Let's Try to Figure Out the Second Imperium

Lately, I've been reading this book:
[image=http://www.openlettersmonthly.com/issue/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/CivilWarof1812Taylor.jpg]

The first part of the book deals with the tensions between the newly formed United States and the British Empire after the end of the American Revolution. Specifically, it explores the efforts of some British and American Loyalists to undermine the United States and draw the "wayward colonies" back into the Imperial fold. Only several stern slap-downs from London kept some actual conspiracies from being launched.

In my dork-brain, this got me thinking about the Galaxy after the Bastion Accords/Pellaeon-Gavirsom Treaty, a period we've only really had explored in the Young Jedi Knight books. As such, I wonder if us here on the Lit Forum can't retcon some color into this period.

Before we get to the Second Imperium itself, I do wonder if we know of any worlds that switched sides under the Treaty? If none are confirmed, are there any systems that seem likely?

And now to the thread title...

We have seen precisely two efforts to restore or expand the Empire post-treaty. One was a comically abortive effort by Moff Derran Takkar in Star Wars: Union. The other was a seemingly well-funded Second Imperium, which put together an army of Dark Jedi, built a cloaked, mobile space station, and successfully hijacked a small fleet. Given the incompetence or insanity of the depicted Second Imperium leadership, their success implies that they had help from within the Empire.

My questions, then, are:

1) Do we know of any Moffs (or other players) from the NJO/LotF/FotJ era that can be retconned into backing the Second Imperium? These would also, theoretically, be Disra's allies from the Hand of Thrawn Duology

2) Beyond the Shadow Academy itself, how large was the Second Imperium movement? The fact that they were recruiting urchins from the Coruscant underworld and appointed, essentially, a hobo who had missed the entire war to lead their space forces tell me that they could not readily recruit within the Imperial population or military.

3) If that is the case, what efforts did the Pellaeon government take to confront the Second Imperium? Are there any Imperial characters from the post-YJK era whose military credentials could benefit from some counter-terrorism experience?

4) What effect did the Second Imperium's activities have of NR/IR relations? I would think that some of the same allegations that the U.S. is currently directing towards Pakistan in regards to the bin-Laden raid would sound very familiar to Imperial authorities between 19 and 23 ABY.


So what do you guys think? Any thoughts (or wild speculation) on this topic?

 

1) Do we know of any Moffs (or other players) from the NJO/LotF/FotJ era that can be retconned into backing the Second Imperium? These would also, theoretically, be Disra's allies from the Hand of Thrawn Duology

He's not an Imperial, but Nom Anor seems likely to me; we know he was involved in undermining the Empire from the CE comics, and helping create what was basically a boogyman threat to help distract/harass the NR would be a logical move on his part to prepare the way for the YV invasion. Not to mention that (as you mentioned in your post) the 2nd Imperium may have caused tension between the Empire and the NR, which of course would only benefit the YV in the long run.


2) Beyond the Shadow Academy itself, how large was the Second Imperium movement? The fact that they were recruiting urchins from the Coruscant underworld and appointed, essentially, a hobo who had missed the entire war to lead their space forces tell me that they could not readily recruit within the Imperial population or military.

The Empire proper would've had to be out of their collective minds to consider colloborating with the Second Imperium. It would probably not have taken much to get the NR to decide that it should just steamroll the Empire, and very little the Imperial Navy could have done to stop it.

3) If that is the case, what efforts did the Pellaeon government take to confront the Second Imperium? Are there any Imperial characters from the post-YJK era whose military credentials could benefit from some counter-terrorism experience?

In all honesty, keeping to their side of the border (besides maybe assisting in ways not directly related to military efforts, like sharing intelligence data with NRI) would have been the logical effort for the Empire. I doubt the NR would've reacted warmly to the idea of any Imperial forces in NR space, especially with the war having ended so recently.

4) What effect did the Second Imperium's activities have of NR/IR relations? I would think that some of the same allegations that the U.S. is currently directing towards Pakistan in regards to the bin-Laden raid would sound very familiar to Imperial authorities between 19 and 23 ABY.

I'm really not sure. I mean, the NR knew that the 2nd Imperium was not based in Imperial space, probably could have found out without a whole lot of trouble whether or not the Empire was directly helping them. I mean, there were bound to be those who would be like "IT'S THE MOFFS AGAIN!!11!!" regardless of whether or not the Empire proper was actually helping the 2nd Imperium, but they would not have had any evidence that it actually was...

That's my two cents, anyway.

 

Too late to edit, so...

This is pretty iffy-but perhaps the occasional resurgences of Imperial-influenced dark siders (like the ones in the 2nd Imperium, which had heavy links to the folks in JA obviously) were one of the reasons behind the creation of the Imperial Knights? For one thing, the Empire having it's own Force-users would allow it to bring all potential Force-sensitives under one roof where they could be both useful and watched; for another, such a military-focused order as the IKs would, to my mind at least, be an excellent concept for eradicating any potential nascent dark side groups with delusions of grandeur, which of course could become a very big problem quickly with just how corrupt and manipulative the Moffs have remained over the years.

 

What's more, it dedicates the Empire to capital G Good. It's an experiment in benevolent dictatorship - the Empire is good, now, but the shadow of Palpatine has to be eliminated.

 

1) Do we know of any Moffs (or other players) from the NJO/LotF/FotJ era that can be retconned into backing the Second Imperium? These would also, theoretically, be Disra's allies from the Hand of Thrawn Duology.

Any number of them could be retconned into Second Imperium backers, but it wouldn't make any sense. What forces did the SI have to its name? Some stormtroopers, a handfull of cut-rate Dark Jedi wannabes, some old TIEs, and a single battle station? If the Empire had been giving them military support, they could have at least "lost" some up-to-date equipment their way, and some military advisors so the SI wouldn't have to rely on the odd marooned nutjob to train their new recruits.

2) Beyond the Shadow Academy itself, how large was the Second Imperium movement? The fact that they were recruiting urchins from the Coruscant underworld and appointed, essentially, a hobo who had missed the entire war to lead their space forces tell me that they could not readily recruit within the Imperial population or military.

It's been a couple years since I read those books, but I don't recally any indication that there was any structure beyond what we saw on-screen. Frankly, it seems a wonder that they managed to keep themselves fed, though I suppose the Royal Guardsmen could have given their dupes the location of some old Imperial supply caches.

3) If that is the case, what efforts did the Pellaeon government take to confront the Second Imperium? Are there any Imperial characters from the post-YJK era whose military credentials could benefit from some counter-terrorism experience?

The answers to those questions are "none" and "no", respectively. The SI was more on-par with some half-baked militia group in the Rogue River Valley or some other backwoods area than Al-Qaeda. They had little to no apparent support or network beyond their one little group of nutjobs, and a corresponding lack of equipment and training. Expecting the Remnant to confront them would be like expecting Great Britain to send troops after Shay.

4) What effect did the Second Imperium's activities have of NR/IR relations? I would think that some of the same allegations that the U.S. is currently directing towards Pakistan in regards to the bin-Laden raid would sound very familiar to Imperial authorities between 19 and 23 ABY.

There's really no comparison between the Bin Laden affair and the Second Imperium. The Shadow Academy wasn't hiding out on Bastion; they were in orbit around Coruscant. Bin Laden wasn't found in DC.

Again, you're comparing foreign terrorist organizations/attempts to foment unrest in a foreign country with an entirely homegrown movement of holdouts and cultist nutjobs.

 

My understanding is that the Second Imperium was primarily backed and funded by the Replacement Warlords in the Deep Core.

 

1) Do we know of any Moffs (or other players) from the NJO/LotF/FotJ era that can be retconned into backing the Second Imperium? These would also, theoretically, be Disra's allies from the Hand of Thrawn Duology

Kurlen Flennic comes to mind, though his origins as a Moff are in question to me despite the Wookieepedia's claims that he was assigned by Palpatine. I don't want to say its not true I'm just not sure what source its from. A few years back I looked into his role in NJO and couldn't really find a definitve statement one way or the other about him.

Grand Moff Quille also comes to mind from Revelation. He must have had some considerable clout to be challenging Pellaeon's hold on the Empire


2) Beyond the Shadow Academy itself, how large was the Second Imperium movement? The fact that they were recruiting urchins from the Coruscant underworld and appointed, essentially, a hobo who had missed the entire war to lead their space forces tell me that they could not readily recruit within the Imperial population or military.

I suspect it wasn't very large


As for which worlds/systems/sectors may have switched sides due to the peace treaty most of the possibilites would come from LOTF and the Atlas, where we find out that the Empire is roughly thirty sectors, a big increase from 8, presumably all gained without ever having a shot fired.

Mygeeto is mentioned in LOTF and just a glance at the Atlas map allows one to extrapolate that Orinda, Phaeda, Ord Trasi, Agamar, Donn and Ansion returned to the fold at some point.

 

Maybe it was false flag operation by an New Republic intelligence organization that got horribly out of control? Using old Imperial military guys picked up in the ghettos of Coruscant, an old Lucrehulk-class ship as their base, a second-hand darksider (Brakiss, who had already been brainwashed by the Empire) and some ersatz Royal Guardsmen.

 

I thought that the Replacement Warlords were behind it but the Essential Atlas stated that Prakith, the last Imperial Deep Core holding, made peace with the New Republic in about 13 ABY or thereabouts.

I always thought that moffs like Flennic and Quille came from the Deep Core.

 

Prakith wasn't the last Deep Core holding. The New Republic was still skirmishing with Deep Core warlords at least as late as 17 or 18 ABY, when Bel Iblis and the Fourth Fleet fought a number of perimeter assaults against the warlords, who failed to provide a united front against him.

 

The Second Imperium was funded by, and formed from, the Deep Core replacement warlords who remained independent of Imperial command and considered the Bastion Accords to be treason. Just remember that despite Prakith having surrendered, we still have his "superior" Grand Moff Gann, Moff Tethys, and all the others Daala whipped up during the Final Imperial Push. We also see that some of them are still active (even with an SSD which engaged the Viscount) right up until the very beginning of the Yuuzhan Vong War.

The fact that Daala couldn't get them to fully cooperate and the fact that they wanted to command their own independent forces and lead their own independent campaigns shows something apart from the expected distrust Deep Core warlords would show Daala; they lack the ability to cooperate. As such I imagine that any donations, beyond a handful of troops and the funding to create the cloaked space station would be very limited.

However the greatest gift of the Second Imperium was its "resurrection" of the dead Emperor Palpatine. Palpatine not only had legitimacy in ruling the Empire, enough to declare the Bastion Accords null and void and its supporters treasonous, he also had the ability to give hope to those who refused to surrender. People believed he was back because they wanted to believe he was back. In this regard, while the forces of the Second Imperium were limited they did succeed in returning several Dark Jedi (no known Dark Jedi exist within the Imperial Remnant) back into loyal Imperial service, including Brakiss and Jeng Droga.

As for the reaction of the Imperial Remnant? Maybe, just maybe, some Moffs like Flennic would have contributed something IF they genuinely believed it was Palpatine and managed to cover their tracks but I doubt it. I actually wouldn't mind seeing Dreyf doing some counter-intelligence on the Imperial side of things if this was ever explored further.

 

It?s been years since I?ve read the YJK books, but I distinctly remember a passage which makes clear that, other than the Shadow Academy itself, the fleet that the Second Imperium managed to scrape together basically consisted of nothing but third-rate junk? Let me see if I can find it.


Here it is: (Jedi Under Siege, page-156)

New Republic warships had appeared unexpectedly, firing and firing upon the Shadow Academy. But then came the newly arrived fleet of Second Imperium ships, cobbled-together Star Destroyers, Imperial battle cruisers assembled from leftover pieces in reclaimed shipyards...
...This new fighting force looked somewhat... desperate - as if people whose dreams stretched far beyond their resources had leaped into the fray.

 

Whoops, my bad, I meant 13 years after the battle of Endor. Now I don't have my copy with me, but the Atlas said that Brill was the only warlord of note left after Daala disappeared (which makes one wonder where that Executor Star Dreadnought came from).

We know that Leia had to ask Pellaeon for star charts of the Deep Core, so the NRDF obviously didn't go in there too much before the Vong War.

 

This is a big leap. I guess Flennic could have replaced what ever Moff was actually in command of Yaga Minor if he did come from the Deep Core at some point. That said I never really got that impression.

He certainly came from somewhere as we get introduced to all eight sitting Remnant Moff's in Specter of the Past and he's not one of them. It could make sense that if he was actually promoted by Palpatine himself that his initial posting was different than what we see in NJO.

As for Quille, we just don't know anything about him other than that he was an influencial Grand Moff in 40ABY. It's all guess work.

 

Well, being one of "Palpatine's servants' is certainly vague enough, but if Flennic was a Moff appointed by Palpatine, where else could he have hidden himself until 19 ABY besides the Deep Core?

 

Alright, I think we are making some sense of this.

Military Force: I had forgotten that exact description of their fleet. While it is certainly far from impressive from the standpoint of taking on a NRDF battlegroup, a "cobbled together" Star Destroyer is still a Star Destroyer. I certainly wouldn't want a hostile "cobbled together" aircraft carrier to sail into New York Harbor.


And there is still the question as to where they got all those crewmembers from. "Star Destroyers" was used in the plural. Even a Victory I- class requires a crew of 5,000+, and an Imperial II calls for something between 5,000 and 37,000. While a drop in the bucket for a galactic navy, that's still a lot of people for a small terrorist organization to handle.

The fleet presented, rag-tag though it might be, would still far outstrip the resources of Brakiss, Tamith Kai, and the Four Guardsmen. Their military being the scrapings of the leftovers of the Deep Core warlords would make sense. However...

The Deep Core: The Essential Atlas says (pg 209) that Pelleaon pulled all of his forces out of the Deep Core to consolidate his forces around the Pentastar Alignment. Whatever stayed behind was lead into another bloodbath by Daala as part of the Orinda campaign. I wonder how much was left there to help out the SI by 23 BBY.

Though one wonders: Could the Imperial presence in the Deep Core actually have increased post-peace treaty? The region may well have become a refuge for any anti-peace hardliners who didn't want to live in a "softer, gentler" Empire.

Imperial Backing: I like your thinking with Flennic and Quille, Robimus. Again, I don't think anyone would be a card-carrying member of the SI openly. My thinking, to again use the al-Qaida example that Josey seems to hate, is that these guys would be more the Saudi princes quietly donating money and material from afar rather than the people living aboard the Shadow Academy/hiding in Waziristan.

I don't think the thing would have been a false-flag by the Republic. Why would they even bother? And it crisis never seemed to approach the point where the Republic would invade Imperial territory.

The Shadow Academy: I know this isn't the first time I've read that the battlestation itself was a modified Lucrehulk. Do we have a source confirming this, or is it still (totally believable and hopefully correct) speculation?