What if Palpatine had never been born?

Interesting question that occured to me as i was reviewing certain events in the EU and films.


What if Palpatine had never been born( or died at an early age)?

What would the galaxy we know and love be like?

How would this change the destinies of our favorite characters?


for starters....

trade federation blockade wouldn't have happened ergo there would be no reason for the Jedi to go to Naboo much less escape with the queen.

with no reason to go to Naboo and escape with the queen then they would have never stopped on tatooine thereby never meeting a "Funny little boy."

Ani and Ami would have never met and never married.

Luke and Leia would not have been born

the Clone wars would have never happened

The jedi would still be the same stick-in-the-mud's that they were

the galaxy would be a whole lot worse off without the Empire ( don't shoot me! there is a logical reason for this statement)

the Rebellion would have( in all likelyhood) never been needed.

these are just a few of the things that would have been changed by the absence of Palpatine.

Care to add any?
Feel free- eventually i hope to make one long list out of these...

 

this is one of those what if posts that probably is off-topic.

i would imagine that life might have turned out differently, but perhaps not be the same way as dria described. if palpatine was not around, i would imagine his sith master finding a different student instead of palpatine. had this student showed the same ability with politics as palpatine, the galaxy might have ended up pretty similar, with the overthrow of a corrupt republic, and the establishment of an empire, and the purge of the jedi. luke and leia might not have been born, but the rebellion may certainly have come into play, possibly with some of the same players: Mon Mothma, Bail Organa, etc. The timing might have changed, and perhaps clones might not have been used, but there is still a good chance that some sith power would eventually try to take over the decaying republic and exact revenge on the jedi.

even if the sith-who-is-hypothetically-replacing-palpatine were not of a political bent, perhaps they might wait another generation, when the republic has continued to wither, the jedi are increasingly confused about whether to serve the republic, and someone might make a move to take over the republic. this takeover attempt, while perhaps not part of the sith design, could be easily turned into part of the sith plot to end up behind the throne..

what if palaptine's replacement was much more bloodthirsty? the galaxy would be worse off.

again this is all idle speculation and probably deserves to be on a different board. is there a 'what if?' board?

 

What if I was a supermodel? What if humans had four arms?

 

The Republic would still collapse. Didn't anyone read the Foundation Trilogy? Events occur because they are built up of smaller events. If Palpatine hadn't been born, another sith lord would have risen, and would have taken advantage of the corruption in the senate, and by doing so, taken the republic down.

 

What if Palpatine had never been born?

Then the galaxy would be a much nicer place

 

Then the galaxy would be a much nicer place

Would it?

If Palpatine hadn't been there, whoever trained him would've trained someone else instead. Maybe that person wouldn't have had as much powers as palps, and maybe he would've. There's no way to know.

Also, Palps was bad, but even without him, the Senate and the Republic as a whole were pretty corrupt and rotting despite appearances of solidarity. He definitely took advantage of that to put himself into power, but things were getting ugly anyway; his manipulations just speeded the process and made it uglier.

Also, if he hadn't been around, there would be no GAR, and then no Empire, and then no NR, and so there would be no true trained galactic military when the Yuuzhan Vong invaded. Granted, there would be several thousand more Jedi, but those Jedi would not be battle-hardened as the 100 at the time of NJO were, and without any kind of military backup, they likely wouldn't have been so effective against the Vong. Remember, all they've known had been peacekeeping. Not soldiering.

Or, the galaxy might be a nicer place.

There's really no way to tell, and infinite ways any event could have unfolded.

 

I have a feeling the Republic would have crumbled anyway, just a little later and resulting in a longer and bloodier civil war.

 

We knew long ago that the Republic was dieing from within. This is pretty much mentioned in The Journal of Whills, the preface to the ANH novelization. And it's been showning in the Prequel era movies and novels. So someone would have taken Palpatine's place if he had not exsisted. The question is whether or not they would have been the same as Palpatine or if they would have tried to fix the Republic and possibly caused even worse problems.

 

If Palpatine had never existed, the corruption of the republic would have occured at a dramatically slower pace. The Trade Federation would not have blockaded Naboo, and the taxation of the trade lanes would have not been repealed, and so the Republic would have had much more badly-needed money in those years of decline, further drawing out the Republic's life (if there is one think that can give life to a dying country/administration/regime, then it is money)

Chancellor Valorum might have remained Supreme Chancellor for another half century, letting the government be run by corrupt beurocrats, who, despite their greediness, don't want the government to fall. The chance of another Sith with nearly as much power as Palpatine springing up in his place is so unlikely that the Sith probably would have remained invisible for the last half century, and maybe beyond then. The Outer Rim would certainly not have been as colonized, mapped, and controlled as it became during its occupation by Tarkin, Kaine, and the Rebels. When the Vong came, the New Republic probably wouldn't have even known it until they were on the doorsteps of Raaltiir.

Nom Anor would have significantly accelerated the decline of the Republic, maybe with as much efficiency as Palpatine. Due to its limited control over the core and inner rims of the galaxy, and its complete absence of control over the Outer rim, combined with its lack of a military, political weakness, and its ignorance of everything that is happening in the galaxy, the Yuuzhan Vong would have had virtually no resistance against their invasion, except for against the Hutts, Ssi-Ruuk, and Chiss (and even these wouldn't have lasted long with the full force of the Vong against them)

Ten thousand soldiers is not that much, even on earth today. Ten thousand diplomats with some self-defence training (the Old Jedi Order) would not have even been thought of as something to divert a single warrior to eliminate. Perhaps the Sith would have even tried to make an alliance with the Vong, and thereby been eliminated in the process. The Vong could have scooped up planets by the thousands without anyone to oppose them.

---

The other possibility, which just occured to me:

The only thing which kept the Ssi-Ruuk from invading the galaxy after they had finished constructing a fleet was the knowledge that Palpatine would have wiped them out at the first sign of agression. Without Palpatine to stop them, the Ssi-Ruuk could have walked right out into Bakura, and enteched all of its inhabitants. With their now-improved fleet, they could walk right across the galaxy, enteching everybody that they come across and putting the remaining humans and aliens into concentration camps, awaiting their turn to be enteched.

Bakura had not much more than a dreadnought to hold off the Ssi-Ruuk during TaB. They wouldn't even have had this if it wasn't for Palpatine. The Ssi-Ruuk could easily create a military millions of times larger than the Empire's with an entire galaxy to enslave and entech. With captured Jedi in their possession, they could then create their super-machines which could entech beings which weren't even present at the entechment devices (long-distance enteching) making them quite literally unstoppable.

Nom Anor would have had to flee into the dark corners of the galaxy to await the Vong's arrival, or would have been captured and his spirit enteched, creating a pretty funky battle droid. Even if for some reason they decided to downsize after their Shreeftuft finished building a castle on Coruscant, and they were out of place to defend against the Vong when they came, it wouldn't take too many days to entech a billion or two slaves, and then they would have a nearly endless supply of droid fighters to send against the Vong. They wouldn't even need to fire their weapons, they would just need to crash into the worldships to wipe out the Vong.

[hr]

Hmm, I wonder what would be worse: A galaxy under the complete domination of the Vong, or the complete domination of the Ssi-Ruu

 

or if palpatine had never been born... palpatine's master might have trained someone who had a bit of jedi training, had political will and charisma -- count dooku. dooku could have easily gotten himself a position of power in the senate, eventually becoming chancellor with his 'jedi' wisdom.. or claim to expose the 'truth' about the jedi order and have public sentiment go against them, as they defend a corrupt republic. Dooku would make an interesting emperor.. and he might have built the death star sooner. he also might have found a use for young anakin as a potential heir...

i believe Dooku would have been just as vicious against the ssi-sruk as palpy was, and dooku might not have had an anti-alien agenda, so rebellion might not have erupted as it did under palpatine... with his good looks and trenchant wit, people might have liked an empire under dooku.

 

How very true, Count Dooku is played by THE Christopher Lee, so could head off a lot of dissent, unlike an Emperor played by (no offense to the great Ian McDiamirid, I think it was the first Palps).

As for The Ssi-Ruuv or Vong taking over the galaxy, urgghhh. Perhaps a blue skinned, red eyed military genius from an obscure humanoid species from the UR and underestimated green Jedi Master of currently unknown species jointy head off the two dastardly menaces?

 

Nah I don't think you could count on Dooku as a sith Lord if palpatine wasn't around. Dooku saw that the republic was crumbling but still he served it until the death of Qui-Gon on Naboo. Now without Palpatine, Maul wouldn't be around to kill Qui-gon and thus Dooku wouldn't have been pushed that one step to far. Correct me if I'm wrong by all means.

 

It is also possible, without Palpatine, that there would be no Darth Maul, that Maul would have continued to live out his life wherever in the galaxy he was really from.

To be sure, whomever it was that was Palpatine's master, Darth Whatever, would have eventually found a new apprentice to continue to train and such. BUt it is possible that the idea of "Hey, why not train an apprentice, but keep him in the political realm, and have him someday take over the Republic thru our ways, and thus whatever" came from Sidious's master and not Sidious himself.

 

So basically, Palpatine and Anakin are the unknowing saviors of the galaxy? Maybe...

Wasn't Palpatine's greatest force ability to see the possibilities of the future, and prepare for them? Maybe there was some foresight to his militarization of the galaxy.
Think of how soft everyone is at the time of TPM. Places like Naboo, they elect kids, mainly because it is such an egalitatian, utopic society. So ornamental. So easily crushed.

We all know Anakin's contribution to the galaxy, besides genocide and inimitable sense of style, is Luke and Leia. That's better than what most other force-users gave.

 

Even if Dooku had somehow been convinced to join the Sith, it wouldn't have been from birth, and by the time he reached his old age in TPM, his career would already have been established. He might have moved up to a high position in the Senate, but he wouldn't have had the political clout or the time to take the reins of power, stage a massive war in order to recieve emergency powers, declare himself emperor, and then build up a military of such immense proportions that hundreds of ships could go missing at any time without anyone so much as blinking an eye. Palpatine had been plotting his rise to the top since long before TPM, and since Dooku was already a well-known figure, it would have taken him even longer to get all the chips in place for his big move.

Also, Thrawn would never have had the opportunity to join with Yoda in a fight against the Vong or Ssi-Ruuk (who I still believe would have taken over the galaxy) First, the Chiss only first encountered the human-inhabited area of the galaxy because of Kinman Doriana's fleet which was trapsing all over the unknown regions, hunting for Outbound flight. If it wasn't for Doriana and his very large and very noisy fleet, sent at the direct orders of PALPATINE, the Chiss' fist contact with the Republic would have been delayed by several decades, and Thrawn would never have been exiled. Thrawn was able to be recruited by Palpatine because of the actions which he took against Doriana and Outbound flight (both direct results of Palpy's tamperings) which caused him to be exiled to Nirauan, which happened to be the planet that Booster Terrik fled to while being chased by an Imperial (not a Republic) star destroyer trying to collect an imperial tax. Thrawn would have remained ignorant of what was happening in the galaxy proper until the arrival of the Vong or Ssi-Ruuk until it was much too late to stop whatever was happening and/or to meet the little green muppet.

Also, Yoda would not have lived long enough to encounter the Vong. His living in a peaceful and nearly stress-free enviornment like Dagobah probably prolonged his life even more than it already was, and he died before the Ssi-Ruuk invaded, and long before the Vong even came within sight of the galaxy. Yoda wouldn't have made a difference in the war against these two because he would have been dying or dead before they arrived.

So, yes, in a way, Palpy is the saviour of the galaxy.

 

It is unlikely that we would have ever known the name Darth Vader, but I feel certain that the Republic would crumble even without Palpatine. As seen in Episode I before Palpatine's chancellory, the Republic was rotten to the core, and was destined to crumble within a few decades no matter what. When the Republic collapsed, three things could happen:

1. A new, functional galactic government free of corruption would be created to lead the galaxy to better times.

2. The galaxy would let the Republic go and not establish a new galactic government.

3. Some of the corrupt senators seize power, declares a New Order who again gets overthrown by even more corrupt and evil people.

Which do you think the most likely?

 

LOL

ok i am so going play devil's advocate here for a minute....

Suppose that the Sith Order had died with Palpatine... what then?

I loved the points about the Vong and the Ssi-ruuk!

Really it's all about seeing the other POV (point of view).

For example;
Yes the empire was bad and evil (for the most part), but look at all of the good it did... (please don't shoot me for this)

1. The Republic was dying anyways and Palpatine saw this and instituted a whole lot of new procedures and social reforms.

2. As was pointed out earlier, it was the fear of Palpatine and instant retaliation that kept the Ssi-ruuk and who knows how many other possible invaders out of the galaxy.

3. Palpatine kept the galaxy whole and under one government (type) there is no doubt in my mind that had he not overthrown the government then there'd be no Republic left. Just a whole lot of different sovereign clusters.

4. It was time for the Jedi Order to be overhauled and reinvented.

I agree that Anakin and Palpatine were in a way the saviors of the galaxy.

to make a long story short, the galaxy was better off WITH Palpatine then without him.
We may not agree with all of the things he did but even so the galaxy is a better place because of him.

Here's another question for ya, Do you think that Ulic Qel-Droma was somehow a foreshadow of The Chosen One, Anakin Skywalker?


TTFN,

Dria

 

1. The Republic was dying anyways and Palpatine saw this and instituted a whole lot of new procedures and social reforms.

Likewise so could have anyone else interested in saving the Republic and willing to form a despotic regime to do so.
Besides creating a lot of new procedures and social reforms might not be considered good -- I think the Wookiees liked the dying republic to the Empire's "social reforms"


2. As was pointed out earlier, it was the fear of Palpatine and instant retaliation that kept the Ssi-ruuk and who knows how many other possible invaders out of the galaxy.
I don't think they feared Palpatine as a person, but simply knew that his government had a vast military and used it frequently. They could have equally feared Dooku or Bob Saget in the same position.


3. Palpatine kept the galaxy whole and under one government (type) there is no doubt in my mind that had he not overthrown the government then there'd be no Republic left. Just a whole lot of different sovereign clusters.

breaking up the republic might not have happened, nor would it have been necessarily a bad thing. While they might not have been as unified against an outer threat, competition between the soverign clusters might have escalated arms production so that by the time the Vong or Ssi-Sruk came around, the mini-republics might have jumped in technology due to arms races.

Polybius commented that there is a 'natural' progression in governments over time. democracies fall into mob rule which then end up as dictatorships which decline into despotism which is overthrown by oligarchies which then fall back to democracies. (any of the history / political buffs can correct me on this order)

Besides, which is better to have -- one overall ruling government, or having multiple governments that are thus more accountable to their own people. In real world history, the tendency is toward independence and autonomy. Like many 'industries' there are economies of scale in government, depending on the culture and makeup of those being governed. Perhaps the Republic had simply grown to big for it to be run efficiently, and breaking it apart might have worked better.


4. It was time for the Jedi Order to be overhauled and reinvented.

Shouldn't that choice be made by those in the Jedi Order, and not from outside sources?


I agree that Anakin and Palpatine were in a way the saviors of the galaxy.

to make a long story short, the galaxy was better off WITH Palpatine then without him.
We may not agree with all of the things he did but even so the galaxy is a better place because of him.

What if there was no Palpatine or Sith plot, but in his place the Jedi recognized that the Republic was failing, and thus worked with the Supreme Chancellor to re-invent government, rooting out corruption, ensuring equality for Core and Outer Rim worlds alike, etc.

 

The TPM visual dictionary book implies that it was the Sith that worked for thousands of years to make the Republic unstable. There's line in the book about Palpatine implementing hos order's thousand year plan for revenge orr something like that.

Can anyone get the exact quote?

 

The Sith Lord Darth Sideous sets into motion the final stages of his order's 2,000 year old plan to destroy the Jedi. Working patiently, Sideous has extended his indluence deep into the galactic government. Using his grasp of psychology and bureaucacy, to stifle justice, he brings about the crisis he needs to make his move for domination.

So, Palpatine is just a figure in a gigantice plan to overthrow the Jedi. If he wasn't there, another palpatine would be in his place.