You see it more clearly in VOTF when Mara suggests that Thrawn most likely had a whole netweork of alliances in the Unknwon Regions. But hose alliances and politic moves were meant to support his whole military. Look at the Chiss philosphy he is part of, there can't be any true celebration until the end, even if the fight is never-ending. Thrawn's fight was never ending, everythign he did was to continue that fight, against who? That we don't know (yet). I imagine the Chiss to be a militaristic society, that ha, though some moral issue built into warfare. Their reactive to a preempitve strike, etc... Thrawn is the product of this society, and I gues sthis also helps to support Thrawn's dislike of superweapon, they are not moral by Chiss standards. He is a warrior, politics and information and armies, are just tools, valuable tools.