I read that in a Star Wars book (I think it was about Rogue One) that Storm Trooper training was so dehumanizing that they had less identity than clones after it was done. Although the human storm troopers were physically more like the clones grown from human DNA, their mindset was ironically more like the droids under CIS that Palpatine was manipulating. It makes sense, considering that Palpatine was familiar with controlling that faction and that the stormtrooper concept was based on that Chaplain speech about "machine men with machine hearts and machine minds."
Ironically, the clones were like organic battle droids until some of the better Jedi over them tried to give them an identity, humanizing them to have a sense of brotherhood with their clones and detachment in reflection to their Jedi's leadership style.
I wonder if one of the byproducts of such a dehumanizing, fear based training actually made other wise intelligent people weak minded. Like they weren't stupid, they could still be trained how to use logic in a way that served their purpose as marines and infantry in the Empire, but I wonder if that over emphasis on negative training made them have weak spots, or blind spots, in their thinking ability, giving force users like Obi Wan Kenobi openings to use mind tricks that weren't originally there.
Or the guy could've just been weak minded or stupid from the get go and Basic Training did nothing to help or hinder that.
All militaries have to break you down, but they also try to build you back up after they break you down. That's part of it. I wonder if the Galactic Empire was so machine like and fear obsessed in heart and mind that it effectively broke people down enough to make them obedient, if not fanatically loyal to the Emperor (or what the Empire stood for), but it didn't build them back up to make them enthusiastic and efficient. I wonder if that's what lead to a morale decrease and eventually a performance decrease among a military that, on paper, did get elite training and decent gear.
That and the fact that if their Drill SGTs were former clones teaching them how to fight battle droids, the asymmetric (guerilla) warfare of the Alliance threw them off balance. Clones were bad asses but from what I understand they were bad asses with endurance against legions of skeletal droids (and getting the drop on oblivious and distracted Jedi), hating having to think on their feet with regular born people/aliens using unorthodox tactics.
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