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Originally Posted by skip spence
This raises several questions for me. Firstly, who gave them the orders? Sauruman, surely. But there were Orks of Mordor travelling with Ugluk and company too.
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Careful! It was not like that. We are going a little ahead here, but just to clear this up: Grishnákh and his bunch joined Uglúk only later. There was a group of Mordor Uruks in Moria, but I think these were in Moria before, no doubt simply stationed there as part of Sauron's "block all roads through which the Ring could go" strategy. As I see it, Uglúk was sent from Isengard (probably based on the Crebain information) towards Moria, he did not succeed in catching the Fellowship there, but with his leadership taking advantage of the mess made by the Fellowship's passage and taking some of the infamous "mountain-maggots" with him. Then only later, Grishnákh crossed the river and joined him, simply because he had orders to get the halflings. First, they could work better together; second, Uglúk was in the lead and had the halflings (Grishnákh seemingly returned to the river later to ask the Nazgul for verification what he should do since the hobbits were carried towards Isengard, and he was seemingly sent back to accompany Uglúk just if there was a chance to get the hostages back).
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And where does the Balrog fit into this. Did it work independently, or was it subject to Sauron's authority? As it chased the fellowship straight down perhaps the only path that could have saved them, as it led to a doorway behind the fire, I find it unlikely the Balrog had anything to do with the 'trap' at the gate. Besides, the idea of a Balrog working for Sauruman is ludicrous. But could Sauron subjugate the Balrog? I think he might be able to, but to me it is more probable that he wasn't even aware of the Balrog's existance.
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Of course independantly; and I think the last sentence you post would be close to the truth. After all, in fact seemingly no one was aware of him (the only one among the living who actually saw him before the Fellowship came was probably Dáin).