Star Wars: Empire at War

One thing with the Empire is this. If you have Tarkin with you, the empire can not retreat. Check to see if is with you. If he is blow up the building, or ship he is in. Once he is dead you are able to retreat again.

check to see who's with you. rebels can't retreat with Mon Mothma. Also, if your in a space battle, and if the empire has an intredecteral star cruiser, they could put the gravity well on, so you can't leave.Check to see your battle, before you star retreating

If you don't have mon mothma, or they don't have a intredecteral star cruiser using a gravity well, they might have a stationary gravity well, it's a buildable space structure that the empire has, like a long-range scanner. destroy that and you home free.

If you are out of fighters/bombers/corvettes and all of you larger ships engines are down, the retreat button doesn't work. But that is a very rare case. If you are on land, and you don't control any reinforcment points, i don't think you can retreat either

Well you can retreat i have it's mosly beacuse you'r either low on troops and credits or... You'r losing and i'm rebs..

Well if you are in a land battle, then it might be possible that you have lost all your reinforcement points. In such a case, the retreat button will become unavailable. Capture a reinforcement point and you'll see the retreat button back again.