There is no way the broken down Skyrim could even tickle the Thalmor. Bring the war to Summerset Isles, and Skyrim is wiped out. We talk about a bunch of people that is on the egde of taking over Tamriel. The Nords are primitive, the elves are not. Healing magic + light armor is tenfold better than a 2 handed and leather armor. If the Stormcloak wins, they are screwed. They need to rebuild, but that leaves Cyrodiil and Hammerfell to be invaded. They could attack, but that means they would be wiped out rather quick. Ulfric is an idiot, and don't see the bigger picture here. He doesn't have a military tactic, which the Thalmor does. Heck, the Thalmor WANTS the Stormcloak to win, after a hard war. That way they got 2 options open: A) Take out Cyrodiil or Hammerfell. Keep a line of defense to hold the other province's backup occupied, whilst taking over. Skyrim can't help, since they need to rebuild, and Ulfric couldn't be arsed to help non-Nords. B) Take out Skyrim. The Stormcloak just broke the Empire. They are almost powerless, and are not allowed to help. Unprepared Nords versus a war. Who will win? Really, the Thalmor got the plan planned out carefully, and Ulfric is playing right into it. There is a reason they didn't want Ulfric dead in the intro. He is a vital piece to taking over the last areas now. [[[How would the thalmor attack skyrim in your vast military tactics knowledge there's a little something called supply lines which means they wouldn't be able to invade via the see and if they took cyrodil great they would be wasting more troops policing its not like they're gonna allow Imperials to enlist not to mention being over stretched and instead of having a border against the Empire and Hammerfell they'd also have border friction between the argonians in the black marsh, Skyrim, and the Breton princes or whatever they call themselves. So If the Thalmor where to invade and annex the Empire (with a seperate Skyrim) hammerfell, the bretons and skyrim would be able to launch a mass invasion and the Argonians will want a slice aswell so either way if the Thalmor are smart the would not seek further advances on the continent and stick to they're little island.]]] Even the mighty can fall. It wouldn't take more than 20 men to take down Dovahkiin alone. And no, Ulfric would not let you take an army to help anybody. You are not in power, you are a mere puppet now. Ulfric is power hungry, and will not share. now I do agree that Ulfric is an idiot the first thing that has to be done is move the capital to whiterun and centralize because each jarl having so much power is horrible they should attempt an absolute monarchy with the Dragonborn as Emperor.