Thrawn was a male Chiss born on the planet Csilla a few decades before the start of the
Clone Wars.
He grew up within the Chiss Ascendancy, a territory within the Unknown Regions controlled
by the Chiss.
When he was old enough, he joined the Chiss Expansionary Defense Force, the military branch
of the Chiss Ascendancy.
He soon reached the rank of Commander, becoming the youngest Chiss to obtain such rank.
As a commander, Thrawn had many achievements to his name.
He was the first Chiss to make contact with Humans, with one of them being Corellian smuggler
Jorj Car'das.
Through this contact, Thrawn learned Galactic Basic, the standard language of the Star Wars
Universe.
He also was told about the Jedi and droids, two things that were unheard of to the Chiss.
About 5 years before the clone wars, Thrawn would make contact with a small fleet of trade
federation ships commanded by Kinman Doriana, a trusted aid of Palpatine who was sent on
a secret mission by the secret sith lord to destroy Outbound Flight and its escort.
The Outbound flight was on a mission to explore the unknown regions and to reach the edges
of the galaxy and make contact with possible alien species outside the galaxy.
Palpatine’s motivation for destroying the outbound flight was to prevent them from discovering
the Yuuzhan Vong, also known as the far outlanders, as had they done so, the galaxy would have
gone into sheer chaos at the threat of a massive intergalactic invasion force preparing to
attack the entire republic, and such chaos would have hurt Palpatine’s plans for securing
the galaxy for himself.
Also there were 20 Jedi onboard Outbound flight, so Palpatine also wanted to take them out
as well.
After destroying most of the trade federation fleet, Thrawn boarded the enemy flagship and
confronted Kinman.
During their meeting, Kinman explained his mission to destroy Outbound flight and told
him how the Jedi on it posed a threat to Thrawn and his people.
Thrawn listened, but was unimpressed, and before he could continue his interrogation,
he was summoned to a meeting with another Chiss admiral who had just won a costly battle
against an unknown alien force on the edge of the galaxy, which unknown to the chiss
at the time, was the Yuuzhan Vong.
Worried about this unknown dangerous force and also not wanting to start a conflict in
which the Chiss would have to fight multiple wars, Thrawn made a deal with Kinman that
he would help him, but only if he told him the full story of his mission.
Reluctantly agreeing, Kinman explained how he was an advisor to Palpatine, who was the
Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic.
He went on to tell him that Palpatine had information on a group only known by them
as the “far outlanders”, who were massing an invasion force at the edge of the galaxy,
and that Palpatine was preparing the republic to be able to repel such invasion.
Kinman explained how if the Outbound flight reached its destination, it would lead the
far outlanders, the Yuuzhan Vong, back the the Republic, and that’s why it needed to
be destroyed.
After explaining his mission, Kinman contacted Palpatine by hologram to confirm his story.
Palpatine was impressed with how easily Thrawn was able to defeat Kinman’s fleet.
Palpatine then ordered Kinman to provide all the known reports and information on the far
outlanders to Thrawn.
After reviewing said data, Thrawn concluded that these so called far outlanders were the
same forces that his fellow Chiss admiral had fought against earlier.
Realizing the threat they posed to his people, Thrawn accepted the mission to destroy Outbound
flight.
Satisfied with his decision, Palpatine gave crucial information on the Outbound flight
and warned Thrawn of the Jedi on board, informing him of how they were capable of using the
force in combat.
When Thrawn confronted Outbound flight and its escort, he initially wanted a peaceful
resolution to the conflict and started a negotiation with the Jedi on board to have them return
back to the Republic unharmed.
But the stubborn leader of the expedition, Jedi Master Jorus C’baoth, refused to retreat
and instigated a battle between the two fleets, with at one point C’baoth almost killing
Thrawn by force choking him from his own ship.
However, Thrawn was able to win the battle swiftly and was successful in ending Outbound
flight's expedition.
Afterwords, Thrawn’s career in the Chiss Expansionary Defense Forces didn’t last
long, as he was soon exiled by the Chiss government over his overly aggressive tactics and pre-emptive
strikes on unknown forces that he believed were a threat to his people.
They sent him alone onto an uncolonized world for him to live out the rest of his life.
However, Thrawn didn’t stay there long, as about a week after the formation of the
Galactic Empire, a group of Imperials would be dispatched to Thrawn’s planet in search
of a smuggler.
Instead they would make contact with Thrawn, who initially tried to steal an Imperial shuttle
to use to get back home, but he failed and was instead captured.
Under Imperial custody, Thrawn was taken by captain Voss Parck to Coruscant to be personally
presented to Emperor Palpatine.
Pleased to have the genius behind the destruction of Outbound flight from years earlier before
him, Palpatine was able to convince Thrawn to use his superb tactical abilities for the
Empire.
He did so by telling Thrawn that the Empire was the best chance the galaxy had in defeating
the imminent invasion of the Yuuzhan Vong.
After accepting to join the empire, Thrawn was privately trained by Parck and soon quickly
rose through the ranks, becoming one of the very few non-human officers in the Imperial
Navy.
Thrawn achieved many victories and accomplishments in his early career in the Imperial Navy,
including conquering numerous worlds for the Emperor as well as initiating cooperation
between the Galactic Empire and the Chiss Ascendancy to produce Chiss designed Imperial
Nssis-class Clawcrafts.
As a result, Thrawn became one of the most valuable commanders in the Imperial Military.
About a year and a half after the destruction of the first Death Star, Thrawn was promoted
to grand admiral by Emperor Palpatine.
But due to Thrawn being non-human, this promotion was kept out of the public and was known only
by a few.
Along with the promotion and ceremonial title of Warlord of the Empire, Thrawn also gained
deep trust and respect from Palpatine.
Despite being praised by the Emperor himself, most of the other high ranking Imperials looked
down upon Thrawn solely due to fact that he wasn’t Human.
Eventually Palpatine gave Thrawn permission to go beyond the Empire’s borders in the
Unknown regions and to start building up defenses for potential outside threats to the Empire.
In less than a year Thrawn conjured much of the Unknown Regions and was able to establish
multiple defensive bases.
For his successes, he was summoned back to Coruscant and was invited by Palpatine to
join the Order of the Canted Circle, one the highest and most exclusive social orders on
Coruscant.
Such an invitation shocked the public, as prior only Humans were invited to join under
the Imperial reign.
Before his return to the Unknown Regions, Thrawn assisted Darth Vader in his campaign
against Prince Xizor and his criminal organization the Black Sun.
Doing so, Thrawn went undercover disguised as mandalorian bounty hunter Jodo Kast.
As a reward for his help, Thrawn was given full control over the Noghri, a species who
were excellent as assassins and bodyguards.
After the battle of Hoth, Thrawn began to engage the scattered rebels and was later
assigned missions to hunt down Imperial admirals who had either defected to the rebellion or
sought to take the Imperial throne from Palpatine.
By the time of the battle of Endor, Thrawn was back continuing his work in the Outer
rim.
After both Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader were killed, the empire went into chaos, with
numerous high ranking Imperials all trying to take control of the remaining empire.
This disarray let the New Republic have the advantage in the continued war, which followed
in the New Republic eventually capturing Coruscant, the capital of the Empire.
4 years later, Thrawn would return back to the remaining Galactic Empire, a crumbling
regime that only had a quarter of its former territory left.
As the last Grand Admiral that was still alive and loyal to the Empire, Thrawn was easily
able to recruit remaining loyal Imperials to his service, including Captain Gilad Pellaeon,
a survivor of the Battle of Endor.
Gilad Pellaeon soon became Thrawn’s second in command.
Before he engaged with the New Republic, Thrawn needed to require resources, including obtaining
the ysalamiri, a species that were capable of repealing the force, and recruiting the
dark Jedi Joruus C'baoth, who was a clone of Jedi Master Joruus C’baoth many decades
prior.
He also went on to create some clones to fill his depleted ranks and he recruited a Noghri
named Rukh to serve as his personal bodyguard.
When he started to attack the New Republic, Thrawn implemented the stateless strategy,
in which he would quickly strike the New Republic then retreat, forcing the New Republic forces
to overstretch and thin out their defenses trying to defend everything.
An ironic strategy, as the Rebel Alliance employed similar attack patterns against the
Galactic Empire during the Galactic Civil War.
With each battle, Thrawn got closer and closer to completely destroying the New Republic.
However, his campaign came to a halt at the Battle of Bilbringi, when amidst the conflict,
Thrawn was killed by his bodyguard, Rukh, who after learned that the empire was secretly
poisoning his people, decided to assassinate Thrawn.
It is said that had Thrawn not been assassinated by Rukh, that he would have steamrolled the
remaining New Republic forces and would have taken control of all the lost Imperial territory.
Thrawn did have a clone of himself stored in his secret complex, but it was indirectly
destroyed by Luke Skywalker and Mara Jade after they discovered it.
Grand Admiral Thrawn was noted for his exceptional leadership and naval commanding abilities.
As a leader, rather than punishing those that failed him, like many of his Imperial colleagues
did, he instead had his men learn from their mistakes and awarded them when they improved
or showed creativity in their success.
He also rarely ever killed those under his leadership, only doing so if they showed obvious
disloyalty or complete disregard of their actions.
He also listened to what both his advisors and men had to say and took their opinions
into consideration before making his next move.
His men did not fear him, but respected him and were proud to serve him.
Thrawn also wasn’t overconfident or arrogant with his attacks, and would retreat and admit
defeat when necessary rather than not and lose men to as a result just to sustain his
ego.
When it came to tactics, Thrawn was an absolute genius, being able to outmaneuver and defeat
literally anyone in a fair even battle.
He did this by not only studying his enemy's battle tactics, but also studying their culture,
their arts.
Learning who they are as a people, and learning not only how they act, but how they would
react to certain situations, giving him the ability to predict his opponent's’ moves
with ease.
Thrawn had a very analytical mind, resulting in him basing his decisions on logic rather
than emotion.
Thrawn’s greatest, probably only motivation for serving the Empire, was that he believed
it was the best bet the galaxy had against the Yuuzhan Vong invasion.
He believed that a unified galaxy under a strong leader, a leader that was willing to
do anything to achieve victory, would be unstoppable and could protect his people from outside
threats.
Although he respected and was loyal to Emperor Palpatine, he did share many disagreements
with him, including the Emperor’s decision of building massive and expansive superweapons
rather than investing in the Imperial Navy to include thousands of more star destroyers
and super star destroyers.
Although Thrawn didn’t show much emotion, he did have great concern for his men and
their well being.
Despite this, Thrawn was not above doing evil acts, such as when he orchestrated a genocide
on a planet that wouldn’t obey his rule in the Unknown regions or when he accepted
to kidnap Leia’s children in exchange for the dark Jedi Joruus C’baoth’s service.
But he did these things because he felt they were necessary for the greater good of the
galaxy, and he didn’t gain any personal pleasure when carrying them out.