The First Order military served as the armed forces for the First Order. The First Order Army, the First Order Navy, the Stormtrooper Corps, and Special Forces comprised its military strength.
It is believed that its foundations were the military assets that survived the Galactic Empire's collapse and fled into the Unknown Regions. While concealed there, the First Order launched a massive military buildup and created a technologically advanced military.
First Order High Command structured the forces into formal military organizations with defined command structures, alongside Snoke, the Supreme Leader until Kylo Ren murdered him and assumed his role. The New Republic's disarmament initiatives left the First Order fleet practically unchallenged.
Following the defeat of the Galactic Empire, former officers, nobles, and technologists established the First Order in the remote areas of the Unknown Regions. They rapidly began to rearm, with the goal of eventually seizing the galaxy from the New Republic, which was a blatant violation of the Galactic Concordance and Republic laws. They secretly constructed military bases and shipyards within the Unknown Regions to produce technologically superior weapons and starfighters for their military, with many of the Old Empire's most valuable secrets ending up in the First Order's possession.
To circumvent treaty restrictions prohibiting the sale of weapons to the First Order, galactic arms manufacturers BlasTech Industries and Merr-Sonn Munitions, Inc. created a subsidiary known as the Sonn-Blas Corporation. This corporation manufactured a large portion of the First Order's weaponry within First Order space, while Sienar-Jaemus Army Systems and Aratech-Loratus Corporation supplied spacecraft and vehicles to the Order. Due to the regime's lack of resources compared to the Old Empire, the First Order prioritized mobility and increased firepower per starship in its military strategy.
Kuat-Entralla Engineering developed the Resurgent-class Star Destroyer in violation of New Republic laws concerning capital ships. It was armed with over 1,500 turbolasers, point-defense laser cannons, and ion cannons, and it was intentionally designed to evoke the terrifying image of the Old Empire's Imperial-class Star Destroyers. Even General Leia Organa's most pessimistic predictions failed to grasp the full extent of the First Order's military buildup, despite suspicions that it was quite large. The mining of dedlanite at Station Theta Black to produce blasters was one aspect of the covert military buildup.
Starkiller Base, an ice planet transformed into a First Order stronghold, served as one of the military's main operational bases thirty years following the Battle of Endor. The base, which served as their unofficial headquarters, was fitted with a superweapon capable of destroying entire star systems by firing a planet-destroying beam through hyperspace. A triumvirate consisting of General Armitage Hux, Kylo Ren, and Captain Phasma was in command of the military at the time.
Following the Hosnian Cataclysm, Starkiller Base was destroyed in an attack launched by the Resistance. The Supreme Leader instructed Hux to evacuate the base and return to him with Ren prior to its destruction.
Following that, a First Order fleet launched an assault on the Resistance base located at D'Qar. Despite the destruction of their dreadnought, the Fulminatrix, the First Order obliterated the base, wiped out the Resistance's entire bombing fleet, and forced them to escape to the Crait system. General Hux then used new hyperspace trackers to confront the Resistance with their massive flagship, the Supremacy. Attacks by Ren and his squad of TIE fighters destroyed the Resistance's starfighter squadrons, including Poe Dameron's own Black One, and its entire leadership team with the exception of General Leia Organa. They also destroyed their medical frigate and the Ninka.
Despite the efforts of former stormtrooper Finn and Resistance mechanic Rose Tico to disable the main hyperspace tracker on the Supremacy, with assistance from the thief DJ, they were apprehended by First Order security bureau officers and stormtroopers. DJ later informed General Hux of the Resistance's intentions to flee in cloaked transports in exchange for financial compensation. Upon confirming this information, Hux ordered the Supremacy to destroy the transports.
However, Admiral Amilyn Holdo turned the cruiser Raddus towards the Supremacy and executed a hyperspace jump that bisected the ship. This also prevented the execution of Finn and Rose, who subsequently escaped on a stolen shuttle after defeating Captain Phasma and a number of stormtroopers. This sacrifice enabled the surviving Resistance transports to flee to the old Rebel outpost on Crait.
Concurrently, Ren brought the Force-sensitive scavenger Rey to Snoke in his Throne Room, where Snoke attempted to extract the location of Luke Skywalker from her. Despite her resistance to his methods, including torture, Snoke instructed Ren to kill the restrained scavenger. However, Ren ignited Luke's lightsaber into Snoke's side and pulled it towards Rey, killing him and severing his body in half. After defeating Snoke's guard, Rey declined Ren's proposal to rule the galaxy together, instead attempting to seize Luke's lightsaber. The lightsaber broke in two, but Rey recovered both pieces and fled the Supremacy. Meanwhile, Ren declared himself the new Supreme Leader after Force-choking Hux. He then ordered the First Order to attack the Resistance base on Crait.
The First Order deployed a massive superlaser siege cannon to breach the massive door. Despite a desperate Resistance counterattack with ski-speeders, the door was destroyed. However, a Force projection of Luke Skywalker delayed First Order forces by confronting Ren, allowing the Resistance to escape on the Millennium Falcon. Meanwhile, the Battle of Grail City commenced when a First Order Maxima-A class heavy cruiser known as the Fortitude attacked the world of Ikkrukk, which was embroiled in a civil conflict between Ikkrukk's government and local First Order sympathizers. Black Squadron engaged the First Order cruiser and its flight of TIE fighters, destroying the attacking forces and securing the planet's safety.
In 35 ABY, Darth Sidious—the mastermind and leader of the "Old Empire," who had returned from the dead by cloning a new body for his spirit—sent a message to the galaxy, promising vengeance. Supreme Leader Kylo Ren tracked Sidious to the hidden Sith world of Exegol, where the Sith Lord and his Sith Eternal cultists had constructed a massive armada of Xyston-class Star Destroyers known as the Final Order. The Emperor offered Ren the Sith fleet and his position in exchange for killing his granddaughter Rey.
Since Ren's flagship Finalizer had suffered damage over Batuu, another Resurgent Star Destroyer Steadfast became Ren's flagship. First Order military forces attempted to capture a Resistance team led by Dameron on two occasions at the Sinta Glacier Colony and Pasaana. Although they were unable to prevent the Resistance from discovering the Emperor's return, they captured Chewbacca on Pasaana after sustaining several casualties. Later, Chewbacca's comrades including Finn, Poe, and Rey rescued him with the aid of the disaffected General Hux, who resented Ren's leadership.
After Ren returned to the light side of the Force and embraced his former identity as Ben Solo, Allegiant General Enric Pryde pledged his allegiance and the First Order to the Sith Lord. To demonstrate his loyalty, Pryde dispatched the Xyston-class Star Destroyer Derriphan to destroy the planet Kijimi as a show of military force. The Sith Eternal's forces saw action against the Resistance and the Citizens' Fleet during the Battle of Exegol, which saw the deaths of the Emperor and the redeemed Solo. The Steadfast along with the entire Sith armada was destroyed during the battle. Following the Battle of Exegol, various worlds, including Endor, Jakku, and Bespin rose up in rebellion against the First Order, leading to the destruction of several Resurgent-class Star Destroyers.
Although smaller than its predecessor, the Imperial Military, the First Order military's individual units and groupings nevertheless followed the same Order of Battle. By the time of the Battle of Crait, the First Order's army branch alone had 10,000 troops ready for combat. Overall command of the military fell to the Supreme Leader, with the likes of General Hux and Captain Phasma operating under the current head of state. The alien named Snoke commanded the might of the First Order until his execution at the hands of his own apprentice, Kylo Ren. Ren already exercised great control within the First Order but was always subservient himself to Snoke. Following Snoke's execution, Ren assumed command of the First Order and its military forces despite Hux's objections.
During his rule, Ren assembled the First Order Supreme Council. In secret, Snoke had been a pawn of the resurrected Darth Sidious. Through Snoke, Sidious had controlled the First Order and its military. Following Ren's return to the light side of the Force, Allegiant General Pryde continued leading First Order forces from Ren's former flagship, the Steadfast. Pryde himself, however, pledged his loyalty to Sidious, cementing an alliance between the Sith Eternal and First Order. The Battle of Exegol, however, would see the destruction of the Sith Eternal and the Steadfast, with Sidious and Pryde falling with each, respectively.
Like its predecessor, the First Order employed stormtroopers, including variants such as snowtroopers. It also utilized specialists including megablaster heavy assault troopers, flametroopers and riot control stormtroopers and selectively had one of the three variants placed in every ten-member stormtrooper squad. Unlike the inconsistent academy standards of the previous Galactic Empire, training of the new generation of stormtroopers emphasized improvisation and counterinsurgency operations, including guerrilla tactics. With the First Order lacking the numerical superiority of the Galactic Empire, better-equipped and -trained soldiers resulted in higher trooper proficiency than the previous Galactic Empire. Soldiers were often trained on capital ships and underwent vivid simulations to create the most loyal soldiers, which was an extension of the ideas of Commandant Brendol Hux and his Commandant's Cadets.
In addition to its stormtroopers and ground tactics like maneuver 0927, the First Order utilized differing vehicles to help their infantry in various environments. For snowy terrain the Order deployed Light Infantry Utility Vehicles and fast snowspeeders, while they used 125-Z treadspeeder bikes for desert environments. More armored were the All Terrain Mobile Artillery used, for example, on Starkiller Base.
The First Order Navy was mainly based on battle cruisers like its Imperial predecessor, with the Navy at its height constructing capital ships numbering well into the hundreds through Project Resurrection. Resurgent-class Star Destroyers were the threatening capital ships deployed against the First Order's targets, but the Resistance believed that vessels even larger than them existed. The First Order also used older Imperial-class Star Destroyers and smaller ships compared to Resurgent-class Star Destroyers, as Lancer-class frigates, Maxima-A class heavy cruisers, Dissident-class light cruisers and Nebulon-K frigates.
For ground assaults the Order made a great use of Atmospheric Assault Landers; a hundred of them could be carried by Resurgent-class Star Destroyers. They also used Upsilon-class command shuttles. To achieve space superiority the Order deployed TIEs in two variants: TIE/fo space superiority fighters and its two-seated version, the TIE/sf space superiority fighter, this one used by the First Order's Special Forces.