During the Third Galactic Civil War, the Hutt Cartel launched a war against the Bothan sector, believing that military expansion would help them fill the power vacuum left after the collapse of the Galactic Alliance and the decline of the Chiss Ascendancy. The war was fought for two years, with most of the war being a stalemate. The Hutt Lords ceased hostilities once they decided that the war was no longer worth the financial investment, and instead changed tactics to economic manipulation by exploiting the Bacta Crisis.
Origins[]
During the Third Galactic Civil War, the Chiss Ascendancy was the closest ally of the New Sith Imperium, often doing the bidding of the Sith. With a reputation as the pawns of the Empire, the Chiss were keen on establishing themselves as a major galactic power in their own right. They spent years acquiring fleets and other military hardware in order to set out on galactic conquests of their own. In order to make these acquisitions, the Chiss took out loans from the Hutt Cartel. With so much of the Ascendancy’s resources devoted to acquisitions, commerce and other sources of income were neglected to the point that the Chiss were no longer able to repay the Hutts. Once the Chiss defaulted on their debts, the Hutt Lords repossessed the Chiss fleet, the Chiss economy began to collapse, the Ascendancy’s territory receded to its pre-war levels. With the Chiss unable to provide any further contribution to the Sith war effort, beyond Chiss agents being used in a campaign to destabilize the Hapes Consortium, the Sith broke their ties with the Chiss and let the government decline into irrelevance.[1]
The decline of the Chiss and the repossession of their fleet, as well as the collapse of the Galactic Alliance, gave the Hutt Lords reason to believe that they could fill the power vacuum through military conquest of their own. Although the Hutts had not engaged in large-scale conquest since the Great Hutt Wars thousands of years earlier, when the Hutt Empire controlled most of the known galaxy, the Cartel believed that they could gain influence and power in the galaxy through conquest. The Hutt Lords turned their attention to the neighboring Bothan sector, hoping that the conquest of Bothawui would provide critical intelligence and military resources needed to launch additional campaigns. With the Sith in no position to stop the Cartel, as the Empire’s focus was in the Core Worlds, and the Alliance Remnant too weak to mount a major defense, the Hutts sent their forces to the Bothan Border.[1]
History[]
The shield surrounding Bothawui prevented Hutt forces from invading.
What the Hutts assumed would be a brief campaign was immediately stalled by major military resistance from the Bothans. For two years, Hutt forces attempted to drive further into the region, but they were only able to modestly push back the borders of Bothan space. It was ultimately Bothawui that proved to be the most resilient and impenetrable, with a massive planetary energy shield that prevented bombardment and penetration to anyone who did not have the codes. The only course of action the Hutts were able to take was to put up a blockade to try and starve the Bothans out, all while attempting to bribe Bothans to destroy the generator or give the Hutt forces the codes they needed to lower the shields. The Hutts were unable to find any Bothans willing to accept a bribe.[1]
As the stalemate continued, the Bothan fleet gained control of the hyperspace lines into their space, preventing critical Hutt resources and reinforcements from arriving. The Hutt Lords finally decided that it was too costly to continue the war effort, and Hutt forces retreated from the Bothan sector and returned to Hutt Space.[1]
Aftermath[]
In evaluating their next steps, the Hutt Lords realized that outright military action was not as effective a tactic as economic manipulation. Knowing that bacta, a healing substance, was a highly valued resource during a time of ongoing war, the Hutts began investing in the Bacta Cartel of Thyferra, where bacta was harvested. In the years that followed, the Hutt Cartel fully owned the Bacta Cartel, which in turn was in control of Thyferra. This placed the Hutt Lords in control of the bacta supply, which had been eclipsed by demand as of 1,022 ABY. The Hutts were able to exploit this Bacta Crisis by selling even small quantities of bacta at highly marked up prices.[1]
At the same time, the Hutts began to organize clandestine raids on planets bordering their territories, worlds that were still recovering from the war between the former Alliance and the Mandalorians that had occupied the territory ten years earlier. Capitalizing on the economic frailty of the region, the Hutts used their newfound monetary resources to buy out entire systems, considerably expanding their territory for the first time in centuries. The Bothans continued to spy on the Hutts during this time, concerned that the Hutts could once again attack the Bothan sector.[1]
To protect their investment on Thyferra, the Hutts threatened to destroy the bacta supply if the Sith attempted to expand their territory towards Thyferra. Meanwhile, the Selkath of Manaan reasserted their historic neutrality, declaring that if any side attempted to attack Manaan, they would destroy the kolto, a less effective but still valuable healing substance. This effectively stopped Sith expansion, allowing a number of Rebel cells to begin communicating with one another and, eventually, form a unified Rebellion.[1]
Behind the scenes[]
The Hutt-Bothan war was created as part of Star Wars Legacies, the fifth and current role-playing timeline on The Star Wars RP. The event was first mentioned in the backstory of the time skip, which advanced the plot of the timeline forward by ten years.[1]
Appearances[]
- Star Wars Legacies (First mentioned)