would have been easy to debunk. simply put, the star wars phonetic alphabet is different to ours (in the way that their letters are full words by themselves) like A is Aurek, B is Besh, C is Cresh etc. we know they use their alphabet pronunciations as a stand in for a phonetic alphabet from Star Wars Battlefront 2 (which is canon) where they refer to the command posts as Command Post Aurek, Command Post Esk and so on.
If only this was utilised more often, especially within canon. Alpha, Omega, Echo, Delta Squad, Alpha Company, Alpha Squad, Alpha Flight, Beta Squadron, Beta Company, Bravo Squad, Epsilon Company, Foxtrot Group, Gamma Squad, Kilo Squad, it just goes on and on with uninspired and often clashing Western Standard phonetic names for things.
except there's several dozens of examples of them using the western phenetic alphabet in canon and legends.
@@Tuskin38 Yeah, they also use the Latin alphabet in places (like droid names; it's not Resh2 and 3 Peth Osk or anything, it's R2 and 3PO).
@@f0rth3l0v30fchr15t though in the novels and maybe other sources, they always spell it out, like R2 is spelled out as Artoo. C-3PO, is See-Threepio.
Besh _and_ Cresh? Ouch, that's a poor choice for a phonetic alphabet. You don't want any word that could be easily mistaken for another.
Makes sense, calling it major base #5 is not good for a covert organisation or for moral. Naming conventions for rebellion bases should be ambiguous and disposable.
The problem with calling your base "5th base" is that it gives information away, even if that's all the enemy knows about it. Even if the bases were sequential and the Empire destroyed bases one through four, maybe they weren't sure that one of them had been yours, maybe they don't know exactly how long you've been operational, maybe they think you have more bases than you actually do.
The point is, as dumb as the other explanation is, it doesn't tell Imperial Intelligence anything about your base.
Ideally, you would number your bases, but you would pick those numbers by running two different models of random number generator, and flipping a coin each time to decide which one to use for that base.
To be perfectly fair, this type of naming was EXTREMELY common back when western countries were first being colonised and explored. Loads of rivers are translated to "River River" because foreigners asked what it was called, the natives said "River" in their own language, and the foreigners mistook that for the actual name.
Some of the most common western surnames are born purely based on what occupation their ancestors had, not because of some grand legacy (Smith, Fletcher, Miller, Baker)
How many animals in our world have names that are based on the most mundane observations? A blue ringed octopus, A hammerhead shark, etc.
My point is that some things just do have the type of name you'd come up with while 3 drinks down in a pub, and I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing.
I always thought it was called Echo base because if you yelled out inside of it that it would create an echo
I always thought though it was pretty lame for the shield generator to be out in the open for anyone to see. Especially from probe droids
My usual headcanon since I saw the movie is that these generators can't operate properly from underground, due to the massive power flowing from them to whatever altitude was chosen for the forcefield. We see the Empire doing the same thing on Endor: they have an underground facility for most of the infrastructure but the main dish projecting the field stands out in the open.
You know that official name and reason also adds detail to the world right?
As everyone has said, it fits the rebel aesthetic. These aren't trained military professionals, they're rebels and dissidents and disgruntled citizens taking up arms against an empire.
It's from a classic galactic song 🎶 called *Echo Base.*
It was about a Base so far away from anything else that it took a long time to get to.
_The only thing that helps me pass the time away_
_Is knowing I'll be back at Echo Base someday_
_Echo base, far away in time_
[x 16].
I thought someone shouted inside the cave and they heard the echo bounce back
Soldier: oh nice echo... you know what? we should call this cave Echo base, what do you think guys??
Han solo: Shut up Wesley!!
Feels like the first rebels to occupy the cave were like “oh I put the supplies in that… that one cave. You know the one. The one with the echo?”
And then variations of people saying “yeah it’s in the cave that echos.” Or “I saw Jim in the echo cave yesterday.”
And then it just got shortened to people saying “we’re gonna go to echo.” And variations of it where the name of the cave becomes just “echo”.
When I read the title the first thing I thought was "because it is in an big cavern that Echoes."
For me I thought it was called Echo base because it was a relay station or something where rebel transmissions where sent and then “echoed” to other bases and outposts
Patrolling Hoth almost makes you wish for a nuclear summer.
I don't mind the Explanation. It's totally believable as a dumb mundane but endearing in-joke of a name that just stuck over time and was made official.
Also I suppose in the star wars Universe you'd have Aurek Base, Besh Base, Cresh base.
I thought the base was named after CT-1409 who is the real “Echo”.
I like to think that was the reason, especially since Rex is one of the commanders in the alliance.
We're only one retcon away from that.
I'd love to have the base actually named for Echo, considering Rex had been confirmed to be on Endor.
Unfortunately, for this to happen requires Disney to actually make a smart retcon. With the exception of Rex, I just don't have that kind of faith in them.
The actual explanation is exactly what I thought it was. It’s a giant ice cavern of course it has a massive echo. And you can here the echo a bit in the movies and almost any video game like the old Battlefronts. Also I feel like it gives the rebel soldier more stay. It’s so mainstream and not “fancy”. The command didn’t really care what to name it when setting it up. But the dudes having to actually do the heavy lifting in setting it up sure as hell did.
The amount of salt in this video for the name Echo Base would be enough to turn Hoth into an ocean planet
You complain about the name Echo base, but then I think back to the days when my father told me he was temporarily based at a location in Vietnam called Long Coc.
The canon name for Echo Base honestly makes sense for how us, as human beings, typically name places xD. We are a very uninspired species when it comes to naming conventions.
I think the design if the rebel base are more down to earth more relatable of how we see base in RL compare to the empire which is different we have nothing that look like thar or ever will
Maybe Echo Base is named after Echo by Captain Rex, who's a member of the Rebel Alliance, in honor and memory of his fellow Clone.
There's Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Base Twentynine Palms. Technically named after the city which got it's name from the palms tress in the area. I'm sure there were 29.
as I was watching this video, I was hoping it's name would have come from something like the planet's ice and ice caves kept causing weird sensor Echos.
I never really bothered to put any thought into why Echo Base is named the way it is. I just kinda figured it was pulled out of a hat or something.
this kind of naming convention is pretty common where i come from. Here are a few examples that i can think of.
Gunung Senyum (Mount Smile) because the advisor smiled when the king asked him about the name of the mountain.
Kuching (Cat) because someone saw a cat there once.
Bukit Katil (Mount Bed) because the top of the hill is flat like a bed.
Melaka (a type of tree) because thats the tree the king sat under while they were trying to come up with a name for the place.
Negeri Sembilan (nine states) because it has 9 districs in it.
Kuala Lumpur (muddy river confluence) well you get the idea.
You do realize mundane explanations aren't bad, right? It fits with the Rebellion being very down to earth. Soldiers irl come up with dumb names for things, lol
I always thought they called it "Echo" base because it served as a sort of communications relay outpost. This would enable the alliance to coordinate efforts in many different areas (especially those who don't have direct communications). Therefore this site would "echo" messages they had received to further destinations (perhaps even changing encryption packages and the like).
This happens in the real world, squadrons are sometimes named after a joke. VFA-143 is nicknamed "Pukin Dogs" cause someone thought the emblem looked like a pukin dog. Note: It's debated on if a pilot from another squadron commented it on it or the CO at the time wife commented, either way the name just came about. It's not an uncommon thing. VFA-83 (Rams) gave their bird to VFA-131 (Wildcats) They didn't sand the Ram horns off and just painted a cat on it instead, thus RamCat came to be. They would even call out RamCat over the radio. Lame expiations are also the most true ones. Echo Base seems like a backwater base that wasn't suppose to be fully maned the people that were there probably were told they were going to "Hoth Base" and then they got there and boredom set in so they did what military does and started renaming things in a derogatory way and thus Echo Base was born.
SEAL Team 6 didn't mean it was the 6th SEAL team, but it certainly wouldn't do them any harm if people thought it was...
I also thought that Echo was just meant to be a phonetic letter E. And I do like the story that tells about the Rebels. But I also think there's good storytelling potential in Echo being named because the caves echoed. It tells a different story, one of a less professional and less structured military. The Empire is very organized. Every weapon, every base, every soldier has a serial number. Its all very logical and orderly. It needs to be in order to keep track of a galaxy spanning empire of assets. But its also very dehumanizing. The Rebel Alliance on the other hand is exactly the opposite. They don't have legions of soldiers or armadas of ships. For the most part all they have is the clothes on their backs and the guys standing next to them. They're a small and tight knit group. What little they have isn't identified with precisely tracked serial numbers. It's given names.
I also heard a fan theory that it was named after the clone trooper "Echo" from the bad batch, who presumably eventually joins the Rebellion like Rex did. But I also dislike this idea as it just doesn't fit in with the Rebellion's style.
I don’t mind the explanation. Military personnel give weird nicknames to each other and to locations. Sometimes it has some deep meaning, plenty of times it follows some mundane logic, other times it only makes sense to those who came up with the name and is nonsensical to everyone else. I say this as someone who got nicknamed cheese for a whole deployment by someone who clearly had cheese on the mind when cause he told me he just looked at me and saw a block of cheese and that was just the first thing that came out of his mouth.
Admittedly there are plenty of cites and other locations that have gotten there names for some simple reason such as naming it after a hill or some guy who owned it first. If the city is old enough the language might of changed enough that you didn't realize it was talking about a river or it was originally two words that got merged together.
I mean, that's how things get named in real life.
First of all, regarding the phonetics, that assumes that the Rebel Alliance is using an alphabetic system that would map cleanly onto English, and while the "Galactic Basic" of Star Wars is spoken in the films as English, that may simply be a translation convention as far as we know. That having been said, Star Wars is a little inconsistent about whether written languages in that setting as being cleanly mappable onto English and Roman alphabets or not (the Death Stars having the designations DS1 and DS2 for example) so while I can't discount something like that, I don't think it's something we can safely assume either.
Of course, I can still see Echo base as being named after the echoing in the caves when they first started moving in, even if it was a bit tongue-in-cheek. The nickname stuck and people just kept using it even when divorced from the original use and the sentiment surrounding it. That kind of thing happens all the time, why do you think we still call the common computer input device a "mouse" after all?
Still, the notion that the Rebel Alliance had multiple bases that they've evacuated before to evade the kind of force concentration the Empire could muster is still signaled in the films themselves, albeit without the implication of sequential naming. Don't forget that Leia tells Tarkin in Episode IV that the rebel base is on Dantooine, and the Imperial forces that scouted it reported evidence of a base having been there that had since been abandoned. Leia fed them the location of an old base that they hadn't found yet to throw the Empire off the scent, and though it didn't work it did delay them. So by the beginning of Episode V that's at least three rebel bases that have been established.
According to Star Wars: Twilight Company, the Rebel Alliance maintains a single headquarters that they occasionally relocate and keep hidden. Various different rebel cells and groups operate semi-independently, selecting and fighting targets of opportunity as they go, while the command staff (who are the only ones who need to know where the main base is) make occasional trips to visit headquarters to share and receive intel and supplies and to get new orders, with the headquarters serving to coordinate their desperate efforts into a united front.
So that worldbuilding was here, just not via the name.
It could've also been something cooler, like the planet's minerals creating echos of its caverns spread out and overlap when pinged with sonar/ scanners.
That'd justify why the rebels chose to hide there of all places while maintaining the feeling of secrecy and danger of detection it holds.
Yeah, I assumed Echo base was because it echoes.
But I was thinking it could be because things kept repeating there. Such as the same battles in a war occuring almost identically. Or because people get wasteland madness, and keep gettijg dejavu, claiming something has happened, which is helped by the poor logistics, and sometimes multiple identical supply drops coming in at once, and the records of earlier ones being lost or never made. Or maybe some strange force magic really does go on there, causing events to seemingly repeat.
when did we go from Investigating alternate worlds to talking mad shit about them?
I think your explanation that it started off as a joke and that more members of the Rebels started to use it would make sense - and an extension could be that the idea started to become popular and the base got named that because some Rebel leader said 'we're expecting them to slowly freeze in here we can at least give them something to laugh about'.
A lot of military bases on Earth, especially more hastily-constructed forward bases, are named for recently fallen service members. Some have even been re-named for a member who died in defence of them.
It could have been a reference to Echo from Clone Force 99, and a nod that they were not only undertaking operations for the Rebellion up to this point, but that Echo had fallen in the line of duty in such a way to earn the honour of a base named for him. Perhaps being involved in the evacuation of the previous site, or counter-intel operations to throw the Empire off of the base's location for some time.
Since Rex was present on Endor later on, it seems only reasonable that the Bad Batch remain active well into this time period.
It's a bit cheap to retroactively name Echo base after a new character. Star Wars has had enough meddling with the previous canon.
Not something I'd get over excited about. Although I accept that your explanation is better. The only argument against it is that it would be bad for the rebels to name their bases in such an obvious way. If the Empire attacks a base and finds it is called Echo base because it is the fifth base, the they know there are at least four other bases.
Echo base is a marvel of a set design.
Given how long the conflict had been going on I would find it odd if that was only the fifth major base of the rebels, especially if the empire sometimes comes along and destroys them. Although its possible that Echo Base was in such a remote location that the Empire couldn't find it for many years. When you consider the side of the planet and the explored section of the galaxy they are lucky they found it at all by shooting probes at random planets.
Yes, I just assumed it was like how military bases are named via jargon, and yes, the ‘actual’ reason is silly. But I have no idea why that would piss you off so much; so what? It’s a dumb nickname, not worth going bald faster over. Just take it a as lesson to to come up with a better origin convention.
So you basically thought it was Babylon 5.
Of all the things to be upset about in Star Wars story telling, this doesn't even make a footnote on the last page of a 1000 page list of complaints.
My head cannon explanation for Echo Base was that it was used as a way for disparate Rebel cells across the galaxy to be able to safely communicate with one another through intermediaries. If a certain rebel cell needed support, or supplies, or information, they could pass that request to echo base; and it would be relayed to the appropriate cell for support. This would mean that if any given cell was captured, they would have no knowledge of the other cells or even how to contact them. Only by capturing Echo Base itself could the empire hope to disrupt the rebel communication networks.
Given that in Rebels they named "Chopper Base" after Chopper who helped find/secure it, I would have asumed they named this base after Echo from the Bad Batch.
its something I wouldn't lose sleep over, but I guess to some, it's THAT important, lol
3:12 You mean like the US Army naming it's largest and most prominent bases after enemies of the state?
But your official vs unofficial naming rationale is fun, like Uncle Sam.
My theory was that there were multiple bases around Hoth with phonetic alphabet names and Echo Base was simply the largest of the bunch, hence it being our main viewpoint. In my head, the Battle of Hoth had more fronts than the one we saw with Imperial troops storming multiple bases while the main armored force broke through towards the shield generator and Echo Base.
"Now let's get you warmer and then to work. It never gets comfortable here, and you don't quite get used to it, but there are ways to make it livable." -- GENERAL PHILAP BYGAR
I like your explanation better.
Me, I believe it was probably called Command Center E/Esk, just one of numerous secondary sites that were chosen in case Yavin Base was compromised and had to be abandoned in a hurry, but the Rebels kept calling it Echo Base because of the damned acoustics and the name stuck.
The real missed opportunity of Echo Base. Is that the rebels did not have an auto targeting/auto fire function on the ion canon. Not only could it have helped cover their escape as they evacuated. But they could potentially crippled at least half of an imperial fleet before the remaining ships moved out of range.
If they have to pack up and flee time and time again, then you could say that each new base is just an "echo" of the previous base, eh?
This is a great example of star wars over explaining everything.
Honestly though the explanations dont have to be mutually exclusive. It's a common trope that soldiers especially those in rather desperate situations will use things like comedy or poetry or regular bantering to cope with things. It could be coincidental that it was named echo and someone made a joke that stuck and was repeated so much it was seen by all as the reason it was called echo base. It's not at all far fetched my dude.
I want to believe it's named after Clone Trooper Echo, a hero during the Empire's initial years
Another explanation for the name "Echo Base" could be that it was a communicacions stations, relaying messages from Alliance High Command to the Galactic South, like an Echo.
Another little detail in this same vein: the ion cannon. They had just barely gotten the speeders winterized and the base up and running by the time of empire. Yet, they have this MASSIVE and presumably expensive gun already online and ready to go. Seems like a huge resource sink while there's still so much to do.
Unless you think about it. Presume, if you will, that there were previous bases. Perhaps not alpha, bravo, etc but like they're not still on Yavin for a reason after all. At least one of those had to go TERRIBLY and that's when the rebels learned their lesson. They need to have an evacuation plan from the word go in case it happens again. So when the Hoth attack happened they had the ion cannon and shield online so they had time to escape.
Just another detail I think about
Nah, the Ion Cannon was connected to the same heating that kept the rest of the base survivable and powered by the main generator. The air speeders had to be self sufficient in the cold and that takes more time.
@@notnotkevinjohn Still a highly expensive and resource intensive installation that you could only ever use once.
I thought it was named after that Martha And The Muffins song. 'Echo Base, far away inside, Echo Base far away inside...'
Could always hope it changes again as all i thought of was Echo from CW and BB. That'd be nice, similarly to what they did in real life...naming places or bases after others before them who have done some great deed or their sacrifice was so noteworthy etc.
I like the idea that they named if as their 5th base, but some gullible administrator (who went on to write down the history) heard troops joking that it was named for the acoustics and believed it.
I think it’s actually a clever name. In Phoenix, there’s a mountain range south of town called “South Mountain.” North of town is “North Mountain.”
To the east is a range of mountains with four distinct peaks called “Four Peaks.”
In Papago Park are a smaller and larger pair of buttes, called “Big Butte” and “Little Butte.” Also in Papago Park is this big rock with a hole in it that is called…yes - “Hole in the Rock.”
Compared to those names, Echo Base sounds almost sophisticated.
That would have been an interesting idea except for the fact that the military alphabet in Star Wars is different from ours, for example alpha in they’re world is aurik. (sorry if the spelling’s wrong, I only heard the word and I’ve never seen how it’s spelled. I also got this information from voice lines in BattleFront 2 so it might be non-cannon.)
Vader: That's it the Rebels are there.
A base underwater would be probably called Bubbles Base and it makes me giggle ngl
I'm betting it will be retconned to be named by Rex after the clone "Echo" at some point.
Their where other bases on Hoth like outpost delta in the battlefront book twilight company
Don’t forget the worst condition in Echo Base: the intense, disruptive, and disturbing sexual tension infecting the entire command staff.
Oh you're alone we'll put your last name as Solo...
His idea was pretty clever and would've been some fun worldbuilding.
Prepare for the retcon when echo base becomes named after echo the clone
In the real world, when a location is not named after a real person or group of people it often has a mundane origin, usually based on some notable geographic distinction. Portland (land near the port), Las Vegas (The Meadows), Costa Rica (Rich Coast), Antarctica (opposite of the north), etc. Its actually a minor miracle that the base's name does not having anything to do with ice, snow or cold.
I mean, technically it'd be Esk Base in Aurebesh, though Echo does exist in the Galactic Standard Alphabet.
Their previous base was called squishy base. They had to evacuate the exogorth shortly after.
Leia: Base names are to be kept to non-indicative alphanumerics. Our 4th and 5th built bases were occupied on the same day, so if noone has a preference the naming will be decided by coin-toss. Hoth base, please mute your microphone when you aren't talking.
Hoth: Sorry, we only caught part of that. The base's acoustics are terrible
Leia: Echo it is then
Given that they probably surveyed a bunch of places for a new main base I wouldn't be surprised if the person who discovered this potential base gave it an non-clever nickname because they didn't think command would choose the candidate that was literally a den of Wampas. A dumb name that the guy thought they would change later but apparently never did.
Alternatively it could be named after the clone Echo, due to some epic unrevealed run-in with Clone Force 99.
Setting up a base in the "Echo Caves" and it naturally ending up being called Echo Base imo is a lot more natural and organic worldbuilding than just slapping generic Western-design Phonetic Alphabet that we already see saturating so much of Star Wars.
Short for ... "Extremely Cold Hoth Outpost" !
Even though its not borne out in the movie at all I always head cannoned that Hoth was a rebel fortress world and that the battle of echo base was the empire finally attack the central command on that world after cracking many other such bases. that's why the force is ultimately so small. Just a few ATATs and Chicken walkers with ground support the imperial fleet didn't even have enough fighter's left after months of fighting to provide air support and has the squadron just on small patrols for fleeing defenseless ships. In my head canon there are areas of Hoth strewn with broken imperial and rebel starships felled by planetary ion canons and ship mounted turbo-lasers alike. I mean the imperial fleet is like 10 ships max by the time of the escape while we know the empire could've spared hundreds or thousands at this point to crush the main rebel army on Hoth. So, I think while han and Luke were in the frozen wastes the rebels were fighting a harrowing defense preparing for evacuation. Finally after millions die on both sides Vader deploys his personal 501st element with armor support to land the killing blow, and that is the battle we see in the movie. The final battle of a months long planetary invasion.
Honestly it would have been just as good as your Phonetic Alphabet explanation if Echo Base was named due to be originally being a listening post? They heard the "echoes" of Imperial transmissions