Your powers are weak, old man.
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None Shall Pass
—The Demense Defense Forces' Motto
The Demesne Defense Forces were the regional, sectoral and planetary non-partisan defensive military and paramilitary forces of the Ethereal Demesnes, which were also known by spelling variations thereof or, colloquially until the restoration of the Ethereal Empire, as the Ethereal Armed Forces and variations thereof. The Demesne Defense Forces were founded during the Republic Dark Age, becoming a fully realized concept particularly during the New Sith Wars, when Carolus Valdayn, King of Luctanem and Regent of the Ethereal Demesnes, determined to put on hold the Demesnes' regular internal conflict and strife in favor of preemptive intervention to declare war on the Sith and those forces aligned with them.
Valdayn, an immensely-popular leader during his lifetime and for over a millennium afterward, managed to finally push through the Diet of the Ethereal Demesnes the necessary massive legislative package required to found the Demesne Defense Forces, forming a totally-new, standing military force maintaining surface and space forces contributed to by worlds from across the Demesnes, prohibited from intervening in internal Demesnes conflicts unless directly authorized by a supermajority of the Diet, and recruiting only from personnel who could be proven to be non-partisan regarding such internal political, diplomatic or economic situations.
By the time of the Clone Wars, the Demesne Defense Forces were one of the largest standing military forces in or aligned with the entire Galactic Republic, and especially so in the Outer Rim Territories or Unknown Regions. Thus, when the war began, they hesitated to integrate with the larger Republic military; being largely cut off from the Republic for most of the war, not being fully politically integrated with the Republic, and in fact maintaining larger numbers than the Grand Army of the Republic and Republic Navy forces in the area all contributed to the Demense Defense Forces remaining separate.
Even when the Galactic Empire arose at the war's end, with the Demesnes becoming an Imperial client state rather than a directly-integrated part of the Empire, the Demesne Defense Forces remained independent of the Imperial Military. Unofficially, Arius Valdayn became the new Regent of the Ethereal Demesnes, and so effectively led the Demesne Defense Forces, but officially, until full independence later, during the Galactic Civil War, the highest officer of the Demesne Defense Forces below the Diet at this time was Grand Marshal of the Demesne Defense Forces Ozirai Unktey of Choragas.