Battle of Starkiller Base

"Roger, base — red squad, blue squad, take my lead."

- Poe Dameron

Approximately thirty years after the Battle of Endor, a battle was fought on Starkiller Base between the forces of the First Order and the Resistance. The battle was fought with First Order TIE fighters, and T-70 X-wing fighters, of the Resistance. The goal of the Resistance fighters was to disable and destroy the Starkiller Base in order to prevent further First Order attacks against target planets by the weapon of mass destruction housed on the installation.

Prelude
During their search for Luke Skywalker, the First Order sought to use Starkiller Base to destroy the Resistance and cripple the New Republic. They first tested the weapon on the capital of the New Republic, Hosnian Prime, and four other planets in the Hosnian system. They were successful, destroying the planets and a New Republic fleet.

On Takodana, Kylo Ren realized that the scavenger and Resistance ally Rey was Force-sensitive. During the Battle on Takodana, he captured her and took her to Starkiller Base for interrogation.

Finn had given them the Base's blueprints, which revealed that the base drained the energy of the sun in order to charge its superweapon, and that it required a thermal oscillator, which sustained the energy on the planet, that, if destroyed, would destabilize the planet's core and implode the Base. However, they would need to do it before the Base fully charged its weapon. Finn, Han, and Chewie volunteered to disable the Base's defensive shield from the inside.

Han Solo piloted the Millennium Falcon to Starkiller Base accompanied by Chewbacca and Finn. Their objective was to disable the shields and allow the X-Wing squadron to strike, although Finn's main objective was to rescue Rey. Flying through the shields at lightspeed, the Falcon landed roughly on the edge of a cliff.

The ground assault
"People are counting on us! The galaxy is counting on us!"

- Han Solo to Finn

Han, Chewbacca, and Finn snuck into the main base and captured Captain Phasma, whom they forced to disable the shields before disposing her in a garbage chute. They reunited with Rey, who had already escaped on her own. Seeing the concurrent aerial assault, Han, Chewbacca, Finn, and Rey tried creating an opening by planting thermal detonators inside the base. Han then confronted Kylo Ren on a bridge over a large pit, pleading with his son to reject Snoke and return to the light side of the Force. However, Ren refused and impaled his father with his lightsaber, sending Han plummeting down a shaft as Finn, Rey, and Chewbacca looked on. Chewbacca injured Ren with his bowcaster and proceeded to shoot down several stormtroopers. Chewbacca then detonated the explosives which resulted in creating an opening for the Base's thermal oscillators.

The aerial assault
"All teams. I'm going in! Pull up and cover me!"

- Poe Dameron

With the shields down, Blue Squadron and Red Squadron, led by Poe Dameron as Black Leader, commenced their assault. All starfighter squadrons locked their S-foils in attack position to initiate the strike on the Starkiller Base's thermal oscillator. General Hux, seeing the fleet from outside, ordered to dispatch all TIE fighter squadrons. The X-wing fighter squadrons attempted to dive bomb the oscillator, hitting it directly but causing no damage towards it. This prompted Poe to command the squadrons to go for another bombing run. Before going around to perform another bombing run, First Order TIE Fighters staged a counterattack. A heavy cannon emplacement launched a missile that destroyed an X-wing fighter, while other X-wings retaliated the TIE fighters and missiles. With ten minutes left until the weapon became fully charged, half of the Resistance fleet had been destroyed. The thermal detonators, triggered by Chewbacca, activated in the Base, and a new hole to the oscillator was visible to the fighter squadrons. Red Four and Red Six covered Poe while the rest of the squadron focused on firing on the target. As the squadrons soared through the trenches of the Base, Ello Asty's X-wing was shot down.

Duel with the Knight
"It's just us now. Han Solo can't save you."

- Kylo Ren to Finn and Rey

Finn and Rey exited the base, but were followed by Ren, who caught up with them in the forest. Rey angrily called Ren a monster for murdering his own father and tried to shoot him with her blaster, but Ren knocked her out by Force-pushing her into a tree. Finn, horrified, rushed over as Ren furiously accused him of treason. Failing to wake her, Finn brandished Anakin Skywalker's old lightsaber and attacked Ren. However, Ren easily overpowered the former Stormtrooper, stabbing him in the shoulder with his lightsaber's crossguard blades and then slashing him across the back, incapacitating him. Ren then attempted to summon Anakin's lightsaber, but Rey used telekinesis to pull Skywalker's lightsaber into her hand and proceeded to attack the Knight. Ren initially held the advantage, drawing on his rage to ignore the pain. Ren became so impressed with Rey that he tried to tempt her, complimenting her strength in the Force and offering to complete her training if she would join him. This backfired, however, as it only served to reassure Rey of her own power: recalling Kanata's words on reaching the light within, she begins to draw on the Force to hone her attacks, and the tide of the duel shifted in her favor. Ultimately Rey was able to overpower Ren and deal him a severe wound to his face while severing his lightsaber into two. By this point Kylo had taken too many wounds to continue standing, but he still struggled in vain to rise again. Before Rey could move to finish him off, the planet ruptured between where they were standing and they were separated from finishing their fight.

Final actions
"Our job's done here. Let's go home!"

- Poe Dameron

Poe ordered his squadron to cover him as he entered the hole of the oscillator. A pursuing TIE fighter did not clear the gap, leaving Poe to circle in the interior of the unguarded structure, firing volley after volley of torpedoes into the oscillator, destroying it thirty seconds before it finished draining the sun to charge the superweapon. This caused a chain reaction which destroyed the base and leveled the entire planet's terrain. Inside the main base, chaos reigned as General Hux departed the command center and First Order officers realized all hope was lost. Hux, meanwhile, reported to Snoke, who ordered him to rescue Ren and flee the Base. Rey returned to Finn, despairing that Finn would not wake up and that they would be trapped on the rupturing planet. However, Chewbacca arrived with the Millennium Falcon to rescue them. The Millennium Falcon and the remainder of the Resistance fleet managed to escape Starkiller Base as it erupted into a ball of fire, and entered hyperspace to return to D'Qar.

Appearances

 * Star Wars: Episode VII The Force Awakens
 * Star Wars: Episode VII The Force Awakens novelization
 * Star Wars: Episode VII The Force Awakens junior novelization