Raid on Coruscant ( Thrawn Crisis ) Grand Admiral Thrawn ' s Raid on Coruscant was an operation to kidnap Leia Organa Solo and her twins in order to appease the Dark Jedi Joruus C ' baoth . It involved fourteen members of Imperial Intelligence , led by Major Molo Himron . A secondary objective of the mission was to " neutralize " Mara Jade , either by killing or discrediting her . Prelude . Joruus C ' baoth was impatient at the Noghri Death Commando s ' failure at kidnapping Leia Organa Solo and her twins . He demanded that Thrawn launch an immediate attack on Coruscant , so that he could personally capture his quarry . Thrawn refused , stating that the operation wasn ' t practical , but mentioned that a commando raid would be feasible . This kidnapping attempt was different from the others in two ways . One , Leia had given birth to the twins , meaning that they were guaranteed to be on Coruscant for the time being , and two , the Noghri would not be involved . Thrawn handpicked a team of fourteen Imperial Intelligence commandos led by Major Himron . After personally planning the operation , seemingly thinking of every variable , he instructed the team to discredit Mara Jade , rather than killing her . Major Himron also planned to take a bit longer to reach Coruscant to leave a realistic trail on their transport . The Raid . The evening of the raid coincided with the Sarkan reception in the Palace . The commando team infiltrated the Palace using a private entrance , and quickly impersonated a Security team . They set up comlink jamming , and moved to enter the Solo ' s quarters using an electronic lock - pick . All might have succeeded if it wasn ' t for one person - Mara Jade . Mara Jade , sensing danger , left her quarters to see four of the commando team ' s members walk down the corridor . Mara recognized the bent diamond formation and the hand signal of the team as Imperial standards and tried to follow them . She was stopped by Lando Calrissian and Garm Bel Iblis , who had noticed the comlink jamming and were investigating . Mara Jade quickly explained the situation , and Lando went to get his blaster . Jade sent a message to Leia through the Force in order to wake her up . Leia , hearing Mara Jade ' s message , woke up to hear the hum of the electronic lockbreaker . She reacted by shooting the wooden door , allowing the secondary metal security door to activate . Han and Winter woke up and decided to buy some time by moving into Winter ' s room , so the commandos would have to search both rooms instead of one . They barricaded the room while a firefight raged outside . Lando , Jade and Bel Iblis were surprised by the team ' s rear guard and began shooting . Lando had the idea of using the Millennium Falcon to rescue the Solo ' s from the window and went down to the hangar . Meanwhile , Palace Security arrived and brought an E - web to quickly eliminate the team . Unfortunately , it wouldn ' t get there fast enough before the commando ' s would have hostages . Mara Jade , using her knowledge of the Emperor ' s hidden passages , decided to ambush the commando ' s from a different direction . She killed several commandos before sending a second message through the Force , telling Leia to surrender . Meanwhile , inside the rooms , Leia decided to use her lightsaber to exit via a wall . Han wasn ' t sure that it would work as Thrawn probably had already guessed that they would try that . Leia , saying that Thrawn was not infallible , got ready to go through the window . At this point , the Millennium Falcon was outside and began sending a signal , which C - 3PO identified as a gambler ' s code . Not knowing if it was a trap or not , Leia began to cut through the window when the team finally broke in the door . Leia heard the message and surrendered . Her surrender created a pause in the fight while the commandos moved to apprehend her . This allowed Mara Jade to quickly kill the remaining members of the team from behind . Aftermath . The entire team , save Major Himron , was killed , but Himron had one more move . He identified Mara Jade as the person who let them into the Palace , thus discrediting her in front of the New Republic leadership . Unfortunately several people , Leia included , did not believe him . After hearing of the news , Joruus C ' baoth once again demanded an attack on Coruscant , to which Thrawn agreed this time . In the end , Thrawn had made one of his few , but crucial mistakes . By not killing Mara Jade , she would end up leading the New Republic to Wayland and ending the war .