However, now that Disney has acquired Star Wars, all of this is now Legends, and we have a new expanded universe to play in.Īccording to Saxton, “ any realistic military force there must be at least ten levels of officer seniority” - which I would agree with under normal circumstances. His work holds up for the most part, although I think that he over-inflated the Rebel Alliance’s ranks slightly. He created marvelous explanations for the insignia that we see in A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back, using the on-screen characters, the given ranks, what real-world ranks are, and using math to give us what insignia must correspond to what officer grade based off all available information. I believe that there is a simple solution for this that covers all of the bases, save for one inconsistent badge.īefore I describe this, I must mention the beautiful work that Curtis Saxton put in on the STAR WARS Technical Commentaries website. However, Captain Cassian Andor and Captain Kado Oquoné wear green rank plaques, which throws a wrench into both systems. I believe that the Resistance took its rank structure directly from the Rebel Alliance.Īccording to the canon reference book, Star Wars: Rogue One: The Ultimate Visual Guide, the Alliance’s rank structure is Lieutenant, Captain, Major, Commander, Colonel, General, which is taken from the Alderaanian standard - this is similar to the description in the Legends roleplaying book Rebel Alliance Sourcebook, except that the roleplaying book indicates that red is designated for the army designation while blue is designated for the navy.

The Resistance is inspired by the Alliance to Restore the Republic (aka the Rebel Alliance), as the New Republic was unwilling to stand up to the threat of the First Order. In my review of The Last Jedi, I mentioned that the officer rank structure for the Resistance is canonically Lieutenant, Captain, Major, Commander, Colonel, General/Admiral (although Amilyn Holdo is a Vice Admiral and Nien Nunb is a Lieutenant Commander, but that’s not germane to this post).

Star wars republic navy intelligence