Stormcloaks Or Empire (One Of The Three Certainties Of Life)

[Batcathat]

The Empire, at that point, has no intelligence on the Dominion at all. Holding out in a state of active conflict is strictly worse for them. The Dominion just sends saboteur teams in to assassinate people, destroy crops, and otherwise start a war of attrition that they can't do anything about because they have nobody available to do counter-operations. The whole point of stopping the warfare is to let them catch their breath, rebuild, resupply, and prepare for the inevitable second round. We are literally told this is the plan. At this point, arguing that the Empire could have kept fighting the Dominion to their gain is just ignoring what the game tells us. Its the worst kind of armchair generaling.

While it's quite possible that ending the war at that point was in the Empire's best interest, the fact that they signed such a ridiculously one-sided treaty still seems like a political and diplomatic failure. Giving in to all of the enemy's demands is what you do when you're decisively beaten by a superior enemy, not when both sides are badly battered.

Even if the Empire considered the terms of the Concordant worth it to buy some time, signing it sent a very powerful message to all their enemies within and without. I'm surprised that there aren't more rebellions and/or invasions in the time since.