The crisis reached its boiling point with the attempted assassination of Senator Padmé Amidala, the former Queen of Naboo whose impassioned speeches against military escalation had made her a target for those who sought war. The assassination attempts, orchestrated by the bounty hunter Jango Fett and his partner Zam Wessel, were designed to eliminate one of the Republic's most prominent voices for peace.
These attempts on Amidala's life served multiple purposes for the shadowy forces manipulating galactic events. They eliminated a powerful voice for negotiation while simultaneously providing justification for increased security measures and military mobilization. The investigations into these attempts would lead Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi to Kamino, where he discovered the existence of a massive clone army supposedly commissioned for the Republic a decade earlier.