Separatist Crisis

The Separatist Crisis (24–22 BBY), also called the Secessionist Movement, was a period of political turmoil at the end of the 1008 years of the Great Peace in which thousands of star systems seceded from the Galactic Republic and pledged loyalty to Count Dooku and the Confederacy of Independent Systems. The period took place in the years following the Invasion of Naboo, and was manipulated by Dooku and his Sith master, the Sith Lord Darth Sidious—publicly known as Supreme Chancellor Palpatine of the Republic. The goal of the Sith was to launch a galactic war that would allow them to amass total control over the Republic, transform it into the Galactic Empire, and destroy the Jedi Order. To help with that goal, the Sith secretly oversaw the creation of an army of clone troopers on the planet Kamino that would become an army for the Republic.

The political turmoil bred by the Separatist Crisis rocked the Republic, with Chancellor Palpatine publicly claiming that he hoped to find a diplomatic solution and avoid a war with the Confederacy. Many in the Confederacy, including members of the Separatist Senate, also did not wish to fight, as they simply wanted to be free of what they saw as the corruption of the Republic. After the attempted assassination of Padmé Amidala, the senator of Naboo and an influential member of the Republic's Loyalist Committee, the Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi began an investigation that led him to discover the clone army on Kamino, as well as a gathering of powerful business interests on Geonosis. These business leaders, who would become known as the Executive Separatist Council, secretly committed their resources to Count Dooku's cause while denying publicly all links to the Confederacy aside from their business dealings and claimed to be neutral. These corporate interests included the Trade Federation, which committed to producing countless battle droids for the Confederacy.

The Crisis culminated in the First Battle of Geonosis, when members of the Jedi Order arrived on Geonosis to rescue the captive Master Kenobi, Senator Amidala, and Padawan Anakin Skywalker from execution. The clone troopers, commissioned as the Grand Army of the Republic through emergency executive power granted to the chancellor by the Galactic Senate, arrived under the command of Jedi Grand Master Yoda and fought the Separatist Droid Army. Although the Republic was victorious in battle, it was merely the first conflict of the three-year Clone Wars. At its end, the goals of the Sith were realized; the Republic defeated the Confederacy, but the Chancellor used the war as a pretense to reform the Republic into the Galactic Empire in the name of security. Though the Empire was ultimately defeated by a New Republic nearly twenty-five years later, the legacy of the Separatist Crisis lived on for decades after, with the First Order rising from the ashes of the Empire in a further attempt to bring the kind of stability to the galaxy that the Galactic Republic was unable to bring during the Separatist Crisis.

Text and facts from the “Separatist Crisis” article on Wookieepedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0. Modified for this site.