Lord Kaan

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Kaan
Star Wars character

Position	Dark Lord of the Sith, Leader of the Brotherhood of Darkness
Homeworld	Unknown
Species	Human
Gender	Male
Height	Unknown
Affiliation	Brotherhood of Darkness
Portrayed by	N/A

Kaan, formally known as Lord Kaan, is a fictional character from the Star Wars Expanded Universe.

Lord Kaan was Dark Lord of the Sith, circa 1,000 BBY. He was the latest leader of the Sith army formed by Darth Ruin 2,000 BBY, which Kaan managed to turn from a scrabble of feuding warlords into the Brotherhood of Darkness, a force powerful enough to retake control of the galaxy.

With his charisma and power, the Sith struck back at the Republic and the Jedi Order. Thousands of Sith and Jedi battled one another across the galaxy. The Sith were opposed by the Army of Light commanded by the aged Jedi Master Lord Hoth.

However, while Kaan was a charismatic and skilled general, his rule was more fragile than it seemed. He preached "rule by the strong" to hide the weakness in his own spirit, and when several high-ranking Sith challenged him by each declaring themselves Dark Lord of the Sith, rather than challenge them and threaten the war effort, Kaan acquiesced to their vanity, and named them all "Dark Lord," declaring "All are equal in the Brotherhood of Darkness."

The tide of the war turned against the Sith, and the internal dissension grew rife. Eventually, Kaan's army were forced to retreat to the planet Ruusan. While most of his followers remained loyal, a few prominent Dark Lords within the Brotherhood began to question his leadership: Githany, Kopecz and most notably, Darth Bane.

There, Lord Kaan came into conflict with Darth Bane, who was opposed to Kaan's battle tactics against the Jedi. Bane thought that Lord Kaan was acting more like an ordinary military commander than a Dark Lord of the Sith, and was not properly using the dark side of the Force. Lord Kaan tried end Bane's dissension by killing Bane with poison; however. Bane was too strong in the dark side, and survived the assassination attempt.

Meanwhile, Lord Hoth's forces had arrived on Ruusan to defeat the remaining Sith forces, and wipe out the Brotherhood, once and for all. Darth Bane returned, and declared Kaan unworthy of his title.

While surprised at Bane's survival, Lord Kaan accepted Darth Bane's tactical advice. Using the Force and attacking as one, the members of the Brotherhood meditated and focused their dark energy into Darth Bane. The combined power of the Sith devastated the Army of Light, and victory was in the Sith grasp.

Even as the Jedi defeat was imminent, Lord Kaan and the other members of the brotherhood broke the meditation circle. Impatient and overconfident, Kaan believed that the Jedi could be quickly and easily defeated if the Sith took to the field. Secretly, Kaan and his followers were jealous of Bane and his power, and felt that Darth Bane was using their energy for his own benefit.

When the Sith masters broke their mediation and took the field, however, the Jedi counterattacked, and the Sith took severe losses. Most of the Sith Masters died in the battle. Kaan took his defeated forces into a deep caves to wait for the Jedi's final strike. There he used his ultimate tactic: a "thought bomb."

Kaan believed that the Thought Bomb would destroy the Jedi, but that he and the rest of the Sith would be strong enough to survive. When Lord Hoth and his retinue finally arrived and confronted the Sith, Lord Kaan detonated the thought bomb.

The caves where they died would eventually be known as the Valley of the Jedi. Only Darth Bane survived the battle. His callous assessment of his rival and former leader was that Kaan's "suicide" was his "smartest decision."