CT Imperial Political and Military Ranks

That's correct, Taggi is "general" according to the cast credits, yet he is addressed as "commander" which suggests he is the commander-in-chief of the Imperial Starfleet, emphasized by Motti's "your Starfleet" and obviously concerned that the Death Star might contribute to the mothballing of the fleet.

Admiral Taggi's affiliation is not quite clear, obviously he isn't concerned about the Imperial Starfleet and rather some kind of supervisor for Imperial bases of some or all kind. However, the scene clarifies, IMHO, that in Star Wars a general can be in charge of the Starfleet while an admiral can be in charge of something not affiliated with the Starfleet.

 

That's weird because either in the old canon or the original version of the movie in the credits it was stated it was "General Motti" until it was changed many years later for some reason to Admiral I'd imagine it would of been vice versa for Tagge as well since Motti mention's "your starfleet." While in the New canon General Tagge has the rank of "Chief of the Imperial Army" and Motti had the rank "Chief of the Imperial Navy," explaining why they're so high up in the ANH imperial Joint Chiefs council. But this doesn't explain or was retconned later on why there roles in the movies seemed reverse with their dialogue.

 

There are also some background imperial officers in ANH in green and white uniforms who lack rank badges.

 

Enlisted personnel I suppose?

 

you sure they didn't have rank insignias? the only ones lacking rank badges were the black uniformed 2 death star troopers and Vader

 

Or the term "commander" could be a more colloquial term, simply denoting someone in charge of something (sort of like the idea that whoever commands a ship is a "captain" regardless of actual rank). I get the impression that the term is used as a sort of generic honorific.

 

The scene where Han and Luke are in stormtrooper armor and enter a elevator with Chewie, several badgeless green officers walk by.

 

ahh some were the white ISB agents from the conference (Colonel Yularen and some other ISB officer) and some other random green/grey uniformed imperials so don't expect them to have ranks for such a not expected to do well movie...

 

One of my pet peeves with Star Wars is that the rank of General is often associated with all three service branches: Navy, Army, and Starfighter Command (SFC).

We're I in charge of the Imperial Military I would have separate ranks for flag officers within each branch:

Navy - Admiral
SFC - General
Army - Marshall

 

Just think of it as a very big Navy with a very big Marine Corps, eliminating the need for an Army or Air Force.

 

You know, that's not a bad way to think about it.

 

It'd make sense too since Admirals seem to outrank Generals (General Veers having to get permission from Admiral Ozzel to land his troops on Hoth)

 

They have space navies that police the Galaxy so i see the Grand Moffs in charge of large fleets. Kind of like the old Ottoman Empire which had Viziers. Admirals and Generals could apply to individual commanders placed in charge of ongoing missions as in deploying troops to rebel planets. Governors being like section commanders such as Tarkin they mediate between the various navies and Stormtrooper divisions.

 

Snafu55 wrote

That's weird because either in the old canon or the original version of the movie in the credits it was stated it was "General Motti" until it was changed many years later for some reason to Admiral I'd imagine it would of been vice versa for Tagge as well since Motti mention's "your starfleet."

Not really, the cast credits read "Admiral Motti" and "General Taggi" (and since the films are supposed to be absolute canon, I write "Taggi" instead of "Tagge").

Where it's somewhat confused is the third chapter in the ANH novelization where "General Tagge" has the same discussion as seen in the film but with an "older officer" whom he addresses as "Romodi". The character mocking Vader is also "Tagge", there is no Motti participating in the ANH novelization.

Slicer87 wrote

There are also some background imperial officers in ANH in green and white uniforms who lack rank badges.

The green uniforms you are referring to are less lavish than those worn by MilitaryCorps officers and apparently feature a zipper in the middle. IMHO they are probably just bureaucrats of the Military Corps.

However, all the light uniform wearers wear rank badges, which nevertheless differ from the Guard (e.g. Praji) and Military Corps which either display 6 colored bars of the same kind or 4+2 different ones (color wheel to select segments from has 6 blue, 6 orange and 6 red bars).

The light uniform wearers wear 3+3 different colors, which IMHO identify its wearers as members of the Engineering Corps, something that seems to have been emphasized by Director Krennic in Rogue One wearing the same kind of light uniform and - at that time of ANH - a rank badge consisting of an equal amount of red and blue bars.

Frankly, I never bought this "Imperial Security Bureau" conjecture (just because they wear black regulation caps?). With Vader present at the Death Star conference as the ultimate "security watchdog" there wasn't really any need for members of this ISB to participate, IMHO.

However, technical questions regarding the Death Star's capabilities might have come up that required the presence of qualified engineering personnel to answer those...

 

So the Empire in canon organized their military in terms of operations branches - the Navy controlled everything associated with space combat while the Army controlled everything associated with ground combat including planetary assault/invasion/landing.

The New Republic in Legends moved to a more 'environmental' branch system where the Navy and Army were joined by Starfighter Command (SFC) which presumably handled the operation of small space craft.

I wonder what the best structure really is. Operational vs. environmental branches, do you split the Army into Army (ground combat) and Marines (planetary assault), do you have the Marines be a branch within the Amry and SFC within the Navy. Do you get rid of branches and go with joint operational commands like transportation, assault, starfighters, ect. Things that I often wonder about are:

1) Security/boarding forces on capital warships. Should the Army be responsible for all ground combat forces (regardless of whether such combat occurs on the ground or on a ship), or should the Navy train and maintain their own security force as this would make more sense for indoctrination, training, and operational deployments.

2) Pilots of landing craft. Should the pilots be Army for operational training cohesion or should they be SFC to maintain consistency on whose piloting small space craft.

 

It makes sense to me, since the Empire would need a much larger navy than army. Even massive AT-AT walkers and things like that wouldn't be as necessary as a huge, mobile fleet with plenty of fighters. They could patrol and have fortifications, but if they became too outnumbered on the ground, just pull out and let the navy commence with surgical strikes and bombardment. If necessary, they could conduct most of their warfare from orbit.

I could see the American military eventually heading in that direction - less massive deployed military forces, but with a larger Navy capable of inserting smaller Marine and Naval Special Warfare teams anywhere on the globe with short notification. If we don't have another World War and things never escalate with Russia or China, then it's looking more and more like the "civilized world" will be fighting small conflicts all across the Middle East.

 

Which forum would you recommend?