EyeShotFirst said:
Well according to Luke in ANH there is an Imperial Academy so I could see them as being like the military in the many nations of our world. The Imperial Academy could be more of a high rank kiss-ass facility that gets them ready to be choked by vader when they are on the death star/star destroyers. And the regular storm troopers look like a recruit job. We have military academies here in the US and we also recruit so it could be looked at in the same vain.

Does he really talk about an "Imperial" Academy (I have seen ep 4 in french more often than in english so maybe I missed something), or is it just a "Pilot" Academy? Because it's obvious that Luke don't like the Empire and I don't think he'd wish to leave the farm to be part of the Empire!