Centauri sneak attacks

Spoiler Warning: The following article contains plot details regarding the 5th season of the television show Babylon 5. If you are familiar with this work and know how it ends, or don't care whether you find out in advance, feel free to read on.

In the fifth (and final) season of the television show Babylon 5, ships of the Interstellar Alliance are being attacked and utterly destroyed by unknown raiders, leaving no survivors and no record to identify the attackers.

The Alliance begins collecting evidence, which slowly begins to point to the Centauri Empire. Centauri Ambassador Mollari repeatedly denies the allegations, in tones of outrage – and the audience can see, following his actions away from the Alliance council, that neither he nor the Centauri military command have any knowledge of the attacks.

Clinching evidence is nonetheless finally collected and presented in the Alliance Council. Mollari again denies that the Centauri are involved, claiming that the evidence has been trumped up as part of a Council plot to discredit the Empire. He angrily leaves the Council (possibly because the Centauri were kicked off the Council; need to check this detail - W.) and returns to Centauri Prime, where he begins an investigation and finds some very disturbing clues.

Meanwhile, Council President Sheridan is trying to prevent members of the Alliance from declaring war on the Centauri while the Council conducts its own investigation (which also turns up disturbing clues). A coalition of disaffected Council members decides to independently attack Centauri Prime, and secretly begins amassing a huge attack fleet.

Back on Centauri Prime, Mollari has an eerie conversation with the Centauri Emperor Regent who, it turns out, has been under very strict control by a group of aliens – the Dhraak – who monitor his every move and word, and are able (by some combination of threats, torture, and direct neural control) to keep him from divulging their existence.

The attacks have, in fact, been committed by Centauri ships – crewless drones commanded by the Dhraak.

The Regent is now able to tell Mollari this because the Dhraak's plans are about to come to fruition, and Mollari will soon be in their control as well.

Playing his final part in these plans, the Regent has just lowered the planetary defense screens and sent the entire planetary defense fleet away on a mission – just in time for the illegal coalition to attack without the slightest opposition.

The Centauri homeworld is consequently decimated, leaving a deep chasm of hatred between its remaining citizens (who blame the Alliance for attacking without provocation) and the Alliance (who blame the Centauri for their repeated sneak attacks and denials, even in the face of clear evidence). Mollari knows both sides of the story, but is forced to accept Dhraak control in order to prevent the Dhraak from detonating nuclear bombs they have planted in all major Centauri cities.

The Dhraak, recently homeless due to the destruction of the Shadow homeworld, are thereby effectively able to take over Centauri Prime from the top down and make it their new home.

Parallels

The recent history of US foreign policy seems like a pale echo of this story: we have attacked two foreign countries, one without provocation, without an international consensus. We are now considering attacking a third, again without provocation, and against the will of most American citizens.

What possible explanation can there be for this insanity, other than the existence of a controlling third party in whose interests these actions are being taken?