Imperial garrison base The Imperial garrison base in Mos Eisley was a short - lived Imperial outpost on Tatooine during the Galactic Civil War . It was purposefully built on Tatooine due to its symbolic relationship with the Alliance to Restore the Republic , which at the time had just won major victories against the Empire at the Battle of Yavin and the destruction of the First Death Star . Even though Darth Vader himself had come to oversee the expansion of the base , not too long after this visit , Luke Skywalker and Anduvil managed to infiltrate the stronghold and sabotage the complex , destroying it completely . Layout . The Imperial garrison base was a fortified and immense stronghold in the Tatooinian city of Mos Eisley , with several buildings inside , as well as a command bridge between two turbolaser towers . Its facilities included a TIE hangar , a medical center , a detention block a landing platform , a main patio and outward - facing autoturrets . The main gate was located in Straight Street , while the rest of the outpost overlooked Kerner Plaza . The base housed a large contingent of troops , officers and a medical staff , and at various times has harbored vehicles such as a " Lambda " - class T - 4a shuttle , All Terrain Armored Transports , All Terrain Scout Transports , All Terrain Advance Raider s , armored tank s , " Omega " - class freighters , a TIE lander and TIE / LN starfighter s . History . In large part due to the events of the Battle of Yavin and the Rebel Alliance ' s destruction of the Death Star , an Imperial - built superweapon / battlestation capable of annihilating entire worlds , the Galactic Empire chose to symbolically build a permanent military outpost on Tatooine . In 0 ABY , Sith Lord Darth Vader , accompanied by a member of the Emperor ' s Royal Guard , personally visited the base to oversee its expansion , causing a commotion among the locals . For this enlargement project , the Empire routinely employed armored tanks to demolish neighboring private residential homes in order to expand the garrison ' s limits towards Kerner Plaza . The Toydarian junkyard entrepreneur Watto occasionally had to visit the base , mostly because he had a hard time otherwise refusing the Empire ' s requests . Nonetheless , he saw the droid bargains , observing the wildlife and admiring the ancient city of Mos Eisley as compensation for the trouble of dealing with the Empire . Watto also suspected that the establishment of the base was largely intended to benefit Emperor Palpatine ' s Sith allies rather than the people of Mos Eisley . By this time , the base ' s medical facility was used to , among other things , analyze potential cases of Bledsoe ' s disease infections . The medical staff , under the auspices of Doctor Kaaldar , would record the star maps gleaned from its " window - eyes " symptom , as it revealed the location of secret bases operated by the Rebel Alliance . This practice was , however , unexpectedly sidetracked after a transport capsule containing Bledsoe ' s disease ended up unwittingly intercepted by a Jawa sandcrawler . Rebel Alliance member Luke Skywalker , having been infected with Bledsoe ' s while investigating the remains of the sandcrawler , was later delivered to the base , where the Imperials admitted Skywalker to a medical chamber . A portion of the base ' s main gate was later severely damaged after the sandcrawler , manned by Skywalker ' s droids , C - 3PO and R2 - D2 , attempted to breach the base in an attempt to rescue Skywalker . The Imperial garrison base was later utterly destroyed when Rebel intelligence operative Anduvil sabotaged one of the TIE / LN starfighter ' s P - s4 twin ion engine s by realigning the energizer and thus compromising the recharging system . Anduvil had done this by infiltrating the main hangar bay , which at the time was left unguarded due to the unintentional diversion caused by C - 3PO and R2 - D2 ' s attempt to breach the main gates . The ensuing ion explosion engulfed the complex and killed a number of stormtroopers and officers , as well as Doctor Kaaldar , while Luke , Anduvil and the droids safely escaped on a landspeeder . Behind the scenes . The Imperial garrison base was first introduced in 1979 ' s comic strip " Tatooine Sojourn " , distributed by the Los Angeles Times Syndicate , written by Steve Gerber and drawn by Russ Manning . The outpost was formally named in 2004 ' s reference book " Inside the Worlds of Star Wars Trilogy " and reused in 2012 ' s online puzzle game " Star Wars Galactic Spy " . The depiction of the base , however , is somewhat different between " Tatooine Sojourn " and " Inside the Worlds of Star Wars Trilogy " , while " Star Wars Galactic Spy " mainly draws from " Inside the Worlds " , with small adaptations , such as the addition of military units and characters . " Tatooine Sojourn " places the outpost amidst a Tatooinian desert , on the outskirts of Mos Eisley while " Inside the Worlds of Star Wars Trilogy " places it within the city . Other differences such as in the design , size and coloring employed between both versions are also visible . Due to the fact that the three stories are set around 0 ABY and in the same region , this article assumes they refer to the same structure .