Lock's Mistake

Between yesterday and today I watched the Matrix trilogy again, and this time I spotted a flaw in the plan. Commander Lock is charged with the defence of Zion from the imminent arrival of an army of Sentinels in Matrix Revolutions. He is already facing an impossible mission, which is complicated further by councillors over riding him and sending his resources away on other missions. Even with that, he made a mistake.

They know the only weapon they have against the machines is the EMP detonation. After the initial assault on Zion, the one thing that drops every machine dead in a heartbeat is the arrival of Niobe and Morpheus with a ship able to deliver that EMP blast. The blast not only knocks out the attackers, but also knocks out the defenders electrical equipment. So why didn't Lock plan to exploit that weakness?

There could have been an initial defence with all guns blazing to ensure that as many Sentinels as possible are inside the blast range, then a planned order to switch all focus to turning off all electrical equipment, followed five seconds later with an EMP pulse. The EMP pulse only affects stuff that's switched on. That way they'd have been able to power back up almost immediately and prepare for the next wave of Sentinels, where they'd do the same trick again. It's not as if the Sentinels could power down to protect themselves, even if they did learn from the first wave, what the tactics are, which in itself is doubtful as they'd need working circuits to send the message when it got hit.

They obviously created, tested and fitted the EMP tech to their ships after decades of refinement, why couldn't they have created the same as a standalone weapon for Zion too? Surely they knew that one day their worst fears would come true and they'd have to use them. It is the last city of mankind after all. It's not as if there are other cities out there if Zion is obliterated. The end of Zion means the end of humanity. Zion wasn't a refugee camp with everything made to be temporary and moveable, it was a planned and fully constructed, permanent base.

It would of course have changed the story quite a lot, perhaps made it not as dramatic. On the other hand, Lock was under serious pressure and did the best he could think of with his constantly depleting resources.