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I was on Yavin IV, at the Alliance’s base of operations when I heard about Alderaan. Force, Alderaan was the world of my heart. I loved it, I could have lived there easily. I wanted to at some point but now I can not. No one can.
I was planning to visit there at some point soon, to meet with Bail Organa and discuss things as intellectual, free thinking beings did. It was an important place to me. I have good memories there. It was a marvelous planet. What happened there was a tragedy unparalleled. The people who lived there were good people. They didn’t deserve this. No one does.
The Empire has much to answer for.
The Empire will white wash the whole situation as they always do. They already are. They show it as a den of rebels being squashed, if they even acknowledge it. But it was an entire planet with billions of people going about their lives there. All of them ended in an instant. All gone.
Aldera was the eternal city. It had a strangely ancient yet also modern feel. It was the height of fashion and a cornerstone of history. A 4000 year old building could be next to a 10 year old one. Preservation was the mantra of the people. Preservation of history, of art, of culture.
Every breath you breathed was one shared by history, by revolutionists, Jedi, kings and philosophers. Everywhere you looked the past and the present met. Residential streets tucked away behind ancient cathedrals. Parks older than the colonization of many Core worlds.
It was not a place so much as an idea. It is hard to explain Aldera to those who haven’t been there. Many Imperials will write it off a capital a rebel planet, getting what it deserved.
But in truth it was so much more. The culture and people there were great yet humble. Strong, powerful and willful. Ancient yet evolving. Democracy has been tried there, and failed and tried again more than on all the planets in most systems. The streets were still red with the blood of their patriots. Noble houses fought like dogs for centuries, but they did peace better than any world did war.
They were a planet of no weapons. Since the destruction of the Clone Wars, they shunned all violence. As a society, a culture they moved beyond it, or tried to. They wanted peace, but most there knew that not would not be easy with tyranny on Coruscant. They were conscientious objectors to many of the Empires plans. In the Senate they spoke courageously of strong ideals and of goodness and mercy inherent in all sentient beings, and the darkness that the Empire fostered while most worlds turned a blind eye to it.
And then this happens.
Aldera was the city of lights. Their lights can’t and won’t go out. I have faith in the free thinking beings of the galaxy. They will make sure Alderaan is not forgotten.
They won’t be. I was there a few weeks after the last terrorist attack several years ago. Most felt the Empire was trying to stir up trouble. It was a thing of the past, they had moved on, forgive those responsible and mourned their losses. Granted it was a smaller attack, but Alderaan-Aldera persevered. There is not doubt in my mind the pitiful few survivors will do so now.
It will be hard, like after the Caamasi lost their world. Or after the scourging of Lasan. But we are, as Princess Leia Organa put it today, we are all Alderaanians now.
We have been and will continue to be as long as we know and respect the Alderaanian way. They were philosophers, artists, lovers of peace. They were the best of us and their culture and ideals will persevere as long as they are remembered.
I was in tears hearing about what happened. It was horrible. I hate the way they suffered there today. I hate the waste of lives and worthlessness of the people who brought it about. They are monsters. The Empire is made of up of monsters.
But we can not let this hatred blind us. For if we do, we will be no better then the Empire. Peace is our goal, and justice, as the Jedi taught. It has long been held dream that a new hope will arise in the galaxy and bring light to darkened people. We can only hope this will happen soon.
The shadow of the Empire will be with us for a while yet. But in the end, light will triumph. If for no other reason then sentient beings can not stand being in the dark for too long.
Even now, on the eve of the destruction of the weapon that killed so many, they call us monsters on the holonet. They call us terrorists. But it was not us that killed men, women and children going about their daily lives. The Death Star was a military target. A well staffed target, with millions of soldiers, but a military target none the less. But does the holonet talk about Alderaan at all? No. It was a world destroyed in an accident, they say. When they speak of it at all. Their propagandists are working overtime.
We killed millions they say. But they killed billions. And destroyed a world so rich in art and history that the cultural impact and moral guidance that was lost will be felt for generations.
The Imperials suffered the fate they deserved. Their afterlife will not be kind to them. If the Rebellion wiped them off the kirffing map for what they did here and elsewhere, it would be just, but that is not our goal. It can not be our goal.
The Empire does so much damage and get away with it. But we are not warmongers. We are not wishing today for the same fate to befall them.
We not in favor of the Alliance to Restore the Republic being the moral police force of the galaxy. But The Empire need to be stopped. The Empire and their Emperor need to be stopped.
But yet, we remember the lessons of Alderaan. Violence begets violence. Hate begets hate. Alderaan taught this for generations untold. Their bloody history left its marks and its scars. But they overcame it. They moved beyond it.
We need to show the Galaxy the better way. Show them that we will not be cowed by their insanity. Show them we will not live in fear of what they can do. Of what they will do. Of what they have done.
I have faith that the Alliance and the Alderaanian survivors will do this. We will stand tall in the face of this tragedy. We will show the galaxy what it means to be Alderaanian and how to be resolute in the face of adversity.
We are all Alderaanians today.
The eyes of the galaxy are on Alderaan tonight, or what’s left of it. The hearts of the free, forward thinking peoples are with the survivors tonight. Our tears fall for our fallen friends and for those we never know and will never now know.
Terror may be powerful and frightening. Terror may be easy, but at the end of the day, peace will win out. Peace must win out.
We will remember the people who died tonight and not let their deaths be in vain. We will stand tall against this terror and this senseless act of cowards.
The Alliance will not be cowed. Alderaan will not be cowed.
We will stand side by side with our allies and we will come out about this stronger than we had been before.
The force is with Alderaan.
The Force is with us all.