Star Wars - Darth Plagueis

both cases, diplomatic solutions followed, and it is my belief that diplomacy will succeed in the Yinchorr system.”
    Valorum’s political career had been forged during the Stark Hyperspace War. Now , Palpatine thought, he begins to sound like his onetime rival Ranulph Tarkin .
    He waited for the Rotunda to quiet. “The events at Yinchorr speak to the greater challenge we now face. The Cularin system—our newestmember—finds itself plagued by pirate attacks. The same is true at Dorvalla, in the Videnda sector. The so-called free-trade zones have become battlegrounds between defenseless worlds and corporate giants like the Trade Federation, or criminal cartels like Black Sun, which are squeezing these outlying systems dry.”
    In an act of what some deemed fair play and others political guile, the vice chancellor took that moment to allow the Trade Federation’s platform to leave its docking station and hover into the dark chill of the Rotunda.
    “With the Bothan’s customary impeccable timing,” Pestage remarked to Doriana.
    The Trade Federation’s Senator was an unctuous Neimoidian named Lott Dod, whose sussurant, snake charmer’s voice wafted through the hall’s enunciators. “I must protest the Supreme Chancellor’s accusations.” His words didn’t convey anger so much as the arrogance of wealth—a strategy he had learned from his predecessor, Nute Gunray. “Should the Trade Federation be expected to absorb the losses it has sustained because of pirate attacks? The Republic refuses to create a military to police those sectors while at the same time prohibiting us from protecting our cargoes with defensive weapons or droid soldiers.”
    “Now is not the time for this argument, Senator,” Valorum said, showing the palms of his soft hands.
    But a hundred voices overruled him.
    “If not now, then when , Supreme Chancellor?” The question came from the wheedling, cranial-horned humanoid magistrate of the Corporate Alliance, Passel Argente. “How many cargoes will the Trade Federation or the Commerce Guild have to lose before we arrive at the proper moment to air this debate. If the Republic cannot protect us, then we have no recourse but to protect ourselves.”
    Again Valorum’s face flushed. “In every crisis we have dispatched paramilitary forces—”
    “With impressive results.” The interruption came from Lavina Durada-Vashne Wren, the human female representative of the newly admitted Cularin system. “The Thaereian military made quick work of the pirates who were raiding our transports.”
    Raucous laughter drowned out the rest of her words.
    “The only thing Colonel Tramsig did at Cularin was make himselfmore contemptible!” Twi’lek Senator Orn Free Taa bellowed from his platform. “The good Senator from Cularin was merely deceived by his dubious charms.”
    Argente spoke once more. “Does the Supreme Chancellor advocate that each system have a paramilitary force at its command? If so, then why not a pan-galactic military?”
    Palpatine’s eyes sparkled in sadistic delight. Valorum was getting everything he deserved. He had demonstrated some diplomatic skill during the Stark Hyperspace War, but his election to the chancellorship had more to do with a pedigree that included three Supreme Chancellors and deals he had cut with influential families like the Kalpanas and the Tarkins of Eriadu. His adulation of the Jedi Order was well known; less so his hypocrisy—much of his family wealth derived from lucrative contracts his ancestors had entered into with the Trade Federation. His election seven years earlier had been one of the signs Plagueis had been waiting for—the return to power of a Valorum—and had followed on the heels of a remarkable breakthrough Plagueis and Sidious had engineered in manipulating midi-chlorians. A breakthrough the Muun had described as “galactonic.” Both of them suspected that the Jedi had sensed it as well, light-years distant on Coruscant.
    “There will be no Republic military,” Valorum was saying, having taken Argente’s bait. “The Ruusan Reformations must be upheld. A military force has to be financed. Taxes imposed on the outlying systems would only add to their burden and lead to talk of secession.”
    “Then let the Core Worlds pay!” someone seated below Palpatine shouted.
    “The Core has no need of a military force!” the Kuati Senator responded. “We know how to live in peace with one another!”
    “Why are the Jedi unable