At the end of The Empire Strikes Back the rebels are desolate. Han Solo is frozen in carbonite. Luke Skywalker has been defeated in battle by Darth Vader, losing a hand in the process. The Emperor's victory was total.... until the Jedi returned.
Not sure what made me think of that.
The one - ONE - small problem with Rishi Sunak's national service plan is that I'm from Derry and if someone had told us to join the British Army aged eighteen, the entire city would have beaten them to death with hammers I can tell you that much.