Clone Shadow Troopers were an elite group of Clone Troopers who were recruited to act
as a covert and secretive replacement for the rapidly dropping number of ARC Troopers
left in the Republic.
These Clones were primarily assigned to partake in undercover missions that regular ARC Troopers
were unable to do, including bounty hunting for the Republic.
So who were the Clone Shadow Troopers and why did they make a covert appearance on Utapau
during Revenge of the Sith.
I’m going to break down exactly what the Clone Shadow Troopers division was, and the
extremely high tech armor that they used.
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During the Clone Wars, the director of the Republic spying and intelligence bureau, Armand
Isard, created a brand new division of Clones, specifically designed to serve as a covert,
undercover spying unit.
The division was created to combat the rapidly falling numbers of ARC Troopers left within
the Grand Army of the Republic, and fill in the massive gaps left every time an ARC Trooper
died.
Despite this being the original purpose for the Clone Shadow Troopers, the Republic quickly
realized that the Clones Selected for this unit were extremely gifted and were able to
perform a whole lot more duties than what the Standard ARC Troopers were capable of.
These Shadow Troopers could also act in a far more Covert Way than Clone Commandos,
making them the highest ranking public division in the Grand Army of the Republic special
forces.
To help accommodate this, the Clone Shadow Troopers were provided with highly modified
and much more expensive armor that suited the roles they would be performing much more
than standard ARC Trooper armour.
The armour they were given was based on Standard Phase 2 clone armour, but it also featured
several very carefully placed magnetic seals.
These magnetic seals allowed the Clone Shadow troopers to attach disguise plates to their
armour, and switch them on and off at any time.
The disguise plates on their armor allowed each individual clone trooper to alter their
appearance, with some plates being designed to replicate the appearance of a hutt cartel
bounty hunter, and others replicating the appearance of a black sun mercenary.
These disguise plates could be used by the Clones to change their armour to look like
any other type of armour required for their operation.
These disguise plates were also so well designed, that they allowed the Shadow Troopers who
wore them to disguise their life form signature, and change it to something other than human.
This was incredibly useful for covert operations where the Shadow troopers would need to sneak
inside a cargo hold and smuggle themselves into secure areas.
So make sure you let me know down below if you think this armour is cooler than regular
Clone Commando or ARC Trooper armour.
In addition to all of this, the disguise plates could also alter the walk of the Shadow Trooper
wearing them, disguising the traditional walking pattern of all Jango Fett Clones.
The small downside of using this disguise feature of the armour, is that the Shadow
Troopers would lose access to some of the Core Features of their Phase 2 Clone Armour,
like particle filtration, communications and some mobility.
To combat this, the Shadow Troopers had a switch placed inside of their mouth that could
be activated with their jaw should they quickly need to return to their standard Phase 2 armour,
which deactivated their disguise plates and allowed them to enter combat swiftly.
As a further protective measure, the Clone Shadow Trooper’s standard Phase 2 armour
was coated in a deep black material that absorbed all scanning equipment waves, and was reflective
to all forms of sensors.
The Shadow Trooper visor also gave off a vibrant red glow, which combined with their dark,
black armour gave an incredibly intimidating appearance.
On the rare occasion that any members of the public saw one of these troopers, they would
often be frightened and follow any orders that they gave, without question.
Some Clone Shadow Troopers chose to wear pauldrons, but these guys just wanted to show off, because
they had no meaning for the rank or status of the Shadow Trooper division.
The helmets of the Clone Shadow troopers also included extremely powerful communications
jammers, which further served to take these Shadow Troopers off the radar in every single
way possible.
Unfortunately, the shadow troopers were unable to work with regular Clones while this jamming
system was activated, because it would damage the equipment of standard clones.
The deep black armour of these Troopers is honestly some of the coolest clone trooper
armour, I really hope we get to see more appearances from the Shadow Clones in the future!
As for weapons, the Clone Shadow Troopers were not given standard DC-15s blasters, but
instead they were equipped with the DC-19 Stealth blaster, which featured a sound suppressor,
making it nearly impossible to hear the weapon firing.
On top of this, the blaster also had an option to change the colour of the bolts it fired,
to a color invisible to the eyes of most species.
These Clones were trying to erase their existence from the battlefield in every single way,
possible, they’re so awesome!
These invisible blaster bolts though, were not cheap at all, and had to be re-loaded
into the weapon after only 10 shots, making them pretty ineffective for regular Clone
Shadow Troopers, but extremely useful for Clone Shadow Snipers.
These Shadow Troopers would often take part in their recon missions alone, or in pairs.
They would often be forced to work under cover, posing as bounty hunters or mercenaries, allowing
them to silently enter and leave locations, without anyone knowing that they were ever
there.
Once arriving at their assigned target location, they would immediately transform their armour
to look like a bounty hunter’s armour, and collect valuable intelligence, before swiftly
leaving, without a trace.
Let me know down below if you think we could see the Clone Shadow Troopers appear in the
Bad Batch TV series which is coming to Disney+ next year.
With the heavy Clone Focus of the Show, I could definitely see the Bad Batch coming
up against the Shadow Troopers, who remained loyal to the empire after the end of the clone
Wars and Order 66.
The most notable mission for the Clone Shadow Troopers Came on Utapau, where they were sent
ahead of Obi-Wan Kenobi near the end of the war.
The Shadow Troopers infiltrated six of Utapau’s sinkhole cities, and activated every single
one of the high powered jammers on their black shadow armour, allowing Obi-Wan and the 212th
to invade the planet without notice.
It’s absolutely incredible to know that without the covert mission by the Clone Shadow
Troopers that took place before Kenobi arrived, he probably wouldn’t have been able to safely
make it onto the surface of Utapau.
The Actions of these Clone Shadow troopers were ultimately what allowed Obi-Wan Kenobi
to defeat General Grievous on Utapau and put an end to the war, allowing for Darth Sidious
to declare the beginning of the Galactic Empire.
Soon after Kenobi’s defeat of General Grievous, Darth Sidious of course began Order 66.
The Clone Shadow Troopers were affected by Order 66, but because of their covert mission
into the deep under- cities of Utapau, they were not around any Jedi at the time of the
order.
Following Order 66 and Obi-Wan’s escape from Utapau, Palpatine ordered the Shadow
Troopers to remain on Utapau, where he was about to establish a secret weapons storehouse.
While the rest of the Clone Troopers who remained loyal to the Empire after Order 66 were transitioned
into stormtrooper armour, the Clone Shadow Troopers were left to wear their ominous,
dark amour, in hopes of scaring away any bounty hunters that would come across the secret
weapons storage on Utapau.
Following this, a few months after being placed inside of his suit, Darth Vader recruited
the Clone Shadow Troopers to accompany him on a rescue mission for the missing son of
Admiral Tarkin.
Tarkin’s son had gone missing during a mission, causing Darth Vader to recruit the Shadow
Troopers to help his 501st legion to find him.
Vader’s 501st were under heavy fire and on the verge of defeat during the operation,
but the Clone Shadow Troopers were able to launch a sneak attack on the enemy forces,
allowing Vader’s men to come out victorious.
Two years after this mission success, one of the Empire’s Inquisitors enlisted a unit
of Shadow Troopers for his own personal purposes, saying that if they were good enough to be
used by Palpatine for guarding sensitive weapon storage, they were good enough for him.
The inquisitor took a small detachment of Shadow Troopers to the Almas Academy, which
was a very secretive Jedi training facility, looking for an ancient Sith Holocron.
Unfortunately for him, once he arrived, he was greeted by members of the Alderaanian
resistance and was defeated along with all of his Clone Shadow Trooper men.
The incredible covert ability of these Shadow Troopers caused the Emperor to eventually
replicate the Clone Shadow division, but with natural born human stormtroopers instead,
fearing that the clones may someday turn on him.
Eventually, the Storm Commandos and the Shadow stormtrooper units were created, to replace
the rapidly aging Clone Shadow units.
Make Sure you let me know down below what you think of the Clone Shadow Troopers.
Do you prefer these, or the covert operations troopers?
So that is the story of the most cover and undetectable group of Clone Troopers, the
Clone Shadow Troopers.
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