GoF CH 27-29 Post DH look/ Snape and Harry redux

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 182262

Carol earlier:
> > And I submit that those people were killed before the Potters but
after the Prophecy was known. All of the people named, including the
Potters, were killed within a short time after the photograph was
taken, and the Prophecy had been revealed considerably more than >
fifteen months before the Potters' deaths. <SNIP>
> 
> Alla:
> 
> Not that I think it matters, I mean Voldemort kept killing other 
people till he gathered the knowledge of how to kill prophecy couple,
so what? Does not mean IMO that prophecy couple was not his favorite
target, but I do not think we can say with certainty that photograph 
> was taken after prophecy was already made.
> 
> I would think Potters would not have been on photograph and in
hiding then.

Carol responds:
As I understand it, the photograph was taken shortly before the
Potters went into hiding. Needless to say, all of the people I listed
were killed after the photograph was taken, some of them only two
weeks later. And the McKinnons, as we know from DH, were killed
*while* the Potters were in hiding. Voldemort did not stop killing
people to concentrate on the Potters. In fact, had it not been for
Peter Pettigrew, he could not have found the Potters to kill them. So,
meanwhile, he concentrated on other people who were threatening his
regime. Even if they couldn't kill him because of the Horcruxes, they
could kill his followers, and Voldemort wanted no opposition. Note
that after he was restored to his body, he kept on killing people who
had nothing to do with Harry, including the Muggle Frank Bryce, the
innocent Cedric, who was merely in his way (I know that technically,
Wormtail killed Cedric, but it was on LV's orders), and the now
useless Bertha Jorkins (who was probably fed to Nagini). He killed
Dorcas Meadowes personally, just as, much later, he killed Amelia
Bones personally. Voldemort had many reasons for killing people, and
he obviously wanted the Order members out of the way both before and
after he learned about the Prophecy. He was still killing Order
members as of HBP (Emmeline Vance) and he also, of course, wanted
Dumbledore ("the only one he ever feared") dead. Harry was by no means
his only target or the only obstacle to Voldemort's reign. Had he
remained in hiding (no Pettigrew), Voldemort would have kept on
killing until Harry emerged to go to Hogwarts, at which time he could
act to thwart the Prophecy (and succeed in doing so if Lily wasn't
present or wasn't given a chance to live). Notice that Voldemort
doesn't stop killing when he's obsessed with the Elder Wand or when
he's ordered Draco to kill dumbledore. The only reason he stops
killing in OoP is that he's keeping his return a secret until he hears
the Prophecy. When that plan fails and he's seen by Fudge and the
Aurors, it's back to murder and mayhem, some of it systematic (killing
Order members and important opponents like Amelia Bones is strategic;
even destroying the Muggle bridge results from a threat to Fudge (turn
over the Ministry to me or I'll kill a bunch of Muggles). Voldemort's
goal is not merely to destroy the Chosen One. He wants to take over
the Ministry and Hogwarts, and he'll kill anyone who gets in his way
or presents a threat of any kind.
> 
> Carol:
> <SNIP>
> ( Why should the Potters do better than the Prewitt
> > brothers, who between them took five DEs to kill?
> 
> Alla:
> 
> Because I do not remember reading that they defied Voldemort three 
> times, that's why.

Carol:
You know, I wonder about that "defied [Voldemort] three times"
business. What does it mean? The Longbottoms also defied Voldemort
three times, yet they were Crucio'd into insanity by four Death
Eaters, one of them a boy of nineteen. And Frank was an Auror, too, so
you'd think that he had defied Voldemort more than three times. (So
was Alice, if we take OoP rather than GoF as our authority.) *All* of
the Order members defied Voldemort at least once simply by joining the
Order. And whatever they did for the Order was also a form of
defiance. I think that James, at least, defied Voldemort by refusing
to become a Death Eater. Possibly, the Longbottoms, both Pure-Bloods,
were given the same choice. Certainly, their defiance did not consist
of fighting Voldemort face to face. Not being "the Chosen One," they
would have died in the attempt. Dumbledore is the only Wizard who can
out-duel Voldemort (and could have killed him if he hadn't had a
number of reasons not to do so. Maybe Grindelwald, armed with the
Elder Wand, could have done so if he hadn't been in Nurmengard, but no
one else could). I do wish that James hadn't been wandless in DH, but
even if he'd had a wand, he would have died. Voldemort would have
known the spell he intended to cast before he cast it. (Harry, of
course, defeats Voldemort, but not through skill or power.)
> 
> Carol earlier: 
> > You don't seem to understand that Voldemort was to all intents and
purposes immortal because of the Horcruxes. <SNIP>
> 
> Alla:
> 
> Yeah, I do. I also understand that all it takes to destroy him is to
destroy his horcruxes one by one and teenagers seem to do quite well.
**Teenagers** and two of who, were without any special abilities. 

Carol responds:
No special abilities? Maybe not, but Ron won the right to use the
Sword of Gryffindor through his courage and chivalry in a time of
need, and his ability to mimic the word "open" in Parseltongue enabled
him and Hermione to enter the CoS and destroy the cup with a Basilisk
fang. And Hermione's book knowledge kept them alive when grown Wizards
(and Goblins) were being killed. They survived but Dirk Cresswell and
Ted Tonks and Gornuk didn't. And had it not been for Harry's scar
link, they wouldn't have found the Ravenclaw Horcrux or known that LV
knew that his Horcruxes were being found. Not to mention that only
Harry could get the memory from Slughorn that informed DD how many
Horcruxes there were; only Harry could speak Parseltongue to open the
CoS and destroy the diary; only Harry could persuade Helena Raenclaw
to tell the story of the diadem; only Harry could open the locket
Horcrux so that Ron could destroy it.

Alla:
> Just imagine Dumbledore telling order members what the things are
and sending them to find those things. I sincerely doubt for example
that Arthur Weasley would have been considered less true Gryff than
his son. <snip>

Carol responds:

But he wouldn't have had the Sword of Gryffindor, which comes to a
"true Gryffindor" (other than its owner, DD) only under conditions of
peril and need. the Sword could not have been used to destroy
Horcruxes had Harry nof first killed the Basilisk with it. DD didn't
know what the Ravenclaw Horcrux was or where to look for it. And he
couldn't have taken a grown Order member with him in the boat to find
the fake locket Horcrux because the boat was designed to carry one
Wizard and one person or creature whose powers wouldn't register (so
that someone other than Voldemort would be foreced to drink the
potion). "One alone could not have done it," says Dumbledore, and two
Wizards could not ride in the boat unless one was underage. And,
surely, Dumbledore would not have expected another Order member to
drink the potion, even if they were skilled enough to figure out how
to get in. (As I said before, Reggie didn't figure it out. Kreacher
remembered how to get in.)

So, we would need for Dumbledore to find the Chamber of Secrets
himself and get inside it to destroy the Basilisk with the Sword of
Gryffindor, which would then have the power to destroy Horcruxes. But
he would also have to destroy the diary, whose existence he didn't
know about, realizing that it was a Horcrux. Then he could find the
ring Horcrux and destroy it himself, having the sense not to put it
on! And he would have needed a House-Elf to go with him to the cave
and get him home after he had drunk the potion (unlike LV, DD would
not have made the House-Elf do it). Without Snape, I'm not sure that
DD could have been saved from that little adventure. If he survived,
he would still have needed an Order member to find the real locket.
Perhaps it would still be at 12 GP, but they wouldn't have been able
to destroy it without opening it, which could only be done by a
Parselmouth. And the moment that the cup was stolen, if it could be
done under circumstances other than the ones in DH, Voldemort would
have been alerted to the theft of his Horcruxes, exactly as he was in
DH. In any case, he wold not have been off hunting for the Elder Wand
to kill the chosen One. He would have been concentrating on taking
over the MoM, Hogwarts, and the British WW.

And so on. In the unlikely event that the Order members found and
destroyed all six Horcruxes, including Nagini, that would only make
Voldemort mortal. It wouldn't take away his extraordinary powers. It
took Harry's act of self-sacrifice (and his mastery of the Elder Wand)
to do that. Unless you think that someone could sneak up on Voldemort
in his sleep and kill him. I don't think that Voldemort sleeps, myself.

Alla:
> 
> I am snipping your explanation of why Dumbledore cannot learn 
> Parseltongue just to say that sure, it is a nice speculation, but we 
> do not know any of it. We do not know that Parseltongue cannot be 
> learned, for all I know it is language same as for example Mermish, 
> which by the way we know that Dumbledore speaks. He is very gifted 
> and why he cannot speak Parseltongue, I am not sure.
> 
> **Harry** knows it from soul bit, how does it follow that nobody
else can learn it, I do not know.

Carol responds:
The only other known Parselmouths in the books are the descendants of
Salazar Slytherin. (I speculate that Salazar was himself a descendant
of Herpo the Foul, a Parselmouth who bred the first Basilisk,
according to FB.) No one taught the half-witted Gaunt children to
speak Parseltongue. Like their father and Merope's son, they were born
with that ability. (Which leads me to wonder why no Heir of Slytherin
appeared in previous generations. Did the gene for Parseltongue skip
some fifty generations, or did his descendants stop attending Hogwarts
 after he left or did they conceal their ability to speak it to
conceal their connection with him? The Peverells, who surely attended
Hogwarts, wouldn't have spoken Parseltongue; Antioch or one of his
descendants must have married into the Gaunt line. Ugh.)
> 
Alla:
> > > So, yeah, I think somebody could do it, I really do not think 
> that it matters who. IMO.

Carol responds:
Parseltongue is a very rare gift. None of the Order members spoke it,
and without that gift, neither the diary nor the locket have been
destroyed.

Alla:
> 
> LOL. Of course there is a chosen one to rely upon in the scenario
that went in the story. I am talking about lazy WW and Dumbledore NOT
having the Chosen one and his special powers to rely upon. <snip>

Carol responds:
It's not just that the WW is lazy. Very few Wizards, not even the
clever and powerful Snape or the equally clever and powerful James
Potter, or Barty Crouch Sr. or Rufus Scrimgeour or Mad-eye Moody or
Amelia Bones or any others who seem especially gifted, can match
Voldemort, the Horcrux-maker who has also performed other great feats
of Dark magic (most of which, unfortunately, we're not privy to, but
including the invention of that resurrection potion and its evil
incantation). He's the greatest Legilimens who ever lived (matched
perhaps by DD and "hoodwinked" by Snape, the superb Occlumens, but no
one else can withstand his Legilimency). I agree that the WW is
pathetic and their government corrupt, but even Barty Sr.'s stringent
punishments for DEs couldn't defeat LV. It took ancient magic and a
series of choices with unintended consequences to bring him down the
first time, and the combination of DD's sleuthing and mentoring,
Harry's scar connection and ability to speak Parseltongue (not to
mention his luck and his friends and his courage), and Snape's
involvement from start to finish (there would have been no Chosen One
and no self-sacrifice on Harry's part without him) to defeat LV.

It's not just laziness or incompetence or reliance on DD, the man who
defeated Grindelwald to help them deal with LV. Quite simply, they
*can't* defeat him. Vaporize him and he'll keep coming back until the
Horcruxes are destroyed. Destroy the Horcruxes, if that's possible
without a scar connection and the ability to speak Parseltongue, and
you still have to fight LV himself, who can only be defeated because
Harry's self-sacrifice takes away his powers.

Alla:
> And nothing convinces me that horcruxes cannot be destroyed by 
somebody else. I say Several people would destroy horcruxes, no 
matter how many years it takes and then somebody finish off Voldemort
- without Harry battling him. 

Carol:
I don't think that's possible. For one thing, the diary wasn't even
supposed to be given to a Hogwarts student until Voldemort gave the
word, so DD had no way of knowing of its existence. He also had no way
without Harry's getting Slughorn's memory of knowing how many
Horcruxes there were. And anyone who fought Voldemort without that
drop of blood and the soul bit in a scar would not have survived.
Harry was the only one who could fight him without fighting (sacrifice
himself, return from what ought to have been death, and win the battle
against him with Expelliarmus).

At any rate, I've given my arguments as to why I don't think that
anyone, even Dumbledore with the help of the Order members, could have
found and destroyed all the Horcruxes. I've also stated that the
Voldie War would have gone on without interruption until the Order
members, Potters and all, were killed off and oldie was in control of
the WW. And I've pointed out that just destroying the Horcruxes merely
makes Voldemort mortal. It doesn't kill him. Possibly a skilled Wizard
like Dumbledore or Grindelwald armed with the Elder Wand could have
done it (heaven help the WW if Grindelwald had defeated both DD and
LV!) or a chosen One with the power of love and self-sacrifice (and a
soul bit and a drop of shared blood and the master of the Elder Wand
and the courage to use Expelliarmus instead of AK) could have done it.

Carol, convinced that without Harry as the Chosen One, LV would have
been unstoppable even by Dumbledore, who merely delayed his takeover
of Hogwarts and made it possible for *Harry* to defeat him