The Star Wars' prequel trilogy. The Clone Wars were mentioned in the first Star Wars movie, with Luke Skywalker thrilled to learn Ben Kenobi had served in the Clone Wars alongside his father. They swiftly became the stuff of legend, with audiences fascinated to learn more. It was a desire George Lucas was ultimately more than happy to meet.
The beginning of the Clone Wars was told in Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith, with Emperor Palpatine issuing Order 66 and causing the Clone Troopers to turn on the Jedi.
And yet, the best interpretative lens for the Clone Wars is offered not in the films or in the TV series, but in Matt Stover's novelization of Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith. This is the strongest of all the Star Wars novelizations, with Stover working closely with Lucas in order to capture his vision. One key age defines the Clone Wars as the ultimate Jedi trap.
The Clone Wars Are The Ultimate Jedi Trap
In chapter 15 of the Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith novelization, Stover introduces the idea of a Jedi Trap. Few can successfully beat a Jedi in direct combat, and so their enemies had learned to put together traps that would lure them into a battle they could not possibly win. You needed an irresistible bait to guarantee a Jedi would come, a remote and almost inaccessible location that you had complete control over, and an army of reliable proxies to do the actual murder so you stayed out of the firing line yourself.
Obi-Wan Kenobi's mission to Utapau is described as a Jedi Trap, with General Grievous serving as the bait. But ideally, because the greatest Jedi can potentially triumph in even apparently impossible circumstances, you also need one last element; a plan so devious the Jedi loses just by taking the bait, even if they survive. In the case of Utapau, Palpatine simply needed Obi-Wan Kenobi out of the way for a time, while he focused on seducing Anakin Skywalker to the dark side. Obi-Wan lost the moment he jetted off to Utapau.
But this was a trap within a far greater Jedi Trap. When Stover turns to Order 66, he points out that the Clone Wars were themselves are one massive Jedi Trap.
The Clone Wars have always been, in and of themselves, from their very inception, the revenge of the Sith.
They were irresistible bait. They took place in remote locations, on planets that belonged, primarily, to 'someone else.' They were fought by expendable proxies. And they were constructed as a win-win situation.
The Clone Wars the perfect Jedi trap.
By fighting at all, the Jedi lost.
This is why Lucas' vision of the Clone Wars initially jarred some viewers. People had expected the Clone Wars to be epic, but in fact they were tragic. Every battle in the Clone Wars was just another stage in a trap, with the Jedi plunging headlong into it, their sensitivity to the Force blinded by the ascendant dark side. "Wars do not make one great," Master Yoda would tell Luke Skywalker in The Empire Strikes Back, and he was no doubt recalling the Clone Wars as he said these words, and all the Jedi who became legendary warriors - and who lost their way as a result.
The Clone Wars Were Irresistible Bait To The Jedi
When the Jedi Temple moved to Coruscant, it had begun the process of binding the Jedi too closely to the Republic. The Jedi had always seen themselves as defenders of the peace, but little by little they had come to understand "peace" in of the interests of the Republic. There were a handful of nay-sayers - the likes of Qui-Gon Jinn, who was always offended by the Republic's refusal to intervene and end slavery on the Outer Rim - but they generally stood at the fringes of the Jedi Order, their priorities causing conflict with the Council. With the Jedi bound to the Republic, the Clone Wars became an existential threat to everything the Jedi had come to stand for. Thus the Jedi were forced to become warriors rather than peacekeepers, generals rather than conflict negotiators. The bait was irresistible.
The Jedi had not known war for generations, and so the very beginning of the Clone Wars served as a shock for them, as they lost so many of their number in the Battle of Geonosis before the Clone Army even arrived to reinforce them. In the aftermath of the Battle of Geonosis, the grief-stricken and shell-shocked Jedi were scattered across the galaxy, caught up in war. As Stover notes, "War itself pours darkness into the Force, deepening the cloud that limits Jedi perception." Some of the more sensitive Jedi sensed they were on the wrong path, and they either left the Jedi Order, or else began to doubt themselves so much they made strategic mistakes and soon died. Others were overwhelmed by the darkness, and were consigned to the Temple; Palpatine would ultimately draw on these fallen Jedi when he established the Inquisitors. By fighting at all, the Jedi had lost.
Order 66 Was The Climax Of The Clone Wars
As Matt Stover suggests, Order 66 is best viewed as the climax of the Clone Wars. The Jedi should have viewed the Grand Army with a lot more suspicion, but it's easy to see why they did not; the clones first arrived on the scene at the Battle of Geonosis, viewed as saviors who prevented more Jedi lives being lost. Thus the Jedi were predisposed to see the Clone Army as valued allies, with even the Jedi Council never truly processing the fact they didn't really understand how they had been created by deceased Master Sifo-Dyas in the first place. They eventually learned of Count Dooku's involvement, but by then they had plunged too deep into the dark pool of war, and this faintest flicker of illumination was too little for them to discern the trap in which they were caught.
And then Palpatine issued Order 66, activating the obedience chips that forced the Clone Army to do his will. "The clones have no malice," Stover points out, "no hatred, not the slightest ill intent that might give [the Jedi] warning. They are only following orders." There was nothing for the Jedi to sense, no rising surge of anger or hatred that would cause them to trigger their lightsaber and turn upon the soldiers they had been fighting alongside. Worse still, as the Jedi began to fall across the galaxy, those who were strongest in the Force would sense every death. They would have heard the voices of childhood friends and trusted mentors crying out in pain, then suddenly silenced, and they too would have been reeling - struggling once again to deal with shock and grief - at the very moment their own Clone Troopers were training their guns upon them. Order 66 was the final stage of the revenge of the Sith, Palpatine's masterpiece of bloodshed painted on the canvass of the galaxy. It was the final stage of the ultimate Jedi Trap - the most successful Jedi Trap in history.
