Why did LF make Lysa kill Jon Arryn?

[TyshaLives]

Seriously. I get it that Lysa wanted him dead because he was going to take Sweetrobin away. But why did LF let her do it? Okay maybe to marry her. But nobody let him marry her till he became the Lord of Harrenhall.

So why pit the Starks against the Lannisters and then betray Ned?

Everybody says he wanted civil war to grab power but that's so vague. He couldn't have known what would really go down.

My logic is that he wanted Sweetrobin to stay in his control as much as Lysa wanted to keep him under her protection. Then he thought telling the Starks that the Lannisters did it would take away the attention from him, so nobody would look to see his gains and there was a probability that his Big Enemies- The Starks would be in trouble.

Littlefinger likes watching the world burn.

Okay I pretty much answered myself but I'll still post this to remind myself what I think in the future.

[Ser Taeser Celtigar]

Littlefinger wanted revenge on the Starks.

He loved and wanted to marry Catelyn but her father would not allow it so he set her up with Brandon Stark (Eddard's brother).

He challenged Brandon to a duel for Catelyn, but she, in her infinite wisdom, begged Brandon not to kill him and Brandon severely wounded him.

After this he was sent away and Rhaegar 'kidnapped' Brandon's sister, Lyanna, and Brandon rode to King's Landing which led to his and his father's deaths, amongst others and the start of Robert's Rebellion.

Eddard married Catelyn in Brandon's place so Littlefinger still couldn't have her.

Years of hate and resentment festered and when Littlefinger had gained the power and influence he needed, he used Jon Arryn's decision to foster Lysa's son to start the Stark-Lannister war in the belief that he would get Catelyn in the end, get Eddard killed along the way. He didn't care how many other Starks would die in the process. Or the Lannisters. Or anybody else.

Of course, he hadn't counted on Catelyn getting killed, but I guess he will settle for Sansa now.

[Federico]

I hate to draw from the show. Sometimes I cannot recall details from the book because of better remembered ones from the show.

JA was the single greatest source for calm, reason, and stability during Robert's reign. LF knew JA was investigating Robert's bastards. Eventually, JA would gather enough evidence and deal with it in a manner that might maintain order.

Eliminating JA let loose the chaos that the show said LF would use as a ladder to gain more. What better chaos than war, which is why he told Lysa to send the note, not starting it, but one of many sparks to ignite it.

He didn't need a grand plan for meticulously manipulating the houses. He probably knew he only needed to crank up the temperature and plenty of opportunities would arise for him to exploit, playing one party/house against another.

[Nerevanin]

I'd say he wanted to create choas and benefit from it, which worked. Maybe he thought that Robert would make him the Hand? Or maybe he knew that Robert intended to give the position of the Hand to Ned and if the point of LF's whole plan is to get revenge against the Starks and the Tullys, he killed Jon Arryn to make the things move faster. I suppose he had million back-up plans how to do it to pit the Starks and the Lannisters against each other and, well, it worked.

[The Mountain That Flies]

He wanted to start a war which would destabilize Westeros and harm as much of the nobility as possible, particularly the Starks, Tullys, and Lannisters. To get the first two involved, he had to make them enemies of the latter, and killing Jon then framing the Lannisters via Lysa is a great way to do that. Yes that's a bit vague, and he couldn't be sure Robert would name Ned and not Stannis Hand, but Littlefinger would have likely kept doing stuff like this until a war did get set up. Hell, he may have even been the one to point out to Jon Arryn that the hair of Robert's kids was a bit odd, just to get the initial ball rolling.

[Guess who's back]

Because chaos is a ladder.

[Aerys Blackfyre]

simply to trigger the events that originated the entire saga!

[BalerionTheCat]

There was a personal vengeance against Ned at the core. I believe he convinced Joffrey to go against his mother and the Small Council and behead Ned.

Killing Jon was the first step, because he wanted Ned in KL. Stannis leaving was probably unexpected. But he wanted to put chaos between houses Lannister and Stark. Many things were pressing. For example, if Renly plan to marry Margaery to Robert had succeeded, and cersei incest revealed, he would not have been able to move a stone after that.

[Tyrion's Third Wife]

1. To prevent JA from revealing the true parentage of King Robert's "children" for the time being

2. To stir the sh*t pot between the Starks and Lannisters

3. Perhaps he was hoping to lure Cat to King's Landing or the Eyrie

4. To marry Lysa himself to gain control of the Eyrie (that was the easiest part)

[TyshaLives]

It's so difficult to understand LF's motives! At least for me.

So he tells the Starks that the Lannisters killed JA but he killed JA because he didn't want the incest to come out. But pitting Ned against Lannisters is what kind of brought out the incest.

Maybe he didn't care about the incest at all. He just weighed the pros and cons of killing JA and went with it.

Pros: A shot at becoming Lord of the Vale, chance to grab power, chance to get favours from Lannisters, screwing over Ned

Cons: Losing Sweetrobin, JA solving everything quietly, things remaining the same

Either way, the incest coming out doesn't affect LF much. It only affects him when he manipulates it (like betraying Ned and supporting Joffrey)

[Lost Melnibonean]

Seriously. I get it that Lysa wanted him dead because he was going to take Sweetrobin away. But why did LF let her do it? Okay maybe to marry her. But nobody let him marry her till he became the Lord of Harrenhall.

So why pit the Starks against the Lannisters and then betray Ned?

Everybody says he wanted civil war to grab power but that's so vague. He couldn't have known what would really go down.

My logic is that he wanted Sweetrobin to stay in his control as much as Lysa wanted to keep him under her protection. Then he thought telling the Starks that the Lannisters did it would take away the attention from him, so nobody would look to see his gains and there was a probability that his Big Enemies- The Starks would be in trouble.

Littlefinger likes watching the world burn.

Okay I pretty much answered myself but I'll still post this to remind myself what I think in the future.

No. Petyr had a plan. He wanted to become lord of the Vale, possibly even king of the Realm. Along the way he would stick it to Houses Tully and Stark and show all the other great lords he was just as great as they were.

[Lost Melnibonean]

Oops!

[Ser Charles of Rosehaven]

Do You remember this plot that stannis And JA had to outlaw brothels And make LF lose power. Maybe he wanted to stop them.

[Mychel_Redfort]

For me, LF plan was always to rule the Vale by wedding Lysa and then killing her. Being lowborn, wedding Lysa was impossible, so he had to gain a lordship : he did so by becoming Lord of Harrenhal. How could he win such a high seat ? By being rewarded for providing a great help during wartime. He did so by rallying the Tyrells to the Lannisters, leading to saving King's Landing from Stannis. But there was no war when the books begin, Robert has been king for fifteen years, how can LF provoke one ? By pushing Cersei to kill Robert before he learned about the twincest. And how could he achieve that ? By having Ned replace Jon Arryn, and by telling him the Lannisters were responsible, and by leading him to learn the twincest. And how could Jon Arryn be killed ? By having his wife murder him because he wanted to separate her from her son. And that's exactly what happens at the beginning of the saga. When Jon Arryn chooses to foster Robert with Stannis, all the pieces are at last in place for LF's plan to unfold.

[OldGimletEye]

Because LF is a professional shit stirrer upper. But, seriously I think it was about getting revenge on the Starks and because he saw a way to advance himself through the resulting chaos.

[John Suburbs]

My guess is that he thought Jaime Lannister would become hand, as Robert had no inclination of naming Stannis and, let's face it, Jaime would make a crappy hand. When Robert went for Ned instead, that threw a wrench into the plan because a) Ned is largely unknown to LF and b) is said to be a careful, calculating man and, above all, a leader.

This also leads me to suspect that LF did have something to do with Bran's death -- not that he told Joffrey before they left KL to kill Bran after he fell from the tower, since LF had no way of knowing that was going to happen, or even that it had happened after the fact. More likely, he told Joffrey that Ned as hand was a threat to Lannister control and ultimately his position as prince regent, so it would be best to do something to prevent Ned from coming south -- something serious like killing one of the Stark children. When Bran fell and that still did not keep Ned at home, Joff paid off the catspaw, gave him the dagger and told him to finish the job.

I have no real proof here, just a suspicion because the idea that Joff would try to kill Bran just to end his misery or just because he likes to kill people doesn't wash with me.

[Lyanna Stark]

From the latter novels it is clear what Littlefinger's motives are:

Firstly, to kill Jon Arryn when he was about to find out that Robert's children weren't his was a surefire way to start a conflict between the Starks and the Lannisters. Note how Littlefinger helps and assists Ned when he first arrives in Kings Landing so that he will eventually figure out what Jon Arryn also did: that Joffrey, Myrcella and tommen are not Robert's kids. Although since Ned is a bit slow, it took him awhile (and Sansa's commentary on what a Lion Joffrey is) to set him on the right path.

Only by pitting those two strong families against eachother can LF finally proft. He keeps control over Lysa, stirs shit in Kings Landing, gets the Stark and the Lannisters to fight each other and in doing so, lose power. Once Ned was captured, it is almost 99% sure that LF was behind Joffrey beheading Ned as well (Varys tells Tyrion as much), so part of the plot was certainly to remove Ned from the equation, probably in order to finally get his hands on Cat.

He then further enhances this conflict by telling Cat the dragonbone dagger used in the murder attempt on Bran is Tyrion's, even if this is a lie.

However, when Ned is removed from the equation, Cat is out of his reach, and he seems to have shifted his focus away from Cat to Sansa. While clearly he still covets power, he also covets what was denied him, and that is Cat, or a Cat replacement aka Sansa, revenge on the Tullys (Tyrion was surprised at how much Lf wanted Harrenhal, but it makes sense since he is then the overlord of the Tullys by holding it) and revenge on the Starks, who took Cat away from him.

Littlefinger doesn't balk at killing off people he finds in the way though, as we can almost certainly guess that he somehow was behind the murder attempt by Ser Mandon Moore on Tyrion during the Battle of the Blackwater. Given that House Moore is from the Vale, LF probably knew the man (and his finances) well. Ser Mandon was brought from the Vale by Jon Arryn, and we already know that Arryn brought LF as well, hence there is a connection between the two that is more subtle than for Cersei to have bribed him (which is what Tyrion believes, but those two are always too busy thinking the other is trying to kill them, missing that there are more murderers and dangerous people around).

[Pablius]

JA dead is a mean to an end

LF sees the opportunity to pitch Starks vs. Lannisters, he not only got Lysa to kill JA, he made her plant in Cat`s mind the idea the Lannisters are behind it, didn't he?

He couldn´t have calculate every possible outcome but that Robert would ask Ned to be his hand was probable, maybe even something he could instigate, I don´t remember if there is any textual evidence of this but it is certainly possible

After that he just kept scheming his way to chaos and power, he probably wanted Cat but settled for Sansa, maybe he wanted to be Lord of the Vale for a while but events accelerated, who knows, he is not a POV character and GRRM may never show to full range of his plans and ambitions

[Lost Melnibonean]

My guess is that he thought Jaime Lannister would become hand, as Robert had no inclination of naming Stannis and, let's face it, Jaime would make a crappy hand. When Robert went for Ned instead, that threw a wrench into the plan because a) Ned is largely unknown to LF and b) is said to be a careful, calculating man and, above all, a leader.

This also leads me to suspect that LF did have something to do with Bran's death -- not that he told Joffrey before they left KL to kill Bran after he fell from the tower, since LF had no way of knowing that was going to happen, or even that it had happened after the fact. More likely, he told Joffrey that Ned as hand was a threat to Lannister control and ultimately his position as prince regent, so it would be best to do something to prevent Ned from coming south -- something serious like killing one of the Stark children. When Bran fell and that still did not keep Ned at home, Joff paid off the catspaw, gave him the dagger and told him to finish the job.

I have no real proof here, just a suspicion because the idea that Joff would try to kill Bran just to end his misery or just because he likes to kill people doesn't wash with me.

I think most would assume Tywin or Ned would succeed Jon with Ned being the clear favorite. Petyr surely knew about Ned even if he didn't know him. Petyr wanted the Ned to leave his seat of power where Peteyr could more easily have him killed.

[Annara Snow]

Do You remember this plot that stannis And JA had to outlaw brothels And make LF lose power. Maybe he wanted to stop them.

Stannis was definitely not a fan of Littlefinger and saw him as the source of corruption in King's Landing and Robert's government. He says to Janos Slynt in ASOS:

“Two men who were prepared to come forward died suddenly on their rounds.” Stannis narrowed his eyes. “Do not trifle with me, my lord. I saw the proof Jon Arryn laid before the small council. If I had been king you would have lost more than your office, I promise you, but Robert shrugged away your little lapses. ‘They all steal’ I recall him saying. ‘Better a thief we know than one we don’t, the next man might be worse.’ Lord Petyr’s words in my brother’s mouth, I’ll warrant. Littlefinger had a nose for gold, and I’m certain he arranged matters so the crown profited as much from your corruption as you did yourself.”

One thing he's wrong about is the crown profiting as much from the corruption - Tyrion realized in ASOS that LF had been cooking the books, and we know the crown was in massive debt, especially to Tywin, so who knows what else an investigation into his affairs would have uncovered.