&gt; it would be like the US wiping Texas off the map with nuclear weapons because the Federal Government was unpopular there<p>No, it would be more like attacking Richmond Virginia prior prior to secession in an attempt to prevent the massive deaths of the American Civil War.<p>&gt; To be clear, while Bail Organa was deeply involved in the foundation of the Alliance to Restore the Republic, it was a separate entity and Alderaan was not in a declared state of war with the Empire. Furthermore, Alderaan was an important Core World with a large population and significant economic output.<p>You still haven&#x27;t addressed the core utilitarian argument; did the destruction of Alderaan save more lives than it cost? While it might have appeared to be destroyed simply to punish Leia, it&#x27;s extraordinarily unlikely to have happened for any reason other than the express directive of the Emperor, a master manipulator and politician whose sole goal was maintaining power over the entire galaxy, who clearly felt the destruction of Alderaan was the best way to achieve that goal.<p>I would say the only reason the destruction of Alderaan cannot be justified is because ultimately it did not prevent the ensuing civil war. Blowing up a planet would have been a tremendous deterrent, however the Empire quickly lost that ability due to an asymmetrical suicide attack by jihadists. (akin to the US Cole bombing)<p>Had the Death Star remained a credible deterrent, the Rebel Alliance would have withered, unable to obtain the backing of the planetary systems necessary to build and maintain a credible space navy.<p>You comment amounts to little more than a weak justification for the pervasive poverty and lack of economic opportunity which followed the destruction of the only source of stability in the galaxy.<p>#palpatine2016 #vaderdidnothingwrong #deathstarwasaninsidejob #protontorpedoscantmeltquadaniumbeams