Kevin's moral code prevented taking deadly action. However, a being of such power as him surely could have taken actions that would have ended the attack without killing or injuring any Husnock. As an "immortal being of disguises and false surroundings" he probably could have made it appear to the Husnock that the entire planet was no longer there, or other appropriate illusion to cause them to stop the attack and leave.
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1 Answer
This was explicitly addressed in the episode; The relevant conversation:
CRUSHER: You had the power to stop them but you didn't?
KEVIN: I refused to for the same reason I refused to stop the Enterprise. I will not kill.
PICARD: So you let the colonists fight a hopeless battle.
KEVIN: I tried to fool the Husnock as I tried to fool you. It only made them angrier. More cruel.
(Emphasis by me)
As you can see, he tried to use his abilities to prevent the genocide, but the Husnock didn't buy his tricks (just as Picard didn't). So it appears he's not very good at deception on such a large scale.
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That explanation by Kevin is a bit suspect to me. It's possible that he's deceiving Crusher for some unknown reason. Considering that he committed genocide of the entire Husnock race, it's obvious that he would kill.– MorganCommented Mar 25, 2013 at 3:55
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4@Morgan: It's a difference to have a general moral standard to do no harm and to have a knee jerk reaction triggered by a traumatic event. In a second of rage over the death of his wife, he wiped them out, yes. But he could still have refused to kill when thinking rationally.– bitmaskCommented Mar 25, 2013 at 11:02
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I hear what you're saying @bitmask but it's been my understanding that those with general moral standards don't commit genocide and kill "all Husnock, everywhere". It forces me to wonder if he's done such a thing before when he 'got mad'. His power seems to potentially approach 'Q' levels. Would like to get some back-story on that race but can't find much beyond; 'They're an extragalactic species made of pure energy, self-described as "immortal beings of disguises and false surroundings" and have the ability to create and destroy on an epic scale.' en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Douwd– MorganCommented Mar 26, 2013 at 1:38
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1@Morgan While he's possibly closer to Q than to humans, but there's at least a couple of key powers that he doesn't have that the Q do. He's clearly unable to properly bring people back from the dead. Otherwise he could just restore the whole Husnock race and his dead wife, something the Q could likely do. He was only able to bring back an illusion of his dead wife that ceased to be when he stopped maintaining it. And he clearly doesn't have the ability to time travel as the Q can. You can't find more because all we know about them is in that one episode. Commented May 29, 2018 at 18:21