Good guys of LOTR clueless?

[the phantom]

I start with a quote from Gandalf (FOTR The Shadow of the Past)-

He (Sauron) believed that the One had perished; that the elves had destroyed it."

Say what? We have two possibilities-
1) Gandalf knows what he's talking about
2) Gandalf doesn't know what he's talking about

If 1) is true then Sauron is stupid and confused (I'll explain why in a sec).
If 2) is true then, well, you can see why I believe the good guys didn't have a prayer.

Here's another Gandalf quote (FOTR The Council of Elrond)-

Into his heart the thought will not enter that any will refuse it, that having the Ring we may seek to destroy it."

So let me get this straight. First, Sauron supposedly thought that the elves destroyed the Ring, and yet Sauron would never think that someone would destroy his Ring. Notice a MASSIVE discrepancy?

And then there's this (ROTK Mount Doom)-

his (Sauron) fear rose...for he knew his deadly peril and the thread upon which his doom now hung

Wait a minute. According to the first quote Sauron thought he could get along just fine if his ring was destroyed (since he was alive and well and also thought that the elves destroyed the Ring). But the last quote shows that he was afraid the destruction of the ring would doom him. Notice another HUGE discrepancy?

If Gandalf's first statement was true then Sauron is stupid and confused. He apparently doesn't even know how his own Ring works to the point that he thinks it can be destroyed without taking him down. But then at the end he must not think that anymore because he's scared to death when he realizes that the good guys are trying to destroy the Ring. Also, he thought that the elves destroyed the Ring yet he thinks no one would try to destroy it.

This seems too silly to be possible. And think of this, if Sauron really didn't think that destroying his Ring would destroy him why were the good guys so confident it would work. It's absurd. Option 1) is not acceptable, which means option 2) is true (Gandalf doesn't know what he's talking about).

Not only that, but think of Galadriel. As Tolkien said (letter 246)-

it appears that Galadriel conceived of herself as capable of wielding the Ring and supplanting the Dark Lord. If so, so also were the other guardians of the Three, especially Elrond. But this is another matter. It was part of the essential deceit of the Ring to fill minds with imaginations of supreme power.

From Tolkien's writings it seems obvious that Galadriel's belief was false. If you want more evidence, look at what Sauron said to Saruman (a more powerful being than Galadriel) when he believed that Saruman had captured the Ring (TTT The Palantir)-

Tell Saruman that this dainty is not for him. I will send for it at once

When Saruman gets the Ring, Sauron treats him the way you'd treat a child threatening you with a plastic knife. It seems Saruman didn't have a chance though he thought he did (and the same goes for Galadriel).

And there's also another claim she made (FOTR The Mirror of Galadriel)-

I perceive the Dark Lord and know his mind, or all of his mind that concerns the elves.

Really? Form Morgoth's Ring (myths transformed, VII, ii)-

No one, not even one of the Valar, can read the mind of other 'equal beings' (All rational minds / spirits deriving direct from Eru are ‘equal’- in order and status- though not necessarily ‘coeval’ or of like original powerl): that is one cannot 'see' them or comprehend them fully and directly by simple inspection. One can deduce much of their thought, from general comparisons leading to conclusions concerning the nature and tendencies of minds and thought, and from particular knowledge of individuals, and special circumstances. But this is no more reading or inspection of another mind than is deduction concerning the contents of a closed room, or events taken place out of sight. Neither is so-called 'thought-transference' a process of mind-reading: this is but the reception, and interpretation by the receiving mind, of the impact of a thought, or thought-pattern, emanating from another mind, which is no more the mind in full or in itself than is the distant sight of a man running the man himself. Minds can exhibit or reveal themselves to other minds by the action of their own wills (though it is doubtful if, even when willing or desiring this, a mind can actually reveal itself wholly to any other mind). It is thus a temptation to minds of greater power to govern or constrain the will of other, and weaker, minds, so as to induce or force them to reveal themselves. But to force such a revelation, or to induce it by any lying or deception, even for supposedly 'good' purposes (including the 'good' of the person so persuaded or dominated), is absolutely forbidden. To do so is a crime, and the 'good' in the purposes of those who commit this crime swiftly becomes corrupted.

So once again, it seems Galadriel makes a false claim.

So if you put my entire post together, I'm saying it appears that the good guys of Lord of the Rings didn't know very much, or that much of what they thought they knew was wrong. So maybe everything else they said was wrong, too, it's just that we don't know it.

I've always thought that the good guys didn't have a chance but wow, I didn't realize they were this clueless. Thank Eru for divine intervention in Middle Earth.