Comparing Secret Keeper plan and UV plan (Re: Why DD did not ask Snape)

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 166272

Dana:
> My problem with the whole Snape ordeal isn't so much the possibility
> that Snape was caught in his own web but the suggestion that DD would
> WANT Snape to kill him. I believe Snape did what he did out of his
> own free will even if it was limited by the vow. I still believe that
> if he was ready to die himself, that different choices leading up to
> the tower scene would have made it possible for him to die and still
> save Draco, Harry and DD. It is my opinion but I still am not
> convinced that Snape was prepared to die himself.

Pippin:

If Snape isn't prepared to die, he doesn't belong in the spy business,
no matter whose agent he really is.   "If you are ready...If
you are prepared" No matter which side Snape is really on, he had
some 'splainin' to do then and there was no guarantee that
the Dark Lord would be in a mood to listen.  He'd have to be an 
idiot not to know that there was a very good chance that 
Voldemort would off him before he got a word in edgewise. 

In peacetime there are few jobs which are more important than the
lives of the people doing them. In war the situation is reversed.
The mission is more important than the lives of  individual soldiers,
or it wouldn't be right to ask even the least and humblest of them
to stand in harm's way. 

Snape and Dumbledore are at war and the mission
is more important than either of them. If only one can be saved, then
the question is not which one deserves most to live but which one
is most vital to the success of the mission. It is Dumbledore's
job as commander to make that choice, and his choice might be
to sacrifice himself just as it was Ron's choice in the chess game.
Ron made sure everyone knew what they had to do, and then
he let himself be taken, because he knew that Harry, not he,
was best equipped to save the Stone.

Since we don't know exactly what Dumbledore's plan is, we're in no
position to tell if Snape or Dumbledore was more vital to it. 
But Dumbledore was. If the long term success of the Order's 
mission is more dependent on Snape being alive than Dumbledore, 
then Dumbledore would be betraying Harry and everyone else 
who is depending on him if he asked Snape to save his life 
instead of Snape's own. 

It really doesn't matter whether the vow takes effect or not, because
if Snape unequivocally demonstrates his loyalty to Dumbledore then 
he will die sooner or later, within a year if Karkaroff's
fate is any guide.  The vow only makes sure it's sooner.
And then the mission will have failed. Dumbledore will have failed.

I'm starting to like the idea that Snape could have taken on all four DE's 
on the tower, I really am. Because if we accept that, then it *can't* 
be beyond credibility that he could do something as simple as
fake an AK, maneuver Dumbledore's body to a soft landing, and release
Harry from the freezing charm. It ought to be a piece of cake 
compared to taking on four DE's at once.

Dana:
> The thing I can't get my head around is that it seems, when you look
> at the scene in the hospital wing, that most of the Order members at
> one point have asked DD about Snape's loyalties but it never made
> Snape do anything to convince them why he is truly loyal to them but
> we see him bend over backwards (lying or not) to assure the DEs will
> believe him.
> What is the difference? Or why is it different at all. 

Pippin:
Because Dumbledore can afford to let his people doubt Snape openly.
Sirius and Harry do it, and while Dumbledore stresses his own confidence
in Snape, and grows impatient when Harry demands that he justify it,
he never criticizes anyone for doubting Snape themselves.

But Voldemort can't afford to do that. He can't let any of his followers
even think that someone could be disloyal to him and live, or that he
could be fooled.He knows his servants are only obeying him out of
fear. If they think he's powerless to punish traitors, they'll desert him
just as they did before.

Pippin