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Who's higher in command? Now, Darth Vader is a Sith Lord, apprentice to Darth Sidious and strongest Imperial in the Galaxy (other than Sidious himself). Yet Tarken commands Vader to release that Admiral Motti and Vader obeys. Tarken also holds Vader's leash, indicating that he's superior to Vader. Is he really?

Yes, he's higher in the pecking order than Vader.

Vader is in ANH under Tarkin, which should be clear:
in the conference room Tarkin orders Vader to stop the Force Grip and he complies without protest.

On the Death Star wasnt Vader just the Emperors Emissary? well thats how I understood it. Hes just there to represent the Emperor and ensure the Death Star completes its mission

Yep. The Emperor apparently ORDERED Vader to accept Tarkin's command while he hunted down the Rebels.

not only did vader obey tarkens order to release his choke, leia actually says that she should have expected tarken to be holding vaders leash. does this mean vader has a history of being placed under imperal officers? either that or tarken has a history of being 2nd only to palpatine. whatever the history she was none too surprised to see vader ranked below tarken.

It's because in the first scripts, there were lots a sith, they were just warriors to protect the emperor personally, the moffs are the highest ranks given by the emperor personally! In the original episode VI script, a moff even told Vader to f*ck off from Luke as Vader screwed up.

Now we kinda get the idea though that the jedi and sith are the most important. I guess Lucas changed his mind a bit.

Tarkin was incredibly powerful in both military and poiltics- this is something Vader simply has to accept.

However, let's not also forget that the two of them were friends.

What tells you they're friends? I never heard of that before.

Tarkin came up with the doctrine of "Rule through fear of force, not force itself." That worked extremely well. Enough so to earn him hold of Vader's leesh.

Tarkin is not just a Moff, he is a Grand Moff. I always took it that he holds more stead than the other officers, even above Vader. But yeah, friendship is indicated, as he does say to Vader at one point "You, my friend, are all that is left of their (the Jedi) religion."

You can tell this by: (well this answer is given like 2 decades AFTER ANH, so.....)

Grand Admiral Thrawn was higher in authority than Grand Moff Tarkin, and Vader gave him orders like anyone else...so friendship with the Emperor would get Tarkin some temporary power over Vader.

Originally posted by overlord
What tells you they're friends? I never heard of that before.

The fact that they talk together as equals, including the use of the word 'friend'.

Hmm.. Never noticed that. I really need to watch the OT again some time.

Its also the fact that when Gl wrote Star Wars, he didn't know it would go on to be the blockbuster that it is, and Vader was supposed to be "the cheesy villain". not the chosen one and father to the eventual last jedi. So if you dont have someone planned to be the top dog, you arent going to have them at the top of the pecking order. But the "friend" idea works more for me than any other explanation.

I personally don't think they were exactly to be called friends, I think Grand Moff Tarkin was higher ranked but still a bit scared to be strict to the Sith warrior. But I haven't seen the first movie for a while anymore so I will see..

But Vader only seemed highest in rank since ROTJ, it wasn't the idea in the first two movies.

Well, Tarkin and Vader both have different uses. Tarkin is older, no doubt experienced in warfare and in dealing with imperialistic doctrine, and apparently was qualified enough to have complete control over the Death Star, which is what? Filled with millions of Imperial personnel. This makes him pretty well... Up there.

There's also the fact that Vader was originally never meant to be the villain; Tarkin was.

tarkin had the death star designed and built for the emperor in the secret maw installation by a team of scientists which he led and charged the admiral daala the first female admiral in the empire to guard them. when the death star prototype was presented to tarkin he awarded the designer a medal on the spot the emperor therefore put tarkin in charge of the death star construction and in command of it when it was operational so on board he was in command but lord vader answered to no one but the emperor

Commas, periods, for gods sake man, give us something to work with here!!! J/k. basically, tarkin was an officer, Vader was a sith, so who in their right mind would order a sith around if they weren't friends? Or at least cordial with one another for the emperor's sake.

it is pretty obvious that tarkin was there to keep vader on a short leash.

Tarkin is higher up but Vader is just so damn cool, lol

Originally posted by Rogue Jedi
it is pretty obvious that tarkin was there to keep vader on a short leash.


Agreed - F.F.S.! Remember that things are kind of unstable at the time of A New Hope, changing. Who says that Sith lords are officially above or below certain military ranks when the Sith didn't originally have such titles beforehand? This is a new relationship that has to be worked out, and is possibly evolving, subject to the caprices of the Emperor. It may very well be an abritrary decision on the Emperor's part who he imparts his authority to to see Vader stays in line. This is not the Sith we're talking about, it's the Empire AND the Sith, and the way the two interract (one is religious, the other militant, and the two, of course overlap). And especially since the Sith had all but vanished but for Vader and Palpantine, who's to say where Sith titles fit into everything? Isn't that for the Emperor to decide? This might be why, in the original script for Jedi (and a cut scene), Vader strangles an officer keeping him from seeing Palpatine, because Vader considers it such an insult to be bowing down to who he sees as a subordinate.

Interesting idea. No doubt Vader's command of the Force was not held in -that- high regard in the military circle, or else he wouldn't have choked that one guy in ANH. Tarkin had a detached respect for it, but obviously he is a practical man with no real use for the Force (Unless he could find out a way to blow up planets with it.)