The Clone
Army that fought alongside the Jedi Knights against the Separatists was the first galactic
sized military force undertaken by the Republic for nearly a thousand years.
But what kind of military did the Republic have before the introduction of the Clone
Army?
Well for the most part the Galactic Republic’s military forces were decentralized, with the
judicial forces being its main centralized armed forces, which acted more of a police
force rather than an army.
Though within the Judicial Forces was the Sector Ranger core, which was a far more militarized
branch with its members being trained with military like tactics.
They were basically a SWAT team.
The Sector Ranger Core were often used in large scale slave trade and illegal spice
busting operations that required highly trained individuals.
They also were allowed jurisdiction across all systems within the Republic, following
leads that spanned across multiple planets.
Aside from that, worlds of the republic were responsible with providing their own militias
within their respective territories for defense against common enemies, like pirates and other
hostile powers.
Though these planetary security forces tended to be quite small.
However, there was a time where some within the Republic did garner an actual army that
numbered in the tens of thousands of trained soldiers in an attempt to fight a small war
in the Outer Rim.
It was known as the Republic Outland Regions Security Force, and it was the closest thing
the Republic had to a military before the introduction of the Clone Army since it dismantled
its original forces from the Old Republic era a thousand years prior.
Created 35 years before the Clone Wars, the Outland Regions Security Force was used for
the Hyperspace Stark War and was formed unofficially by senator Ranulph Tarkin, the older cousin
of the later infamous Wilhuff Tarkin.
Around this time, Ranulph was the leader of the small but increasing political faction
known as the Militarists, which was a group that supported the creation of a powerful
centralized military force within the Republic and to disband the restrictions imposed by
the Ruusan Reformation from nearly a thousand years earlier.
While for most of his career Ranulph wasn’t taken seriously, the day finally came when
his speeches began to resonate among fellow senators and even many citizens that lived
within the Core worlds.
For the unthinkable had just happened within the Outer Rim; a pirate named Laco Stark was
combing his forces in the outskirts of the Republic and forming a small army.
He went on to cause a ton of problems, from helping orchestrate schemes to drastically
diminish bacta supply, to disabling travel among the Core and Outer Rim worlds by creating
a computer virus that corrupted navigation computers that tried to use prominent hyperlanes
between the two regions.
This of course brought the attention of the Senate.
While Ranulph was taken more seriously than before within the Senate, his idea of creating
a Republic army was still dismissed in favor of sending the Jedi to negotiate with the
pirates.
But Ranulph couldn’t accept that, so he went on to create the army all on his own,
bringing in supporters of his from the various Judicial Force branches and planetary militias.
Over the course of a few weeks, he would amass a fleet of a couple dozen cruisers and attack
vessels as well as forming an army of a couple ten thousand soldiers that were all equipped
with traditional military gear.
In his mind, he was going to prove to the Republic that the military option was the
best means of doing things by wiping out the Stark pirate army and bringing an end to the
Bacta and Hyperlane crises.
He was going to launch his first attack at the very same place the Jedi were going to
meet with the pirate leaders for negotiations.
But his plans ended up falling apart when Laco Stark intercepted Ranulph’s travel
plans and installed a new virus onto the newly amassed fleet.
The navigation systems for more than 2 thirds of Ranulph’s fleet caused the ships to hyperspace
jump to random coordinates, with a few ships being sent into stars, black holes, or uncharted
territory.
Less than a third of the initial attack force made it to the appropriate destination, only
to find themselves trapped by a fully prepared pirate fleet that had been waiting for their
arrival.
While Ranulph’s fleet was being destroyed overhead, the Jedi negotiations that were
happening on the planet didn’t go well either, as the pirates had no desire for peace, attacking
their guests with full force.
While the Jedi were able to escape, including Obi Wan, Qui Gon, and Plo Koon, they did lose
a fellow Master and were trapped on the planet with no means of getting off it.
The Jedi were eventually able to contact Ranulph and convince him to land the surviving ships
of his fleet onto the planet and to move all of his men into a giant cave that was within
a mountain for safely and so they could regroup.
With communications offline, the jedi and a couple hundred surviving soldiers were forced
to fend off multiple aggressive attacks from the countless pirates for over a week, up
until they were rescued by another Republic taskforce that was quickly created using Trade
Federation ships.
The pirate army led by Stark eventually fell apart as well, as the pirates lost far more
in the short war than they ever gained from all the looting.
Ranulph died in the action but was hailed as a hero by some within the Republic for
attempting to do something when no one else would, and the soldiers that survived the
week long siege in the mountain came to appreciate the Jedi on a whole new level.
Not only were they impressed by their skill in combat, but also by their compassion for
other beings.
The entire Outland Regions Security Force consisted of only Humans, most of whom believed
in the notions that Humans were far superior to other species.
But this changed within many of them due to Jedi Master Plo Koon, who went out of his
way to take care of the injured and sick that were within the cave during the siege.
Seeing an alien care for them in such a manner opened up many of their minds and gave them
great appreciation for Plo Koon, to the point where after the battle a few would regularly
meet up with the Jedi Master to thank him for all he’d done when he cared for them
and for opening up their minds on the contributions of non-Human species.