Reason for Grievous abduction of Palpatine? - ROTS opening

[Adam Reynolds]

I can't currently find my copy of the film to check, does anyone know if it was ever suggested why Grievous abducted Palpatine in the film? I know that Labyrinth of Evil and the novelization suggested it was to draw the heat away from Palpatine as a result of the Jedi investigations into his identity. But those are no longer canon.

I supposed it could simply be Palpatine going for the publicity advantage of the heroic chancellor rescued by Skywalker. One possibility is that he simply wanted Anakin back on Coruscant for the next step in his plans.

[Rawtooth]

Justification for increased powers in light of an attack on the capital/beloved chancellor, that's what some of the deleted scenes indicated iirc.

[The Romulan Republic]

I think Palpatine's objective is pretty clear: Cause a fight between Dooku and Anakin, with the new apprentice killing the old one and going further toward succumbing to the Dark Side (much like what he later tried to do with Luke and Vader). He got exactly what he wanted out of the Battle of Coruscant. Also, as a secondary objective, he might have been trying to stir up fear in the Republic/Senate to get more emergency powers.

But Grevious might not have known that, and certainly the lower down separatists wouldn't have. Probably they were sold on it as a way to a) cripple Republic moral by attacking their capital, taking their leader, and making it clear no one was secure, and b) get a really valuable hostage. And they might have been trying to lure the Republic fleet into a trap.

[Tiriol]

I think that Palpatine wanted to accomplish two objectives: one, to dispose of Dooku and make sure Anakin would be that much closer to becoming his perfect Sith apprentice; two, to sow fear into hearts of the Republic citizens living in Core Worlds. "No one is safe, not even the Supreme Chancellor. Even Coruscant can come under attack." This would increase Palpatine's hold on government as people would call for ever greater security measures and the Senate would be all too willing to hand over even more power to Palpatine as a result. Palpatine's personal power would grow and the final pieces for the fully realized formation of a militarized, totalitarian state (the Empire) would be in place.

As for Grievous's goals, I suspect they were pretty standard: capture the head of state and of government of the enemy state, humiliate the enemy military and either force the Republic to seek out a new leader for themselves (one likely not up to Palpatine's level of skill) or to negotiate with the Separatists from disadvantage. Grievous most likely also sought to spread fear and chaos to the Republic strongholds and loyalists worlds by showing that even Coruscant was vulnerable to his attacks, thus (from his point of view) making it more likely that the populace would be cowed into seeking unfavorable (for them) peace with the Confederacy. I doubt Grievous actually thought he could conquer Coruscant or force the Republic into total submission - later on in the movie Obi-Wan recounts that the Outer Rim sieges are going well for the Republic, meaning that the Separatists are otherwise on the losing end of the war. Grievous and Dooku (at least in public) clearly sought alternative methods of ending the war without surrendering to the Republic.

[Lord Pounder]

Not sure how the novelisations figure into things now but another objective of the grab, for Palpatine, was to kill Kenobi making the corruption of Anakin even easier.