[ WP ] Argument supporting the building of a Death Star

`` Fear will keep the systems in line!'' 
 
 `` Fear? But at what cost? You're talking about genocide? Xenocide!'' 
 
 The consultant sighed. Tarkin had a reputation as a bit of a sentimentalist and he'd come into the meeting expecting this kind of thing. Namby pamby bureaucratic bantha-shit is what he'd call it, but you do n't say that to a client's face. 
 
 Deep breath, let's try another angle. 
 
 `` Have you any idea how big space is?'' He asked the Grand Moff. `` Big. Unfathomably, incomprehensibly, unyieldingly big. Policing the galaxy is n't like rounding up a couple of lost droids on some backwater desert world; you're talking about hundreds of trillions of square lightyears. Trillions. Can you even begin to comprehend that scale? 
 
 Light, which moves so fast that it takes most cultures centuries to realize that it moves at all crosses the galaxy slowly enough that we can literally still see the flashes of the relativistic dilations from the first hyperspace jumps from the outer rim. Still! Nearly 100,000 years later!'' 
 
 The Moff's eyes started to glaze over at that one. Too technical. 
 
 `` The point is, you ca n't possibly expect to police the empire. It's too big. You'll never have enough troops, enough starships, or enough money to pay for it. There are billions of inhabited worlds out there. The Empire is strong but it can not be everywhere at all times and where it is absent lawlessness, chaos, and economic collapse will inevitably follow in the wake of a slackening of imperial power.'' 
 
 He leaned forward, voice ernest now. The hook was almost set. 
 
 `` Yes, the superlaser is a terrifying weapon and yes it will claim the lives of billions but with quintillions of souls across the empire depending upon the continued peace and tranquility guaranteed by Coruscant there are few other options. We must deal sternly with those that would subvert imperial power if we are to have any hope of maintaining a continuity of government. We must consider the greater good.'' 
 
 Tarkin sighed. His posture betraying resignation to the inevitable. 
 
 `` Yes, for the greater good.''
