Operation : Cinder Operation : Cinder was carried out by the Galactic Empire as a means of devastating several Imperial planet s in 4 ABY , only a few weeks following the Battle of Endor . The operation was part of the Contingency , a plan devised by Emperor Palpatine to ensure that the Empire and its enemies did not outlive him should he perish . The plan was put into action following the Emperor ' s death during the Battle of Endor . Imperial forces placed satellite s in orbit of planets to form a climate disruption array . Electrical storms and other extreme weather events would begin to ravage targeted planets . Operation : Cinder lasted for at least three months after an attack on Naboo , the homeworld of Emperor Palpatine and a rallying point for many Imperial sympathizers . Other worlds that were targeted included Vardos , Burnin Konn , Candovant , Abednedo , and Commenor . By the end of the war in 5 ABY , the Contingency was carried out to rebuild the Empire in the Unknown Regions , though the New Republic was triumphant and survived the Galactic Civil War . Prelude . Emperor Palpatine , ruler of the Galactic Empire , believed that if he was to ever perish unexpectedly then the Empire did not deserve to live beyond him . He likened it to the strategy game of Shah - tezh , in which the role of each game piece was to protect an Imperator . If the Imperator was to fall , then the surviving game pieces had failed and the game was over , as the others did not deserve to carry on . As a result of that belief , he entrusted Gallius Rax , who knew Palpatine since Rax was a small child before rising to the rank of Fleet Admiral in the Imperial Navy , with carrying out a Contingency plan with only one purpose : the annihilation of the Empire and its enemies . Rax altered the nature of the Contingency , however , by allowing a select group of Imperial survivors to regroup in the Unknown Regions where he intended to build a stronger Empire . In 4 ABY , Palpatine was killed during the Battle of Endor . The Contingency was activated soon after . As part of the plan , several worlds were targeted for destruction in what was known as Operation : Cinder . Messenger droid s were sent to select Imperial officer s to relay the last orders of the Emperor : to begin Operation : Cinder at once . The Operation . Target : Vardos . Acquiring satellites at Fondor . After the Battle of Endor , Iden Versio , Commander of the Imperial Special Forces commando unit Inferno Squad , was summoned by her father , Admiral Garrick Versio , aboard the " Eviscerator " in orbit of Vardos to receive her next orders . She received her orders via a Messenger droid carrying the Emperor ' s last command , though she was suspicious of what Operation : Cinder entailed . Inferno was sent to an Imperial shipyard above Fondor to provide security for Moff Raythe , who was procuring and transport ing satellite s that were crucial to Operation : Cinder , although Inferno was not informed of the target of the satellites . During this time , the Rebel Alliance attempted an assault on the " Dauntless " but their MC80 star cruiser flagship was ultimately destroyed by Inferno . Deployment of the satellites . After securing Raythe ' s satellites and destroying the Emperor ' s Observatory on Pillio , Iden and Inferno Squad returned to Vardos , an Imperial haven and the homeworld of the Versio family . Upon arrival , they noticed the experimental satellites they had protected at Fondor deployed in the planet ' s upper atmosphere along with the " Dauntless " itself , the flagship of Raythe . Now aware of their target , Iden confronted her father aboard the " Eviscerator " , furious that their own homeworld was a target of Operation : Cinder despite its loyalty to the Empire . In response , Admiral Versio stated in his point of view of Operation : Cinder that , for the greater good of the Empire , Vardos and other worlds had to be sacrificed so that the utter fear and brutality would prove beyond a doubt to the galaxy that the Empire was still in charge . Garrick then ordered for the satellites to be activated , spawning massive electrical storm systems within minutes . Whilst the storm systems laid waste to the planet surface , anti - air batteries shot down any non - Imperial ships attempting to leave in order to contain them on Vardos . Iden and Inferno Squad were ordered by Garrick to extract Protectorate Gleb alone from the planet and bring the Aqualish to him . However , at the Archive in Kestro City , Iden and Del Meeko attempted to bring along other civilians with them to transport them off world . Agent Gideon Hask , refusing to disobey Garrick ' s command , attempted to prevent this from happening , but was unable to stop the civilians from fleeing to the " Corvus " . Iden claimed that the Empire ' s job was to protect civilians from things like Operation : Cinder ; Hask responded that this was the " new Empire , " prompting Meeko to state that he sought no part in this " new Empire " and would follow the orders of his commanding officer , Iden . When Hask refused to lower his blaster and aimed it at Iden , she shot him first in his leg . Hask returned alone to Garrick with Gleb and a Rodian while Iden and Del escaped aboard the " Corvus " with their crew , jumping into hyperspace to the Outer Rim Territories . There , they decided to formally surrender themselves to the Rebel Alliance . Target : Naboo . Not long after the Battle of Endor , Captain Lerr Duvat of the Star Destroyer " Torment " was approached by a Messenger droid , which relayed the Emperor ' s final command : to begin Operation : Cinder at once . Twenty days after the Battle of Endor , Duvat ' s Star Destroyer was relocated to Naboo and launched satellites in orbit to form a climate disruption array . The array was used to create massive hurricane s and electrical storms across the planet . By the time the array ' s power reached twenty percent efficiency , three class - five hurricanes were already formed — with another dozen forming . As fire s , flooding , and chaos ripped across the surface of the planet , Lieutenant Shara Bey of the Alliance to Restore the Republic — who accompanied Prince ss Leia Organa to Naboo , where Organa rallied the support of Queen Sosha Soruna in establishing the New Republic — realized that satellites had to be behind the phenomenon . The only means Naboo had of fighting back was to scramble starfighter s to destroy the satellites . Bey was placed in command of the mission , with Organa and Soruna accompanying her . The Emperor demilitarized Naboo many years earlier , but a few N - 1 starfighter s remained in storage from the Battle of Naboo decades earlier . Once in orbit , Bey destroyed a number of the satellites while Organa and Soruna dealt with TIE fighters dispatched from the " Torment " . The three pilot s were outgunned against seventy - two TIE fighters and were nearly killed until General Lando Calrissian arrived with a Rebel fleet , along with Danger Squadron , whose newest members were Iden and Meeko , former Imperial commando s who provided key intel to the Alliance about Operation : Cinder . The Alliance had also gathered intelligence of Operation : Cinder during a raid at an Imperial Security Bureau complex at the Wretch of Tayron , allowing them to move their forces to Naboo in time to help save the planet . Though Danger Squadron was able to destroy the satellites and cripple the Star Destroyer in orbit of Naboo , surviving Imperial forces , following standard protocol , evacuated to the nearest safe haven : Theed , the capital city of Naboo . There , Danger Leader Shriv Suurgav , Iden , and Meeko met up with Organa , who covered Meeko as he repaired Theed ' s defenses . Once rebel forces were inside the royal palace , the defense system was activated , sending an ionic disruption across the city that disabled all blasters and starfighters , forcing the remaining Imperials to surrender . Afterwards , Organa confronted Iden and Meeko over the damage that they had done to the Alliance in the past . Iden apologized on behalf of them , and wished to continue to fight with the Alliance in order to continue the fight against Operation : Cinder and the new Empire . Organa complimented them on being images of hope for the galaxy , and formally welcomed them to the New Republic , which Inferno Squad was integrated into . More targets . Three months after the Battle of Endor , the Empire continued to carry out Operation : Cinder on countless worlds . A dozen other worlds were targeted , including Burnin Konn , Candovant , Abednedo , and Commenor . The Republic was able to determine the purpose of many of these attacks , though they found that the Empire ' s motivations behind others were less clear . Nonetheless , Republic forces were able to save untold numbers of civilians as a result of combating the Imperial operation . Despite that , it would still be many months until the war came to an end , with Admiral Gial Ackbar and General Crix Madine seeing no end to hostilities with the Empire in the short - term . Aftermath . Naboo was targeted by the Empire again during the Naboo invasions in an attempt to wipe out New Republic forces on the planet , but the Republic was able to thwart these attacks as they had done with Operation : Cinder . The final phase of the Contingency was ultimately carried out in 5 ABY , as New Republic forces attacked the Empire , assembled on Jakku by Counselor Gallius Rax , during the Battle of Jakku . Using the power of ancient Sith artifacts buried in the surface , Rax sought to carry out the final part of Palpatine ' s Contingency by corrupting the planet ' s core and life essence with the dark side , thus destroying the desert planet and wiping out both the Imperial and Republic forces , crippling both sides . The Contingency was thwarted , however , by Grand Admiral Rae Sloane , who further sought revenge against Rax after he removed her from power . She killed Rax , though in his dying breaths , he urged Sloane to regroup with select Imperial officer s and loyalists in the Unknown Regions and begin the Empire anew . The Republic emerged victorious during the battle and signed the Galactic Concordance with the Empire ' s Grand Vizier , Mas Amedda , bringing an end to the Galactic Civil War . However , in the Unknown Regions of the galaxy , Sloane , Brendol Hux , and other Imperial loyalists formed the First Order , seeking to one day reclaim the Imperial legacy as they plotted their return to power . Behind the scenes . Operation : Cinder first appeared in the second issue of the Marvel comic book series " " , written by Greg Rucka . The second issue , released on October 7 , 2015 , depicted the beginnings of the attack on Naboo , while the third issue , released on October 14 , 2015 , showed its resolution . Operation : Cinder is further depicted in the story campaign mode of " Star Wars Battlefront II " , where the Imperial utopia of Vardos is targeted and the battle of Naboo is resolved . The events of the 2017 novel " " , written by Chuck Wendig , revealed that Operation : Cinder was part of a greater Contingency devised by Emperor Palpatine to destroy the Empire and its adversaries so that it could begin again .