What If?

[The Squatter of Amon Rûdh]

I think that Tolkien intended for us to attribute some of the more outlandish coincidences not to the Valar, but to Eru Ilúvatar himself. It would have seemed quite natural to him for divine intervention to aid those who served Eru's purposes in good faith (a Christian who doesn't believe in miracles is rare indeed). We must remember that the Valar are an angelic order, not deities in their own right: their activities are ultimately subject to the will of Eru, and any world-altering decision is taken with reference to his will.

Furthermore, the War of Wrath took place because in all of Middle-earth only the Valar had the power to defeat Morgoth, who was of their own order. As we can see from the events of The Lord of the Rings, once he had created and lost the One Ring, Sauron could be defeated by means other than full-scale intervention from Valinor.

Since this was difficult to achieve, they sent other beings of Sauron's own order - the Heren Istarion - to aid the free peoples in their fight against him, but there are other reasons why the Powers would not have wanted to intervene. Firstly there is the question of collateral damage: the War of Wrath destroyed all of Middle-earth from the sea in the West to the Ered Luin in the East. This is not the sort of calamity that one inflicts if there is an alternative. Also, in allowing the people of Middle-earth to defeat Sauron themselves, the Powers reinforced their independence from Valinor. A freedom and peace that is achieved thus, rather than imposed from outside, is more valued and thus more likely to last. No doubt the free peoples were helped by Eru and by the Valar, but it was done in such a way that Elves, Men, Hobbits and the rest would be able to believe that they had won on their own. Such victories tend to be treasured in a way that free gifts never are.

To my mind, though, it seems more than likely that the Valar (subject to the approval of Ilúvatar) would have intervened more directly had Sauron triumphed. Since aid had already been provided, and action taken to redress the balance in the light of Saruman's treachery, it seems very likely that something would have been done to remove the Dark Lord had he succeeded in crushing all other viable opposition to his will. Whether this action would have taken the form of a full-scale assault is another matter entirely.