The Galactic Politics of Star Wars and Palpatine's Rise to Absolute Power

 

The Galactic Politics of Star Wars and Palpatine's Rise to Absolute Power

By HD 

 

In an epic universe of Star Wars Palpatine aka Darth Sidious is the supreme bad azz, a classical Super Villain and a purely evil Dark Lord who patiently master minded and engineered his way towards galactic domination.

 

We usually see villains try to rule the world and all that and they get busted by the heroes before achieving their plans but this genius, cunning and powerful Dark Lord of the Sith ruled the entire galaxy for many years until the forces of light overcame him. Palpatine is such a master of the darkside of the force that he seems to be a personification of the darkside itself, besides his darkside powers he was a brilliant strategist who sets things in motion in order to achieve desired objectives and his manipulation of events and people is masterful. Emperor Palpatine made his first entry in the Star Wars movie 'The Empire Strikes Back' where he was revealed as the master of Darth Vader and in a short scene he contacts Darth Vader to discuss the threat of a young Luke Skywalker an emerging Jedi. It is only in the movie 'Return of the Jedi' we all get to see the awesome dark presence of the evil Emperor Palpatine.

 

Palpatine is one of the characters from the Star Wars who has always fascinated me and I was impressed when I first saw him in the 'Return of the Jedi' with all his command and authority and being the master of Darth Vader himself in the original Star Wars Trilogy.  The prequel Star Wars trilogy displayed his character in depth in which he raised himself to power as a Politician and a Sith and signified himself as the epitome of intelligence and power.

 

The Sith and the Jedi were mortal enemies of each other, the Sith Order dedicated to the darkside while Jedi Order to the lightside of the force, the Sith declined due to their own hate and self-destructive tenacities while the Jedi flourished.  It was the legendary Sith Lord called Darth Bane who reformed the Sith Order comprising of only two Sith Lords at a time a master and an apprentice. The Sith Order continued in secrecy until came the time of Palpatine himself. Palpatine learned the darkside of the force from his powerful Sith Master Darth Plagueis and was named Darth Sidious. Palpatine started a political career in quest of gaining power, with his own ingenuity and the darkside of the force at his side Palpatine became a successful politician and later became the senator for his home planet Naboo, once he had access to the Galactic Senate the most powerful political body in the galaxy Palpatine started his devious but extremely effective schemes to change the entire shape of the galactic politics and to destroy the mortal enemies of the Sith the peace keeping force of the galaxy the elite Jedi Knights.

 

Palpatine as the shadowy Dark Lord Darth Sidious engineered a political dispute between the powerful Trade Federation and his own planet Naboo, he influenced the Neimoidians of the Trade Federation to invade the planet Naboo and created a crises situation for the Galactic Senate, and taking full advantage of the crisis situation he himself became the Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Senate due to overwhelming sympathy votes. Unbeknownst to the poor and unsuspecting Jedi their Supreme Chancellor now happens to be an unknown, cunning and very powerful Sith Lord. That is the true genius of Palpatine as he is soon to take everything from right under the noses of the Jedi his sworn enemies this makes him a master stratagem.

 

Palpatine furthered his sophisticated plans to dominate the galaxy by orchestrating with the help of Darth Tyrannus aka Count Dooku a powerful fallen Jedi a full-scale dispute and war between the inter-galactic systems. The Galaxy split into two factions one under Old Republic leaded by Palpatine himself and the other under the Separatists leaded by Count Dooku Palpatine's Sith apprentice, a double game played by the Sith in order to fool the Jedi and diminish their numbers.

 

And finally to add insult to the Jedi Order's overwhelming injuries Palpatine also managed to stole away the Chosen One of the Jedi Order the young and fiery Anakin Skywalker, the Jedi never had an idea what is actually about to hit them until it was too late as we saw all the climax in the third prequel 'The Revenge of the Sith'. In the end even the mightiest of the Jedi Master Yoda and Mace Windu were not able to get control of the situation and the Jedi Order's imminent destruction, though individually they put up a brave stand but in the end all was lost and Palpatine's plans came to fruition as he became the Supreme leader of the galaxy and declared himself the Emperor.

 

With the Jedi brought almost towards extinction Emperor Palpatine with his apprentice Darth Vader aka Anakin Skywalker ruled over the galaxy, he consolidated his grip over the entire galaxy and appointed local Governors for each sector of the galaxy and built a Death Star a planet sized battle station with the fire power of destroying an entire planet. The Emperor's reign of terror met its end many years later when the Jedi prophecy was finally fulfilled and balance to the force was restored by the Chosen One a fallen hero who was brought back to the lightside by his own flesh and blood his son Luke Skywalker.