: I'm going to disagree with your last point. If you recall the early work in
: The Fall of Reach and The Flood, plus the Conversations From The Universe
: booklet, it had been well established that the Covenant (particularly the
: Elites) actually felt that humanity was WAY beneath them, not even
: deigning to legitimize them as intelligent life, but mere animals. They
: were appalled that they desecrated holy sites and showed no understanding
: of the Forerunners at all.

I remember one of the CFTU entries suggested that many Sangheili actually revered human tenacity and martial prowess in spite of their overbearing defeats in the war.

: As honor-bound warriors, Elites only fought legitimate enemies, so throughout
: most of the Human-Covenant war, Elites wouldn't lower themselves to fight
: humans directly, but would just exterminate them from orbit. When ground
: action was required, it fell to the lesser Covenant species to do so, like
: Grunts and Jackals (whom the Elites didn't care for much either, but
: merely tolerated).

Such behavior would ultimately contradict their need for honor. Their battle doctrine would see little of it in simply pressing a button to glass human populations. Maybe that's why there has never seemed to be Sangheili in Covenant service who were purely naval officers. Seems like all of them had their start in the infantry legions.

: It was when the Grunts and Jackals were really unable to win against
: deployments of Spartans that Elites began to really be in on the fight
: with humans. I think it was written well with truly unique alien cultures
: in mind before the Covenant seemed to just be different takes on human
: traits.

It's an interesting concept, definitely, but one that I don't think fits well with the universe. Only the Sangheili could have effectively led the countless combined units of Unggoy and Kig-Yar with a mutual hatred for each other. Not only that, but the Sangheili seem so hellbent on proving their meddle in the purest form of warfare. Sure, few humans could ever hope to match them, but maybe it was that hope that one could make their superiority truly tested.