In "Civil War", why did Tony Stark and Steve Rogers choose sides that didn't reflect their attitudes?

Question

Prior to Civil War, Steve Rogers has cooperated better with the system, while Tony Stark was more independent and even subversive. Examples:

1. Rogers served in the army.
2. Initially, Rogers was selected to be a member of the Avengers, while Stark wasn’t.
3. Stark created Ultron without the knowledge of most of the Avengers members. Later, when they found out about it and argued with him about it, Rogers emphasized the importance of the team working together. Stark said, “We’ll lose,” and Rogers replied, “Then we’ll do that together too.”

And the list goes on.

However, in Civil War it seemed that each of them made the opposite call. Stark wanted to sign on the Sokovia Accords, thus make the Avengers cooperate with the system, while Rogers wanted to keep the team independent.

Answer 1

TL;DR:

• Steve Rogers only ever does what he believes to be right, and many times, this does go against orders and the rules of the system, as evidenced by previous movies even before Civil War. He will break the rules if he feels it is the right thing to do, and he has faith in his own judgement and reasoning.
• Tony Stark initially remains completely independent, but after repeated attempts at doing the right thing which ended up causing more harm than good, he is desperate for some form of control, for someone better at this to tell him the right thing to do. In this case, that someone is a UN council.

Full Answer:

Prior to Civil War, it is true Rogers seemed to cooperate better with the system. He was very keen on enlisting in the army during World War 2, he was selected to join the Avengers and agreed with it, and later he got on Stark's case about keeping Ultron secret from the rest of the Avengers. However, there are a few points you missed out, especially referencing Captain America: Winter Soldier.

1. Although he enlisted in World War 2, it was not entirely out of patriotic fervor. As he said to Dr Erskine before he was accepted, he "did not like bullies" and didn't care where they were from. This lead him to attempt to enlist 5 separate times under false names, basically lying on his enlistment forms. He knew what he wanted to do was morally right, and didn't mind breaking rules to do it.

2. Later, on his tour as Captain America, this quality of his was further shown by his rescue of Bucky Barnes. He was ordered to remain at the camp. But he knew there was a chance of saving his friend, and so went against his orders. Enlisting the help of Howard Stark and Peggy Carter, he went behind enemy lines and saved Barnes and his men. Again, he knew what he wanted to do was morally right, and didn't mind breaking rules to do it. Then when he returned to the camp with the men he saved, he knew the morally right thing to do was turn himself in for disciplinary action for breaking said rules, and that's what he attempted to do.

3. In Avengers 1, Rogers was selected to be a member of the Avengers, as you mentioned. However, it may be noted here that again, it might not have been out of a desire to cooperate with the system. He had just woken up from a 70-year nap, all his friends were gone (he didn't dare call Peggy, afraid of her seeing him still young), and Fury was telling him that the very same cube he had given up his life to deal with was back and causing trouble again. It is highly likely that, given a chance, he would have gone after the damn thing anyway, with or without the Avengers.

4. Also in Avengers 1, there was the scene where the Avengers realise how much Fury had been keeping from them. Even lying to them. In the lab with Banner, Stark plants the idea in Rogers' head that something was off about Fury and SHIELD. Later, Stark hacks in to the system, and Rogers finds weapons that SHIELD had been developing, using the Tesseract as the power source. He realises that Fury and SHIELD had been lying to them from the beginning and, though in the end they are all distracted by the threat of Loki, Rogers' faith is still shaken by the lies.

5. In CA:WS, this is where his faith in the system was completely destroyed. After Loki had been dealt with, and the Avengers temporarily disbanded, Rogers signed up with SHIELD and participated in many covert operations, alongside Natasha Romanoff aka Black Widow. We see the very first operation in the movie, where Rogers thinks the mission is to save hostages, but he learns that Romanoff had been entrusted with a separate secret mission of her own, which was to copy data from the computers onto a memory stick. Later, he tells Fury that he "can't run a mission when his men have missions of their own" and "soldiers trust each other, that's what makes it an army, not a bunch of guys running around shooting guns". Fury attempts to placate him by showing his the Helicarriers meant for Operation Insight. Rogers is unconvinced, and later talks to Peggy about how complicated the politics of the current 'war' are.

6. Of course, as the movie progresses, we see the emergence of Hydra as a parasite lurking in SHIELD from the beginning. And even the head of SHIELD Alexander Pierce was a part of Hydra. Rogers realises that the system that allowed Hydra to grow under their very noses and helped them get so close to world domination again couldn't be trusted. He thus destroys not only Hydra, but SHIELD as well.

7. Later in Avengers: Age of Ultron, Stark creates Ultron without telling his fellow Avengers, and while he is trying to defend himself saying that he wasn't even close to an interface, Rogers says "Well you did something right, and you did it right here. The Avengers were supposed to be different from SHIELD". It is clear from this point, that he already mistrusts the system because of all the secrets and lies, and he had hoped that the Avengers would be different. When Stark says that they'll lose the fight, Rogers says "Then we'll do that together too." He wants them to fight and (if necessary) lose together. Not split apart by lies and secret developments hidden from the rest of the team. Not like how SHIELD fell.

8. By the time Civil War comes around, he is tired and jaded from everything that happened since he woke up from his hibernation. The system that was supposed to oversee the Avengers lied to them and tried to make weapons from the Tesseract. The system that was supposed to oversee his operations with Romanoff in CA:WS kept secrets from them and was infiltrated by Hydra. And now the UN is coming to them, saying that they must sign the Accords, allowing themselves to be placed under another council that could very well be as corrupted as every other system he has served under since he was unfrozen. He has seen how HYDRA, with SHIELD's unknowing help, has treated his best friend Barnes. He has seen how easily SHIELD condemned him and Nick Fury as terrorists, under Pierce's wayward leadership. He has seen how Stark's secret work with regards to Ultron threw the entire team out of balance. And he is completely done with 'serving' another overseeing system. As he says during the discussion about the Accords, the council meant to oversee the Avengers is "run by people with agendas, and agendas change... If we sign this, we surrender our right to choose. What if they send us somewhere we don't think we should go? What if there's somewhere we need to go and they don't let us? We might not be perfect, but the safest hands are still our own."

All the way from the beginning of Rogers' journey as Captain America, we see that he has very straight morals and firmly believes in his idea of what is good and right in this world. And he does not mind breaking rules to do what he knows to be right. Lying on his enlistment form to join the army, going against his orders to save his friend, commandeering a Quinjet to chase after Loki without getting approval from Fury first, all the way up to defying the UN and the world to save his friend, who he knew to be innocent. Even after his fight with Stark at the end of Civil War, he sends Stark a letter of apology and a burner phone so that he can call for help if it is needed. Despite everything that happened between them, he knows that the right thing to do is apologize for his part in the conflict and to offer his help should it be needed. Throughout his story, he does what he feels is right, regardless of the rules. It just so happens that in Civil War, the end result was not 'in line' with what the world liked.

On the other hand, Stark started off 'rebelling' against the system. He was incredibly independent, and wanted to "do everything by himself", as Fury said in Iron Man 2.

1. In Iron Man 1, after his sojourn as a prisoner of the terrorists, he makes an executive decision to shut down Stark Industries' weapons manufacturing effective immediately. He makes this decision independent of his board of directors, without first consulting with his PA, or his long-time friend. He decides to subvert the system, and do whatever he wants, in this case stopping the development of weapons. He had seen what these weapons can do and takes upon himself all the blame for what his weapons have done in other people's hands.

2. In Iron Man 2, he is severely depressed, he is dying, and yet still had to deal with pressure to share his technology with the military, and the added threat of Whiplash (Ivan Vanko). He already saw what his weapons could do in someone else's hands, and is thus understandably reluctant to share his tech with the military, feeling that should they misuse it, as they are likely to do, more blood would be on his hands. And now, Ivan Vanko comes to him, and he realises that Vanko blames his father and, by extension him, for his misfortunes in life. Whether or not that blame is well-founded, Stark realises that Vanko would hurt innocent people to get at him. Stark still tries to remain independent, but is possibly beginning to realise that he might need help (for example, when Fury and Romanoff give him lithium dioxide to help save his life). Either way, he knows that if any innocents had died during Vanko's murderous rage, it might very well have been his (Stark's) fault, since he had previously promised to protect the people of America.

3. In Avengers, he agrees to work with SHIELD and the Avengers, but obviously distrusts them all. He hacks into the system and find the plans for the weapons they are trying to build. Possibly, this bolsters his resolve not to get involved with any other 'system' and to remain independent. However, he ends up taking a nuclear bomb through the wormhole, and he alone out of all the Avengers sees the true threat out there, waiting in space for Earth's defenses to fall. It's this realisation that drives him to get the world ready for another alien attack: something that the rest of the Avengers do not fully understand, since they hadn't seen the army waiting in space like he did. Still, one way or another, Stark knows that the army will come, and they have to be ready for it.

4. However, in Iron Man 3, he is hit with yet again another reminder from his past. His callousness and uncaring attitude towards anyone from years ago came back to haunt him in the form of Aldritch Killian. And Killian says that if it hadn't been for Stark, he would not have found what he so desperately needed to succeed: desperation. This further impresses upon Stark that the atrocities Killian has committed was in part because of him. And now he has more blood on his hands. Earlier in the movie, Happy Hogan tries to tell Stark about his suspicions regarding Killian and his man Savin. But Stark ignores him. This drives Happy to investigate on his own, leading to him getting severely hurt in the explosion in the Chinese Theater. And we see Stark clearly affected by this. He knows that had he taken Happy seriously, Happy might not have gone to the Theater alone, and might not be within an inch of his life. At the end of the movie, we see that, again because of his connection to her, Pepper is put through a lot of pain due to Extremis. As she says to Killian, she's just his 'trophy'. Final proof that he has beaten Stark. Stark has to watch the woman he loves in pain, knowing that she was only put through that pain because of her connection to him. All this pain and suffering and death happened because of him, and he is finally realising how much hurt he caused to people he loved because of his independent actions.

5. And then in Avengers: Age of Ultron, he goes back to his experience from Avengers. He has been trying to make things better by creating 'a suit of armor around the world', and sees his opportunity when he gets hold of the sceptre. His drive to prepare the world for a bigger war causes him to inadvertently create Ultron, who kills a whole lot of people and tries to destroy the world. So of course, he knows how badly that independent decision to create Ultron turned out. Even the rest of the Avengers agree that he should not have gone off on his own without telling them, and that whatever Ultron has done was maybe partly his fault. And the addition of the Maximoff twins who lost their parents because of his weapons, and teamed up with Ultron to get revenge definitely makes things worse. By the end of this movie, he realises that his own independent decisions are causing far more harm than good. Eventhough he knows he is still right about the bigger war that's coming and the threat still waiting out there, he has proven that he clearly cannot make the right choices and cannot be the one to save them all from it alone. And he feels that all the death and destruction that resulted from these decisions he made are his fault. They are his responsibility. And he does not want anymore blood on his hands. He is tired of making decisions by himself that turn out to cause far more harm than good. So he decides to leave the Avengers.

6. By Civil War, he has completely claimed responsibility for every independent decision he has made, and his behaviours in the past that resulted in a whole lot of innocent people paying the price. He is trying to make amends the best way he knows how: by approving and funding the students of his alma mater MIT. Hoping that perhaps any good that these students might do as a result of his funding, might help to balance out in part the terrible things that have happened because of him. And then Charlie Spencer's mother comes to him. And blames him to his face for Charlie's death. Because of his failure to save so many people in Sokovia. And since he knows he was the one to create Ultron in the first place, he feels the guilt even more deeply. By this time, he knows that he seems to be taking every turn wrong. That even his most selfless and helpful idea, to protect the whole world, turned out so very very wrong, and caused the death of so many in Sokovia, and the near-destruction of the entire world. The threat of another bigger alien invasion is still there, and he knows that they have to be ready. So since his own decisions seem to be making things worse, he is willing to let other people make the decisions. So when the UN comes to him, proposing the idea of the Accords, he immediately accepts. Additionally, he knows that the Avengers would need help from everyone else in the world as well. There is no way that they could fight an alien war, and be at loggerheads with the rest of their own planet at the same time. In his mind (and Romanoff's as well), keeping the team together and playing nice with the world is the most important thing. This is evidenced by his offer to Rogers: "After we put out the PR fire, these documents can be amended". Perhaps he doesn't fully agree with everything in the Accords, but it is necessary to keep the team together, keep them on the world's good side, and get someone else to make the important decisions.

His own actions, his own independent decisions are doing more harm than good, in his mind. From Stark Industries' weapons, to his fight with Vanko, to his hand in inadvertently helping to create Extremis, and then Ultron. He knows he can't trust himself to make the right decisions anymore. But he still wants to help. And he knows the Avengers cannot win this fight alone. So he is completely on board with the Accords: the idea that he can leave the decisions up to a UN council who would have the safety of the whole world in the best interests. And they can still help to protect the world, just by going where they direct him and the Avengers. Even after Civil War, he keeps as far away from making the executive decisions as possible, falling back on a more supportive/mentoring role with Spider-man in Homecoming, and listening to the advice and ideas of the people around him. He doesn't trust himself to make good decisions, but he can't stop himself from wanting to help protect the world in some way.

Answer 2

Iron Man I Tony Stark (where he was very laissez faire) would scarcely recognize Civil War Tony. Remember, we see Tony getting more conservative over time (in other words, he wants all the Avengers to sign on so they can just keep on being The Avengers, because what's the big deal with a few more rules?). He's been humbled by what his company was doing (i.e. selling arms to the highest bidder) and wants to be above board most of all.

Steve Rogers, however, starts very conservative (he wants to play by the rules all the time) and gradually becomes disillusioned by realizing the The Avengers are being politicized. Thus, he begins to see the rules as the problem. Civil War simply provided the opportunity for him to act on it.

Answer 3

I think the crux of the difference of choice between the two comes down to the issue of accountability and responsibility.

Cap wants to be held accountable for his actions and decisions.

Steve: Tony, you chose to do that. If we sign this, we surrender our right to choose. What if this panel sends us somewhere we don't think we should go? What if there's somewhere we need to go and they don't let us? We may not be perfect but the safest hands are still our own.

They are his powers to use as he sees fit, but he recognises that anything he does with them is his responsibility, if he makes a bad call, he takes the fall for it.

Steve: We are if we're not taking responsibility for our actions. This document just shifts the blame.

He's also uncomfortable with being used at the whim of those in power, without any say in whether he agrees to that cause or not.

Steve: No, but it's run by people with agendas and agendas change.

He's been shaped by the events of The Winter Soldier, where he sees what happens when there are rotten apples at the top and that the rot isn't always visible until it's too late. Consider particularly the beginning of The Winter Soldier where he's sent to rescue hostages only to discover that's a secondary objective to getting information on Project: Insight, which ultimately turns out to be Hydra's grand scheme. Steve is also highly influenced by the events of World War 2. While Tony would think "you register a gun, so why not a person with destructive capabilities", Steve has seen what happens when you put people on a register because of who they are. For Steve the horrors of World War 2 and the holocaust are only a few years old, and that has to have a great impact on his views.

Tony on the other hand sees things from the other side. He's seen what his weapons have been used for (Iron Man 1), he's seen the results of his own (well intentioned) actions and the devastation they cause (Age of Ultron) and he doesn't want that weight on his shoulders.

Tony: That's good! That's why I'm here. When I realized what my weapons were capable of in the wrong hands, I shut it down. Stopped manufacturing.

He doesn't believe that kind of power should sit in the hands of individuals, because not everyone will use them for good, and quite critically, even those trying to do good can often find unintended consequences (like releasing Ultron on the world). He's also astute and has seen that if they don't agree to this, something much worse will be forced upon them later.

Tony: If we don't do this now, it's gonna be done to us later. That's the fact. That won't be pretty.

In short, Tony has been shaped by what happens when people use their powers without oversight, and Cap has been shaped by what happens when that oversight doesn't have good intentions.

Answer 4

Tony Stark is burdened by the deaths of countless Sokovians due to his meddling with technology he doesn't understand (Ultron). He believes he has completely lost the ability to judge what is right & wrong. He wanted to provide a protective blanket over the world, instead laid down the path to its possible destruction. Simply put, he doesn't trust his decision making when it comes to protecting others. Because he will go to any lengths to protect them. Any.

Steve Rogers enlisted in the military & served the commands of his superiors throughout his life. Even when he woke up, he was a soldier of SHIELD. But when SHIELD fell, his belief fell apart too. The government & the authority he was serving all these years turned out to be a fascist HYDRA. He was a puppet in the hands of Nazi's after all this time.

HYDRA, SHIELD, it all goes.

The price of freedom is high. It has always been. But, its the price I'm willing to pay. If I am the only one so be it.

He doesn't trust in institutions any more. He doesn't want to be accountable to anyone, neither wants to be under anyone's authority any more.

If the whole world tells you to move. It is your duty to plant yourself like a tree & look them in the eye & tell them "No, you move"

He takes Peggy's words to heart. Hence he takes Bucky's side.

TL;DR:
Tony doesn't trust himself to make the right decisions about saving other's lives.
Steve doesn't trust anybody but himself to make the right decisions about saving other's lives

Answer 5

It's easy to write something where characters are basically flat pawns and act according to their superficial types. I'm not claiming it's great art, but this movie works at a level beyond most summer popcorn hero flicks specifically because the writers chose to have the characters act against surface-level expectations, allowing a deeper exploration of character.

So that's the why: it's a better story. It's more interesting to go against the obvious, and doing that gives the opportunity to explore character growth.

The details of the obvious types, and the way the movie explores the characters' deviation from them aren't the "why" — they're the execution.

Answer 6

Captain America is a product of the enlightenment era-thinking that America was founded on. He's the personification of those ideals - he represents individual rights tempered by personal morality and a sense of responsibility and duty. He's not "America, the government," he's "America, the ideal."

Above all else, Cap's decisions are made on his own and he's willing to respect the decisions others make. He's not willing to surrender his right to act independently because that might mean acting (or inaction) against his moral core and personal sense of duty.

Iron Man/Stark is the personification of progressive technocracy. Progressive in the traditional meaning of the word - valuing society as a whole over individuals with a goal of creating a better life for most. Technocratic in the sense that he has a belief that the most intelligent have a right and duty to 'engineer' a better society through social policy and technological solutions to social problems.

Cap sees the accords as a violation of individual liberties and won't support it in much the same way that your typical second amendment supporter wouldn't surrender their guns to the government happily.

Tony sees the accords as an engineered solution to the 'problem' of people using special powers.

Taking it a step further, Cap's always seen hierarchies from the bottom up. He was a poor kid who lived most of his life at the bottom before having power. He's seen how others use power and knows there's always potential for abuse. Because of this, he believes in devolving as much power as possible to the individual where its harder for a single bad actor to abuse.

Stark's always been at the top of every hierarchy he participated in. He was born a rich, charming super-genius and inherited a corporate empire that bends to his every whim. His experience with governments and media shows that he knows how to 'play the game' and work the system. He's confident that even with the accords in place he can charm, work or otherwise manipulate the system to suit his needs.

For Stark, the accords are a suit of legal and emotional armor that protect him from the consequences of his actions because he expects to be able to work the system to his advantage just like he has always done in the past.

For Cap, the accords are a straight jacket that remove his agency and replace his moral core with the whims of people like Stark or worse.

Answer 7

With the civilian death counts from the Battle of New York, Sokovia and the Lagos bombing Tony comes to recognise that the Avengers must be held accountable for their actions. He is the leader of the Avengers and so bears the responsibility for the consequences of their actions and the guilt that comes with it. He created Ultron and so everyone who died in Sokovia did so because of him. Tony no longer wants this responsibility and having the UN take control also means them taking this weight off his shoulders.

Steve on the other hand is disillusioned following the reveal in Winter Soldier that Shield, whom he believed to be the "good guys" were infiltrated by Hydra. He no longer trusts figures of authority who branded his best friend Bucky an enemy combatant and instead trusts in his own moral judgement. Steve believes that submitting to the Accords would tie their hands and prevent them from doing their job of saving lives either through red tape or ulterior motives and believes that the independence of the team is vital to their mission.

Answer 8

Cap has fought two battles in the solo movies, one against Germany and the other against an infiltrated SHIELD. Both government threats.

Stark on the other hand has fought, his VP, Whiplash, and AIM in his solo movies. All three are individuals.

In Avengers One they faced an extra-terrestrial threat which has no bearing on the argument. Avengers Two is the only time that Cap fights a threat created by individuals.

The battles they have fought would have given them different perspectives of threats faced to people. Stark fears para-military threats where Cap fears military threats.