The Essential Guide to Warfare: Star Wars

The Battle of Endor continues after the Death Star’s destruction (Stephan Martiniere)

The death of Emperor Palpatine sparked celebrations, but the Empire remained largely intact, and the Rebels were in no position to capitalize on their victory, not with nearly three-quarters of the Rebel capital ships that saw action above the Forest Moon needing extensive repairs.

Captain Gilad Pellaeon of the Imperial Star Destroyer Chimaera knew the Rebel fleet had been battered, and guessed that the Alliance had thrown the bulk of its forces against the second Death Star. But he was unable to do anything about it.

With the destruction of the Executor and the Pride of Tarlandia, command of Death Squadron had fallen to the Chimaera, the next communications ship in line. The Chimaera’s commander, Admiral Horst Strage, had been killed when an ion blast overloaded his neural shunt, leaving command in Pellaeon’s hands. With the Imperial forces in disarray, Pellaeon ordered a retreat to Annaj, the Moddell sector capital—a two-day journey that left him brooding over whether he’d done the right thing, and what he ought to do next.

Pellaeon wanted to fight. Death Squadron had sustained serious losses: the Executor, one of its two battlecruisers, a Tector-class Star Destroyer, and fifteen of its thirty-three Imperial Star Destroyers. But that still left a formidable force. At a council of war, Pellaeon urged a return to Endor, insisting that the Rebel military could be crushed before word of the Emperor’s death spread.

But other officers had also been thinking during the two-day trip to Annaj. Speaking from his bacta tank, Admiral Blitzer Harrsk coldly informed Pellaeon that with the battle over, his command was nullified and belonged to Admiral Adye Prittick, the ranking admiral. That was fine with Pellaeon; he didn’t care who commanded Death Squadron so long as it returned to Endor.

But Prittick couldn’t make a decision. That touched off a quarrel among the flag officers; the council of war broke up acrimoniously when Harrsk declared he was taking the battlecruiser Ilthmar’s Fist, the two remaining Tectors, and three Star Destroyers into the Deep Core until a clear chain of command was established. That prompted the two surviving captains from Elrood sector to return there for orders. Death Squadron was reduced to twelve Star Destroyers—a significant force, but one Prittick declared too small to guarantee victory. He ordered a withdrawal to Yag’Dhul, a missed opportunity that would torment Pellaeon.

Similar scenes unfolded all over the Empire. Palpatine had never provided a succession plan, leaving any number of Grand Moffs, advisers, and admirals to see themselves as able successors. The best claim belonged to Sate Pestage, Palpatine’s Grand Vizier and head of the advisers’ Ruling Council. But many dismissed Pestage as weak and made their own plans. Some officers, such as Harrsk and Admiral Gaen Drommel, declared themselves warlords. Others, such as Admirals Zsinj and Teradoc, fortified their holdings, claiming loyalty while quietly pursuing their own ambitions. Still others broke with the Empire without making a formal declaration: Grand Moff Ardus Kaine infuriated Pestage by abandoning much of Oversector Outer to defend a portion of the New Territories.

Pestage and his advisers sought to fortify their holdings. Convinced the Rebels would soon assault the Core, they defended the inner systems’ key strategic and economic worlds, giving Admiral Ackbar, independence-minded planetary leaders, and warlords free reign.

With the Empire in disarray, the Rebels—now reconstituted as the Alliance of Free Planets—were able to fend off attacks from the Ssi-ruuk, Nagai, and Tofs. But those campaigns stretched the Alliance to the breaking point, and Mon Mothma decided not to press the attack on the Imperial successor states. Instead, she would use diplomatic levers to further dismantle the Empire.

The fledgling New Republic sent envoys to thousands of worlds. Many systems joined the new government, standing alongside the likes of Bothawui, Mon Calamari, Corellia, Duro, Kashyyyk, Sullust, and Elom. But many others declared themselves independent—which the New Republic respected. Mothma’s government would not be the Empire, but a voluntary union for the common good.

Toward that end, Mothma made a fateful decision, one Ackbar later admitted delivered more worlds to the New Republic than any dozen campaigns could have. The Defense Declarations devolved control of Planetary Security Forces nationalized by the Empire to their sectors. New Republic member sectors would be expected to support the military’s starfleet, but would retain command of their local forces.

Word of the Defense Declarations rippled through the galaxy. Sectors loyal to the Empire (or at least ruled by powerful Moffs) dismissed the measure as illegal, but for others it was the deciding factor that led them to break with the Empire or join the New Republic. And some sectors’ loyalties proved sharply divided, leading to hundreds of battles between rival Imperial task forces that further diminished the Empire’s ability to wage war.

A day after the Emperor’s death, an Imperial drone ship arrived at Endor warning that the planet Bakura was under attack by unknown invaders. Mon Mothma sent a small task force to the planet’s defense, and a brief-lived alliance between Rebel and Imperial forces drove the Ssi-ruuk back into the Unknown Regions. A Rebel task force made up of the captured Ssi-ruuvi Shree-class battle cruiser Sibwarra (technically a Star Destroyer) and a dozen Nebulon-B frigates would later push their way into the Ssi-ruuvi Imperium—only to discover the battered remnants of a domain that had already been devastated by red-eyed, blue-skinned near-humans from elsewhere in the Unknown Regions.

Just days after the Ssi-ruuvi invasion, another previously unknown enemy attacked. The chalk-skinned, angular Nagai hailed from the satellite galaxy known as Companion Besh, and began by attacking the frontier worlds of the Western Reaches. Some observers found the Nagai’s wirework ships—of which no two were the same—twisted and alien, while others found their apparent fragility beautiful. The bulk of the Nagai expeditionary ships were frigates and corvettes, backed up by a handful of Yulari-class cruisers, designed by a species from Companion Besh known as the Faruun. Nagai navicomputers were extraordinarily quick at calculating jumps, and relied upon tachyonic observational sensors to map realspace hazards and landmarks much more efficiently than Imperial technology. Nagai scouts used these sensors to chart courses through the galaxy’s stellar halo, allowing them to bypass blockades and establish forward bases deep within the galaxy.

Aiding the Nagai were stormtroopers loyal to Lumiya, the cyborg and Force-wielding dark adept once known as Shira Brie. The invaders set up their primary forward base on Kinooine, where they were joined by their main invasion fleet. From there, they hopscotched among backworlds until they reached Terminus, gaining access to the Hydian Way and the Corellian Trade Spine.

Alliance forces learned the Nagai were refugees who’d had their own homeworld stolen by another species from Companion Besh—the massive, green-skinned Tofs. The Tofs had followed the Nagai, and pursued them to Trenwyth and then all the way to Zeltros in giant, eighteen-hundred-meter bulk cruisers whose durasteel hulls were crafted to look like huge sailing ships from some lost surface navy.

At Zeltros, Alliance troops joined with the Nagai, Mandalorian commandos, and elements of Lumiya’s forces to defeat the Tofs. When it was learned that the Tof Prince Sereno had established his headquarters at Saijo, Luke Skywalker led a raid on the prince’s quarters while the Alliance Star Destroyer Emancipator—known as the Accuser before its capture at Endor—moved to engage the Tof bulk cruiser Merriweather. The Millennium Falcon and Rebel pilots who’d scrambled from the Emancipator destroyed the Merriweather’s complement of starfighters, and Skywalker’s task force captured Prince Sereno. The Tof invasion had failed, while the Nagai had gained new allies in their efforts to reclaim their home planet.

After surviving threats posed by the Ssi-ruuk, Nagai, and Tofs, the leaders of the newborn New Republic met on Mon Calamari to plan the assault on the inner systems.

Admiral Ackbar noted that a number of events had already proved favorable to the New Republic. Rather than attack Mon Calamari in force, Grand Moff Kaine had withdrawn to the other side of the galaxy. Moffs and admirals with Imperial ambitions of their own had begun battling over territory. Patient diplomacy and the Defense Declarations had divided the Imperial military, with many units deciding that their loyalties lay with their home sectors, not the vacillating Ruling Council. And the New Republic’s swift victories over the Ssi-ruuk and Tofs had reassured citizens who’d doubted the former Rebels could defend the galaxy.

For all that, the task ahead would be tremendously difficult. The Empire still possessed a large advantage in terms of military power and economic resources—and lacked only a capable leader to emerge from the scramble for power. Palpatine had aided the New Republic cause by keeping his advisers, Moffs, and military leaders struggling for influence and prestige throughout his reign, ensuring that they would battle after his demise. In the decade after the Battle of Endor, New Republic agents worked in the shadows to exacerbate such tensions through a campaign of sabotage, disinformation, and occasional assassinations. Referred to as Shadow Operations, these operatives first reported to Airen Cracken and later became the heart of the secretive unit known as Alpha Blue.

While Shadow Operations waged war quietly, the New Republic fleet did so loudly—but even here, Ackbar and his cadre of military leaders moved carefully, working to keep the Empire divided. Over three years the fleet marginalized and eliminated warlords and slowly tightened a vise on the Core and Colonies, with several key battles shaping the borders between the New Republic and territory that would eventually become the Imperial Remnant.

After the initial period of chaos that followed the Battle of Endor, the portion of the Imperial Starfleet that proved loyal to Sate Pestage—led by officers such as Betl Oxtroe, Uther Kermen, and Gilad Pellaeon—defended fortress worlds in the Core and Colonies. Elsewhere, six major warlords emerged.

The most powerful of these warlords posed the least threat to the New Republic: Ardus Kaine defended a shrunken Oversector Outer in the New Territories and showed little interest in the rest of the galaxy’s affairs.

Kaine occasionally squabbled with the flamboyant Grand Moff Zsinj, who had turned the Quelii Oversector into a powerful military state on the Hydian Way. But Zsinj’s wrath was primarily reserved for High Admiral Treuten Teradoc, who placed Grand Moff Ambris Selit under house arrest and took control of the Greater Maldrood, a large chunk of the Perlemian Trade Route, and a number of productive industrial worlds.

The most powerful warlord after Kaine, Zsinj, and Teradoc was Admiral Sander Delvardus, who refused to follow Kaine into the New Territories and fortified Eriadu, from which he controlled a chunk of the Hydian Way and the Rimma Trade Route. Delvardus’s chief rival was Moff Utoxx Prentioch, who turned Sombure sector’s large, capable fleet into a power base on the Corellian Trade Spine. Finally, there was Moff Par Lankin of Lambda Sector, who controlled a relatively small territory but was a respected strategist. (A seventh major warlord, Admiral Blitzer Harrsk, vanished into the Deep Core soon after Endor.)

In 4 ABY Admiral Ackbar organized the New Republic’s forces into four fleets: First Fleet began operations in the Western Reaches; Second Fleet protected the New Republic leadership in Mon Calamari Space; Third Fleet operated out of Bothan Space and was assigned to the Slice; and Fourth Fleet also made Bothawui its headquarters and stood ready to reinforce either First or Third fleet.

First Fleet, commanded by Admiral Firmus Nantz, began its campaign at Saijo, site of the Tofs’ defeat. The stooped, cadaverous Nantz raised eyebrows for his brutal candor—he once told a delegation of unaffiliated planetary leaders that “an admiral’s business is to industrialize murder at a distance”—but was a superb tactician. Under his command, First Fleet smashed the Eiattu pirates at Abraxas and drove Delvardus’s forces back from Glova, where General Tyr Taskeen led the New Republic ground attack with the help of Sullustan irregulars. The Glova campaign prevented Delvardus’s Eriadu Authority from linking up with Imperial forces in the Elrood and Minos sectors, limiting his influence.

Nantz then won a skirmish with Prentioch’s forces at Kriselist, bypassing him and seizing Moorja, where a fleet of Nebulon-B frigates backed by Y-wing bombers destroyed Delvardus’s Praetor Mark II–class battlecruiser Thalassa. With Adar Tallon supervising starfighter operations, Nantz ordered a battle group to Bannistar Station, which he captured after heavy bombardment, and from there to Glom Tho, where Taskeen’s forces seized several key foundries. The Hevvrol Sector Campaign ruined Moff Lankin’s dreams of conquest, penning him within Lambda sector.

Ackbar himself took charge of Third Fleet, moving from Bothan Space to Kashyyyk, where his forces slugged it out with Moff Hindane Darcc and Grand Admiral Peccati Syn. Ackbar’s Home One and Captain Verrack’s Maria caught the Grand Admiral’s Star Destroyer Silooth in a crossfire, with a volley of proton torpedoes vaporizing its bridge. Privately, Ackbar admitted Bothan agents had delivered the victory, sabotaging two of Syn’s Interdictor cruisers and impersonating Teradoc’s top aides to promise Syn that Greater Maldrood fleet units would come to his assistance.

Kashyyyk sat at a nexus of six hyperspace routes; from there, Ackbar and Rogue Squadron planned a daring raid on the Core world of Brentaal, defeating Admiral Lon Isoto and capturing the TIE ace Soontir Fel. Fourth Fleet, under the command of the Duros Admiral Voon Massa, moved from Bothan Space to Druckenwell, capturing a key industrial world on the Corellian Run and linking up with First Fleet.

Not everything went well for the New Republic in the first year of the campaign. Second Fleet’s command officially belonged to Admiral Hiram Drayson, though operations were conducted by a trio of capable Mon Calamari admirals: Kalback, Nammo, and Ragab. Second Fleet won early victories as Kalback and Nammo drove Imperial forces from Emmer with the help of Colonel Horton Salm’s Y-wings. But Imperial agents discovered one of the Mon Cals’ secret routes to the Hast system, where a number of Mon Cal warships and captured Imperial vessels were being repaired. Admiral Llon Banjeer, who’d allied himself with Zsinj, persuaded the D’Asta family to lend him several bulk cruisers, which he retrofitted as carriers for TIE fighters and TIE bombers. Banjeer’s forces destroyed or damaged more than thirty New Republic capital ships, derailing the Second Fleet’s planned assault on Zsinj and Teradoc.

The year 5 ABY saw Massa’s Fourth Fleet push Coreward along the Corellian Run to Milagro, held by Admiral Uther Kermen. General Duron Veertag landed New Republic troops in the hope of taking Milagro’s manufacturing facilities, enduring a three-month slog marked by open combat between Imperial AT-ATs and New Republic hovertanks and airspeeders, as well as subterranean struggles between both sides’ sappers and miners. Knowing defeat was imminent, Kermen withdrew and bombarded the planet’s surface, denying the Rebels its facilities. He fled to Spirana, but then launched a surprise attack that nearly caught Mon Mothma while the New Republic Chief of State was meeting the Fourth Fleet’s commanders. Massa beat back the attack and lunged farther down the Corellian Run to take Spirana.

The First Fleet, meanwhile, had an easier time of it: Nantz won a relatively easy victory at Yag’Dhul and seized Thyferra before linking up with the rebellious worlds of Cilpar and Mrlsst (both sites of earlier actions by Rogue Squadron) and opening relations with the neutral forces of Herglic Space. Behind Nantz’s front lines, Delvardus tried to retake Sullust and was badly defeated by First Fleet elements under the command of a bold Sullustan captain named Sien Sovv. Secure in his position, Nantz sent a task force up the Rimma to support the Sullustans. Delvardus lost a series of lightning-quick battles on the perimeter of his territory and fled into the Deep Core.

In the north Ackbar handed temporary command of the Third Fleet to Kalback and Willham Burke, who sought to sever Teradoc’s forces from the Core. Leading from the Mon Cal Star Cruisers Justice and Remember Alderaan, they defeated Teradoc’s task force at Togoria, then fought their way to Lantillies, where they linked up with Contruum’s defense forces to establish a beachhead on the Perlemian. From there, Burke pushed Coreward to Chazwa, where his forces met those of Admiral Ledre Okins, based at Colla. The two admirals stalked each other through a lengthy series of raids and feints before Burke tricked Okins into diverting key units of his fleet to Pindra, where he ensnared them in a grav trap laid among the system’s tumbling asteroids. Burke then ran Okins down at Colla and destroyed him, opening the way to the New Republic enclave at Brentaal.

Kalback had less luck, however—at Corsin, his attempt to seize a beachhead on the Hydian Way failed, as Zsinj’s Super Star Destroyer Iron Fist drove his forces out of the system. He retreated to Obroa-skai, where his warships were added to the New Republic’s Rapid Response Task Force, commanded by Luke Skywalker. It fell to Kalback and Skywalker to eliminate the mysterious warlord known as Shadowspawn, whose TIE defenders had launched a series of vicious raids on New Republic worlds in the Inner Rim, Expansion Region, and Mid Rim. With the aid of Mandalorian Protectors led by Fenn Shysa, Shadowspawn was killed—as was Kalback.

In 6 ABY Nantz moved in force against the isolated Prentioch, who was taken prisoner after a siege at Bomis Koori. The Western Reaches were now firmly in New Republic hands, leaving Nantz free to plot the conquest of the Southern Core. The Fourth Fleet’s Massa was killed in a savage battle with Kermen at Denon, but his successor, Admiral Chel Dorat, broke the Imperial lines, advancing the Corellian Run front to the edge of the Colonies.

The bulk of the fighting was undertaken by the Third Fleet, now reinforced by Ackbar and his cadre of Mon Cal officers. Burke and General Brenn Tantor took Reytha, Gyndine, and Commenor, placing the task forces of Burke, Dorat, and Nantz in position to advance into the Core. To the north, Ackbar hoped to push Zsinj up the Hydian and cut Coruscant off from the Loyalist systems of the New Territories and the Pentastar Alignment. The drive up the Hydian from Brentaal began well enough, with victories at Uviuy Exen and Drearia, but Zsinj’s Raptors overwhelmed Ragab at Paqualis, further elevating the warlord’s profile.

Checked, Ackbar ordered a move to Palanhi, setting up a push down the Namadii Corridor to Coruscant. Mindful of Imperial forces to Rimward, though, he sent Nammo and the Defiance to seize Bilbringi. There, Nammo was bested by Admiral Teren Rogriss, assisted by the 181st Imperial Fighter Wing under Turr Phennir. Zsinj remained a stubborn adversary, and Ysanne Isard still commanded numerous fortress worlds in the Core and Colonies. But years of constant pressure had brought the New Republic to Coruscant’s doorstep.

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WAR PORTRAIT: YSANNE ISARD

The head of the Senate Bureau of Intelligence, Armand Isard, believed that a strong and ruthless hand was needed to reform the Republic. He found that hand in Supreme Chancellor Palpatine, and raised his daughter Ysanne as an enthusiastic proponent of the New Order and its programs.

Ysanne spent much of her youth in her father’s secret underground headquarters in Lusankya—a long-forgotten district of Galactic City buried beneath later developments and converted into a hidden SBI prison. Here, “defective citizens” were made more useful—the best Rebel spies were turned into brilliant double agents, and maverick Imperial personnel were retrained as obedient servants of the New Order.

By her twenties Ysanne Isard was one of Imperial Intelligence’s best field agents, specializing in “dagger and fist” missions alongside her personal brute squad of ex-stormtrooper NCOs—men chosen for their physique rather than their intelligence, and widely believed to be Ysanne’s lovers as well as her muscle. Agent Isard certainly had little time for a conventional social life, living entirely within the structure of the New Order.

The brute squad and her uses of them also marked a departure from her father’s policy of subtle and civilized ruthlessness. Ysanne appreciated new-generation Imperial projects such as the Executor and the Tarkin Doctrine in a way that her father never could, and when Armand Isard attempted to overthrow Palpatine, Ysanne unhesitatingly betrayed him, and was rewarded with his role as director of Imperial Intelligence.

Isard’s power was officially circumscribed by a group of powerful advisers known as the Ubiqtorate. The young Isard made no argument about this arrangement, perhaps because she knew its real purpose was to allow her to monitor their behavior; those who attempted to use the Intelligence apparatus for their own ends were quickly reassigned to Lusankya. Isard rose steadily until she oversaw the entire Imperial security apparatus, suppressing elite intrigues and civic unrest alike.

Isard moved swiftly after Endor, declaring martial law on Imperial Center and using stormtroopers to suppress pro-Rebel agitation before it became a popular uprising. The fact that none of the other surviving Imperial leaders had even reacted to the protests convinced her they were incapable of leading the New Order, and she quickly engineered the fall of Sate Pestage, General Paltr Carvin, and Grand Moff Hissa.

By 5 ABY Isard was the effective ruler of the Empire. Although she allowed the toothless Ruling Council to remain as a notional legislature, it was the director of Intelligence who now boasted a permanent escort from the Imperial Royal Guard, a visible symbol of her acceptance as quasi-Empress by the remains of the New Order hierarchy.

But she was trapped within a shrinking territory—a trap she sought to escape. Her retreat from Coruscant in 7 ABY was a ploy to overextend the New Republic in the Core, one that nearly succeeded—as did her attempt to destabilize the New Republic and destroy Rogue Squadron during the so-called Bacta War. Even when defeated at Thyferra, she managed to disappear, assembling Loyalists and warlords who continued the military advance against the New Republic after Grand Admiral Thrawn’s defeat.

At this point, however, she was contacted by agents of the clone Emperor, and sternly ordered to personally recapture her former command ship, the Super Star Destroyer Executor II, which had acquired the name of Lusankya after being buried at enormous cost and effort on the site of her father’s old headquarters.

Isard must have known that stealing the galaxy’s largest warship from a New Republic dockyard at Bilbringi was a suicide mission, but she never hesitated to obey. Just hours before her forces staged their successful attack on Coruscant, she was killed in a chaotic firefight aboard her former flagship.

New Republic officials strenuously denied rumors that Isard had survived and was being held without trial in a secret facility. But privately, those same officials conceded that “the idea does offer a certain poetic justice.”

Ysanne Isard and Sate Pestage (Chris Scalf)

Appointed Grand Moff of Oversector Outer after the death of Wilhuff Tarkin, Ardus Kaine believed that the destiny of humanity and the Empire lay among worlds unspoiled by the weak, pro-alien policies of the Republic. Toward that end, he moved the headquarters of his oversector—the largest in the Empire, though many of its trouble spots also belonged to overlapping oversectors—from Tarkin’s homeworld of Eriadu to distant Entralla, in the New Territories. Kaine was loyal to Palpatine and proved one of the more effective Grand Moffs, even as he openly favored the New Territories in allocating military forces and economic benefits, citing security as justification for ordering lucrative tax breaks and deals to lure key Imperial corporations into opening subdivisions, joint ventures, and branch offices within the region.

When Palpatine died at Endor, Kaine ordered Scourge Squadron, the task force of Imperial Star Destroyers at the heart of Oversector Outer’s defenses, to regroup at Entralla. Between Scourge’s twenty-four Star Destroyers, led by the Reaper, and the hundreds of capital ships assigned to the New Territories’ sectors, Kaine controlled one of the most powerful starfleets in the galaxy.

It took awhile for Sate Pestage to realize that Kaine’s starfleet was no longer his to command. At first Kaine simply ignored the Imperial regent’s inquiries; later, he dismissed them. With the Rebels triumphant and central authority crumbling, the totality of Oversector Outer was indefensible; under his guidance, the New Territories would flourish. Kaine warned that the Core Worlds would fall, and invited Imperial forces to join him in a new cradle of human civilization. He was unmoved by the Ruling Council’s accusations that the Outer Rim was only indefensible because of his dereliction of duty; he was done defending decadent alien civilizations and foolish ideas about galactic unity.

Disputes with neighboring warlords and New Republic forces persuaded Kaine to consolidate his holdings further. In 4 ABY he met with the Moffs of fourteen New Territories sectors and a quintet of Imperial corporations at Muunilinst and signed a treaty creating the Pentastar Alignment. (Outside the Alignment’s borders, Moffs continued to rule their sectors in the name of the Ruling Council.)

Kaine sought to eliminate some of the inefficiencies that had plagued the Empire. The Alignment was divided into two arms: Order and Enforcement. The heart of Enforcement was the Pentastar Patrol, made up of former Imperial Navy forces, supplemented by a fleet of six-hundred-meter Enforcer-class picket cruisers built by the Jaemus shipyards, home of the Pentastar subdivisions of Kuat Drive Yards and Sienar Fleet Systems. The Alignment was governed by the Chamber of Order, led by Kaine and consisting of the Moffs and key corporate officials.

The New Republic largely left the Alignment alone as it defeated warlords elsewhere in the galaxy, a drumbeat of victories that troubled many in the Alignment. Its former Imperials had seen Kaine as the Empire’s brightest hope, and assumed one day his warships would return to the Core Worlds in force. But that hadn’t happened, and every month the Empire’s prospects dimmed further.

Pestage died, Imperial Center and the Core fell into New Republic hands, and Ysanne Isard was believed dead. In 8 ABY Zsinj was killed and High Admiral Teradoc fled the Greater Maldrood for the Deep Core. The new seat of Imperial power was Orinda, where Ars Dangor led a resurrected Ruling Council. But the Council’s hold on power was tenuous, and a day of reckoning appeared imminent: Admiral Ackbar drove into the New Territories, seizing Ord Mantell, Ithor, and Agamar. New Republic forces now controlled territory perilously close to the Alignment. But still Kaine looked inward.

The Alignment was ripe for revolution—and it came in the person of Grand Admiral Thrawn, though he never claimed the title of Emperor. A series of victories over pirate bands and raids against Ackbar’s forces rallied the Imperial military to his cause and won him the support of the D’Asta clan. Bitterly aware that the officers of the Pentastar Patrol saw Thrawn as the Empire’s savior, Kaine agreed to give Thrawn control of the Alignment’s forces, calling the arrangement a temporary military confederation. But he refused to hand over the Reaper, depriving Thrawn of a powerful flagship.

After Thrawn’s death, Kaine sought to shore up his support, swearing before the Chamber of Order that he would continue the Grand Admiral’s cause. A year later, he was forced to prove it: The reborn Emperor summoned Kaine to Byss, where the former Grand Moff acknowledged Palpatine’s authority. Kaine died at Palanhi when his shuttle was ambushed, supposedly by New Republic E-wings.

The Alignment’s architect was no more; in 12 ABY Gilad Pellaeon asked the Chamber of Order to accept annexation by his Empire—whose borders were largely the same as the chunk of the New Territories that Kaine initially decided to defend. Pellaeon defended this latest incarnation of the Empire valiantly, but could not hope to hold out against the swelling power of the New Republic. In 17 ABY New Republic forces seized the Empire’s eastern holdings, pushing Pellaeon back into the eight sectors around Bastion that had been the heart of the Alignment. Those eight sectors would endure as the Imperial Remnant. Ardus Kaine had dismissed the Empire and seen the Alignment as its successor. But in the end, his efforts ensured the Empire’s survival in the very sectors he had defended.

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WAR PORTRAIT: ZSINJ

The son of a shipyard mechanic from Fondor, Zsinj was dismissed by his instructors and peers at Prefsbelt as a dull sort. His most notable trait was that he had no first name, following an ancient tradition from his Fondorian caste.

In fact, Zsinj was a gifted linguist, mathematician, and businessman, as well as a skilled tactician and engineer. Hyperintelligent, eccentric, and often bored, he adopted various unlikely personas over the course of his career—thus confusing potential rivals, and keeping himself entertained.

Claiming he wanted to become a great warrior, Zsinj accepted command of a Victory Star Destroyer in Quelii sector. Few other officers saw glory in helming an old cruiser on a mapping patrol, but Zsinj proved effective on mission after mission, rising to become Grand Moff of the Quelii Oversector, High Admiral of Crimson Command, and one of the select few officers to earn the ceremonial rank of Warlord of the Empire. When he was charged with controlling the Rimward stretch of the Hydian Way and conquering the Drackmarians, his Sector Group was reinforced with a hundred refitted Victory-class Star Destroyers and the Star Dreadnought Brawl—making it the largest fleet in the navy. Zsinj was now the very model of a modern Imperial governor.

After Endor, Zsinj refused to obey the Ruling Council, built up his forces, and sent out agents to recruit other Imperial officers—as well as pirates, mad scientists, and corrupt business partners. Now sporting a well-tended mustache and a theatrical uniform, Zsinj brought together unlikely allies including the buccaneering courtesan Leonia Tavira, the Dathomir-born Inquisitor Lanu Pasiq, and the Hutt economist Teubbo.

The key to Zsinj’s power was the Brawl, now renamed the Iron Fist after the elderly Victory Star Destroyer that had been his first command. But Zsinj saw his domain as a successor to the Empire, not its continuation. He formed his own elite military, known as the Raptors, and outfitted them with armor, starfighters, and warships created in his shipyards. Zsinj’s Raptors stopped the New Republic’s initial probes of his territory, but his pride drew him into war with the former Rebels nonetheless.

After Coruscant fell, many former Imperials supported Zsinj—but he also attracted the full attention of the New Republic, which could no longer ignore the well-armed warlord of the Hydian Way. To defeat Zsinj, the New Republic turned to its own maverick geniuses, Han Solo and Wedge Antilles. In 7 ABY they almost destroyed the Iron Fist at Selaggis; then Solo stumbled on Dathomir, thanks to a subtle tip-off from the Drackmarians. With the support of a Hapan fleet, he destroyed both the Iron Fist and Rancor Base.

Without its ruling genius—and his Super Star Destroyer—Zsinj’s revived Empire fell apart, ravaged by the Imperial Remnant and the New Republic.

Zsinj at the height of his glory (Chris Scalf)

For the New Republic, the Battle of Brentaal was the most important fight between Endor and the Liberation of Coruscant. Brentaal was the greatest hyperlane crossroads in the Core; a victory there would place Rebel units within striking distance of the capital and limit the Empire’s access to the eastern and southern quadrants.

Ysanne Isard, the director of Imperial Intelligence, saw it rather differently. If she could engineer a Rebel victory at Brentaal, she could overthrow the regency of Sate Pestage, weaken the Ruling Council, and position herself to seize the throne. By allowing the enemy to take and hold a key Core world, she would also draw the New Republic’s leaders and soldiers into exposed positions, where they would be vulnerable to her planned campaign of military and political subversion.

The New Republic committed their very best to the liberation of Brentaal. The X-wings of Rogue Squadron spearheaded the campaign, followed by the assault starfighters of General Horton Salm’s Aggressor Wing and the infiltrators of Kapp Dendo’s Commando Team One—all backed up by an invasion fleet led by the Star Cruiser Independence, with Admiral Ackbar himself in command.

The Imperials defended Brentaal with a trio of Star Destroyers and a fortified moon base, but Isard’s plan depended on less conventional assets: an inept and indecisive admiral named Lon Isoto, the TIE interceptors of the legendary 181st Fighter Group, and the pride of Baron Soontir Fel.

The essence of Isard’s scheme was simple—Isoto would lose the battle, but Fel, the 181st’s renowned commander, would win several tactical victories along the way, making the Imperial defeat appear convincing. The details, of course, were far more complex.

Isoto obligingly bungled the initial phase of the defense. He would have bungled the next phase, too, but Fel’s fighters won the second round, almost preventing the Rebels from landing on the surface—almost, but not quite. Isoto ordered them to pull back too soon—and as Isard had predicted, Fel was too honorable to disobey a personal order from a fleet admiral, no matter how inept.

Next morning, Rogue Squadron moved on the capital. Once again, Isoto bungled the defense; once again, the 181st fought well and nearly won the battle—and once again, Isoto threw away their gains. This time, he had been duped by Isard into ordering the entire Imperial force into a full retreat.

Fel had had enough. He ordered his TIEs to pull out as commanded, but remained behind at Vuultin and defected to the New Republic.

That seemed like a disaster for the Empire, but Isard was pleased. She had suspected that a conspiracy of military commanders was about to offer Fel the throne, which he very well might have claimed. And even had he refused, Fel’s vision of what the Empire should be would have eventually led him to oppose her manipulation of what it was. Now he had effectively taken himself out of her way; the military’s plans to seize power were thrown into confusion; Isoto was dead, shot on Isard’s orders; and Pestage knew he could no longer retain control of the Ruling Council.

There was no one in a position to stop Isard from taking power, and from implementing her plan to save the Empire. All in all, she reflected, it had been well worth a planet and a few days’ work.

A salve that could heal a startling number of species, bacta revolutionized medicine and, inevitably, became a precious commodity that many galactic powers sought to control.

Bacta wasn’t a single substance, but a compound. Its basis was a lotion used by the Vratix species of Thyferra to heal wounds. Bacterial particles of alazhi and kavam were spun into this lotion, which was then mixed with a colorless liquid called ambori. Bacta, it was believed, mimicked the body’s vital fluids; when patients were suspended in tanks of it, the alazhi and kavam particles coated wounds and caused rapid tissue regrowth. Days in a bacta tank could heal wounds that might otherwise have been fatal, with the only side effects a sickly-sweet smell that lingered in the mouth and nasal passages. In situations where a rejuvenation tank wasn’t practical, bacta could be applied through patches, though its effectiveness was reduced.

Bacta’s properties became general knowledge around 4100 BBY, and vaulted the insectoid Vratix to galactic prominence. Vratix excreted a curious chemical called denin, which altered their coloration to reflect their moods, and were known for being slightly telepathic. Scientists argued for eons about the possibility of a connection between these characteristics and the nature of bacta.

The Empire carefully controlled the production of bacta, ensuring that it stayed limited to two bacta producers, the Zaltin and Xucphra. Ysanne Isard released the Krytos virus on Coruscant in 7 ABY and then gained control of the Xucphra Corporation and Thyferra, giving herself control of the bacta supply when it was desperately needed. The Thyferran government refused to move against Isard, and the New Republic felt it couldn’t depose an elected planetary leader, even if she were a psychotic Imperial with her own Super Star Destroyer. That task fell to Rogue Squadron, whose pilots resigned their New Republic commissions to pursue an ostensibly private war against Isard. The Rogues allied themselves with a Vratix resistance group, disabled the Lusankya, and reclaimed control of the bacta supply for Zaltin.

Many a soldier had the disorienting experience of waking up suspended in bacta, wearing a breath mask and trying to reconstruct what had happened. Luke Skywalker recuperated in bacta after his mauling by a wampa and near-fatal exposure to Hoth’s icy night, and veteran Rogue pilot Hobbie Klivian suffered so many injuries and spent so much time in a bacta tank that his fellow Rogues jokingly accused him of loving the stuff.

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WAR PORTRAIT: WEDGE ANTILLES

Wedge Antilles was synonymous with Rogue Squadron and often acclaimed as the best starfighter pilot in the galaxy. The Corellian tried to deflect such honors, insisting that he’d flown with better pilots in Luke Skywalker and Soontir Fel, but it was hard to argue: No one else had the silhouettes of two Death Stars among his fuselage’s kill markers.

Orphaned at seventeen, Antilles joined the Rebellion after an Imperial bombardment killed his girlfriend Mala Tinero. He survived the Death Star run at Yavin and formed Rogue Squadron with Skywalker, taking over its leadership after Luke turned to his Jedi studies. He stole the shuttle Tydirium used to infiltrate the Imperial lines at Endor and flew as Red Leader in the showdown with Emperor Palpatine, helping Lando Calrissian destroy the second Death Star. He then led Rogue Squadron on dozens of missions as the New Republic eliminated the warlords, took Coruscant, and then held it against repeated threats.

Though Antilles had never wanted anything except to fly a starfighter, he eventually bowed to the inevitable and took a role in fleet operations, commanding Rogue Squadron from the bridge of the Super Star Destroyer Lusankya. He retired after a stint as chief of staff of Starfighter Command, hoping to spend the rest of his years with his wife, Iella Wessiri, and daughters.

It wasn’t to be: The Yuuzhan Vong invaded the galaxy, forcing Antilles to come out of retirement. A second retirement was also short-lived: He was imprisoned by the Galactic Alliance as tensions between Coruscant and Corellia exploded into war. Wedge escaped and found himself commanding the Corellian Defense Force against his best friend Tycho Celchu and his daughter Syal, who were flying for the Galactic Alliance. Increasingly disgusted with the Corellian leadership, Antilles resigned and offered his assistance to the Jedi Order instead.

Though Antilles could be chilly in the cockpit, the Rogues found him an approachable, affable commander outside of it, one who tried to shrug off his fame and accomplishments. Still, many observed that there was a sadness about him that never quite seemed to lift.

Only Wedge’s few close friends understood where that shadow came from: Antilles had started killing men when he was in his teens, and never stopped. Countless Imperial pilots—many of them young, scared, or both—died under his guns, as did pirates, Yuuzhan Vong, and others. Innocents died, too, when the Rogues fought above cities or had to hit military targets in civilian areas. And as a squadron commander, Antilles was forced to send inexperienced pilots into combat against long odds. Their deaths, too, were on his head.

Antilles accepted that this was his job—he was a killer who trained others to become killers, and he never lost his belief that eliminating those who would harm innocents made the galaxy a better place. But every time he turned an enemy fighter into a ball of flame, sent a torpedo winging across a cityscape, or ordered a green pilot to engage a hostile formation, he prayed that it would be the last time.

Kuat was one of the Empire’s crown jewels—the home system of Kuat Drive Yards, chief supplier of the Empire’s warships, and one of the galaxy’s most efficient shipyards. Capturing Kuat—preferably with its shipyards and orbital manufacturing facilities intact—would be a giant step forward in the effort to defeat the Empire.

The New Republic tried to take over the system in 4 ABY and again in 7 ABY, only to be foiled by such adversaries as Boba Fett, Tyber Zann, and Zsinj. It wasn’t until Zsinj’s death in 8 ABY that the New Republic was finally able to seize the system.

After Zsinj died, Kuat was one of a handful of Imperial fortress worlds remaining in the Core, along with the likes of Corellia, Chasin, and Rendili. Yet most of the Imperial warships guarding Kuat had departed for the New Territories, leaving Kuat to rely on its own defenses.

Those defenses were formidable, however: The Kuati Sector Forces had been among the strongest in the galaxy for centuries, and KDY had always employed its latest designs for self-defense. More than a dozen Star Destroyers defended Kuat, as did the Star Dreadnought Aurora and a trio of battlecruisers—the Event Horizon, Stellar Halo, and Luminous. And one of the Empire’s best commanders, Admiral Teren Rogriss, had been sent from Orinda to take the Aurora’s helm.

Wedge Antilles, Airen Cracken, and Ral’Rai Muvunc, the Twi’lek minister of commerce, engineered the plan that finally captured Kuat. The New Republic directed an impressive array of Mon Cal Star Cruisers to Horthav, a staging system just minutes away from the system, where they waited for the rest of the plan to come to fruition.

Under Cracken’s supervision, New Republic slicers had worked painstakingly for months to insert astromechs into the KDY droid pool and get them aboard key Kuati warships. Those droids had loaded an ingenious coded virus into the computer networks of five warships, then erased all trace of their malignant programming. When the virus was ready to activate, a transmission went out from the Event Horizon—not to Horthav but to another nearby staging system, Venir.

There a squadron of A-wings commanded by Tycho Celchu jumped into the Kuat system. Surprise Squadron, as Celchu called it, had been fitted with experimental ion torpedoes that packed a ferocious punch. Within minutes the Luminous and three Star Destroyers were struggling to get their systems back online—only to find that the Event Horizon and four other Star Destroyers had locked down their flight hangars and turned their weapons on the other Kuati ships.

Now it was Muvunc’s turn. He hailed the KDY directors with a curious demand: an emergency shareholder meeting. Muvunc asked the puzzled directors to review a series of financial transactions that had been made over the last eight months. KDY stock had been essentially valueless for years given the Empire’s stranglehold on the megacorp’s affairs, but a number of private trusts and investment companies had bought up small collections of shares from discouraged KDY investors, after which they were acquired in turn by a holding company. Muvunc explained that he was the chief executive of that company, and now controlled 34 percent of KDY.

When the flummoxed directors objected that control of KDY was currently a military matter, Muvunc invited them to consider the situation: In just minutes, the New Republic had taken nine warships out of the fight. The Empire might control KDY, but Orinda was tens of thousands of light-years away, while the Mon Cal Star Cruisers could be in-system in minutes. Kateel of Kuhlvult, KDY’s chairman, dismissed Muvunc haughtily—but three other board members promptly voted their 18 percent of KDY shares in favor of surrender to the New Republic.

Rogriss and his command crew were permitted to withdraw and allowed safe passage back to Orinda. It looked like the New Republic had won an enormous victory without a single pilot being killed. But other forces were at work within KDY, too. Within hours of Kuat’s surrender, Imperial agents activated from deep cover: The Aurora and the Stellar Halo engaged their hyperdrives and streaked into Kuat’s sun. More agents triggered explosions that ripped through the yards, then abducted KDY’s key designers and fled for the Deep Core aboard the partially completed Eclipse.