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In Revenge of the Sith there is a scene where Obi Wan and Yoda look at the security recordings (@1:25:30 of film) of the younglings assassination at the hands of Anakin/Darth Vader and then how Vader kneels before Palpatine. Why don't they catch that video and put them in the hands of the press?

Sure the supreme Chancellor may control some of the press in the galaxy but couldn't this move have helped people know what kind of person Palpatine is? Doesn't ordering the death of hundreds of children put Palpatine in a delicate situation?

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Averroes
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  • The very short answer is that the massacre of the temple was public knowledge but the events (e.g. that it was Anakin, acting on the Emperor's orders) was not; http://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/91044/when-how-does-the-empire-say-anakin-skywalker-died. Since the Emperor controlled the holonet, how would the remaining Jedi have gotten that info out and what difference would it have made given that it wasn't common knowledge that Anakin was Vader, nor that Vader even existed, let alone worked for the Emperor. – Valorum Dec 20 '15 at 14:45

1 Answers1

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  1. Because the video doesn't show anything about Palpatine that's gonna change things.

    Let's see how Palpatine would have easily spin what happened in the Temple:

    • Some Jedi killed some other Jedi as part of Jedi rebelling against the Republic (remember, nobody knows that newly christened and changed Vader is Anakin).

    • The clone troops under Jedi's command participated. We will find those respondible and punish them (good luck proving WHICH clones were which).

  2. This is even discounting the fact that he could have simply claimed the recording was fake, and that's discounting even further the fact that he likely could have prevented the information from widely getting out (emergency powers + being voted Emperor == pretty good control over all communications, especially interplanetary Holonets).

  3. Moreover, Yoda's goal was, at first, trying to kill Sidious, and when that failed and he realized Sidious is unbeatable, a creation/preservation of New Jedi Order (as stated in the novelization), not simply scoring a minor propaganda victory against Sidious (see above for why it would have been minor propaganda victory and not a coup de grace).

    So, there was no point of risking capture to deliver the video.

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