Plo Koon

Plo Koon was a Force-sensitive Kel Dor male Jedi Master who sat on the Jedi High Council during the final years of the Galactic Republic. A respected and compassionate Master, he discovered the young Ahsoka Tano and brought her to the Jedi Order, and he served as a Jedi General in the Clone Wars. He was killed during Order 66, shot out of the sky by his own clone pilots over Cato Neimoidia.

The Kel Dor Master#

Plo Koon was a Kel Dor, a species native to the planet Dorin whose physiology was suited to its distinctive atmosphere; away from his homeworld he relied on protective gear over his eyes and breathing passages. He rose to the rank of Jedi Master and held a seat on the Jedi High Council, where he was regarded as one of the Order's wiser and more compassionate voices.

It was Koon who discovered Ahsoka Tano. In 36 BBY he found the Force-sensitive Togruta among her people on Shili and brought her to the Jedi Temple on Coruscant to be trained, and the bond between them endured throughout the Clone Wars.

The Clone Wars#

Koon was among the Jedi who answered Mace Windu's call to Geonosis, fighting in the arena and the opening battle that began the Clone Wars. He took the rank of Jedi General and came to command the 104th Battalion, forming an unusually close bond with the clones who served under him, chief among them Commander Wolffe.

Early in the war, Koon's fleet was destroyed by the Separatists' devastating new warship, the Malevolence, in the Abregado system. When word of the attack reached Coruscant, Anakin Skywalker and Tano set out to find any survivors, and a Republic fleet broke the blockade so that Koon and the remnants of his command could be evacuated. He continued to serve through the conflict, leading the evacuation of Republic forces trapped on Felucia, fighting alongside Skywalker and Tano in numerous engagements, and repeatedly opposing the Separatist assassin Asajj Ventress, who once injured his arm by triggering an avalanche against him.

Death over Cato Neimoidia#

In 19 BBY, in the final days of the war, Koon was piloting his starfighter over the bridge cities of Cato Neimoidia when Palpatine, revealed as the Sith Lord Darth Sidious, issued Order 66. The clone pilots flying at his wings turned their weapons on him, and his fighter was shot down, killing the Jedi Master who had trusted them.

Legacy#

Koon was among the first Jedi to fall in the purge that destroyed the Order. His death, like those of Aayla Secura, Ki-Adi-Mundi, and so many others betrayed by their own troops, marked the end of the Jedi as guardians of the Republic and the rise of the Galactic Empire in its place.