Why didn't Yoda think there was a victory at the end of 'Attack of the Clones'?

[Messianic_Monk]

"Victory? Victory you say? Master Obi-Wan, not victory. The shroud of the dark side has fallen. Begun the Clone War has."

While this line is cool... it's somewhat nonsensical to me. Why wasn't it a victory?

To me, the dialogue seems to lend to the idea that the shroud of the dark side falling is why there was no victory that day. But wasn't the shroud of the dark side falling going to happen regardless of whether or not that business on Geonosis happened anyways? So then why hesitate calling that day a victory? It's not like winning the battle that day caused the clone war to begin.

To me, the dialogue only makes sense if winning that skirmish on Geonosis caused the Clone War.

[Darklydarkened]

What he was saying, is that until the Dark Side is quelled, nothing they do will matter.

The war happening was caused by how incompletent they were as protectors of the galaxy. What happened in Geonosis was just a battle, they discovered that the sith lord was not idle, whilst they were sitting around at Coruscant doing basically nothing about it.

Yoda is wise enough to know, the galaxy was about to be sprung in chaos

[NamerOfStars]

Exactly. Plus, with the exception of Sidious himself, all of the leadership of the Separatists was there on Geonosis- had they been captured or killed, the war could've pretty much ended right there.

[Messianic_Monk]

Your replies combined explain a lot 😁 now that I know all of that... it's hard to see how Obi Wan thought there was victory there.

They lost most of their Jedi that day.
They saw how powerful the separatists had gotten because of their incompetence.
They realized Palpatine was going to get more power from this war.
They found out their Jedi friend turned to the dark side (and they are so lost in their ways they can't even see his reasons for walking away from the Jedi).
And all the separatists leaders escaped.

The only good thing that happened that day was when they bravely escaped with their lives. But when you weigh it against everything else I said it's difficult to see how there was victory that day.

[Darklydarkened]

Think Obi-Wan as the optimist. Also, he was quite young at the time and didn't have the foresight of a master jedi that well.

[MrCommodore]

It was because Yoda knew better, he knew that while they technically won a battle on Geonosis, the Republic and Jedi had actually now embarked on a war and Yoda could sense manipulation by the Sith. Rather than a victory, it was like had walked into arrsp.

[Iron_Man]

Yoda is pessimistic of a return