User blog comment:Animetrash20/Erwin Smith's death and rant./@comment-35417358-20160812225751/@comment-29660708-20160816223540

Well Armin had a stronger motivation than Erwin. Armin wants to go out and see the ocean, this is a long term goal pretaining to the fact that he hopes that one day he will be free to wander outside the walls with no danger.

Erwin on the other hand, he wants to find out whats in the basement, one goal that has been stuck in the back of his mind his whole life, but what does he want after that? He doesn't even know himself. If Erwin were to look inside the basement, he would be emotionally shattered due to the fact that, the thing that kept him going for so long is finally done and it would never meet his expectations after years and years of build up. Levi even says that it would be crule to bring him back after he escaped hell, the hell that is Erwin only worring about that basement. His addiction to it.

So I believe that Levi made the right decision on this one.