United States military seniority is the method by which the United States Armed Forces determines precedence among commissioned officers. A higher-ranked officer is senior to a lower-ranked one; among officers of the same rank, seniority derives from the date when appointed to that rank. Seniority is used to determine assignments, tactical commands, promotions and general courtesy. To a lesser extent, historical seniority is used to recognize status of honor given to early United States military leaders such as inaugural holders of certain ranks or those officers who served as leaders during major wars and armed conflicts.
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👉 United States military seniority in the context of General of the Armies
General of the Armies of the United States, more commonly referred to as General of the Armies, is the highest military rank in the United States. The rank has been conferred three times: to John J. Pershing in 1919, as a personal accolade for his command of the American Expeditionary Forces during World War I; to George Washington in 1976, as a posthumous honor during the United States Bicentennial celebrations; and posthumously to victorious Civil War commander Ulysses S. Grant in 2024.
The grade is sometimes described as a six-star general, as being senior to the five-star grade of General of the Army. However, no six-star insignia was ever officially created, and Pershing, the only person to be General of the Armies during his own lifetime, never wore more than four stars. Whether Pershing's grade should rank as four, five, or six stars has been a subject of debate ever since the five-star grades were created in 1944. To make Washington unambiguously the highest ranking Army officer in 1976, Congress specified that his new grade of General of the Armies ranked above all other grades of the Army, past or present, while the law authorizing Grant's promotion made his rank in parity with Pershing's rank.
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United States military seniority in the context of Civilian control of the military
Civil control of the military is a doctrine in military and political science that places ultimate responsibility for a country's strategic decision-making in the hands of the state's civil authority, rather than completely with professional military leadership itself. As such, a "fundamental requirement of any nation is to ensure that the activities of its armed forces be subordinated to the political purposes of constitutional government; hence, the armed forces must be under civil control". The concept of civil control falls within the overarching concept of civil-military relations representing the "societal imperative that the military remain subordinate to civil authority and that it reflect, to an appropriate degree, societal values and norms".
Civil oversight over militaries puts the power to take military action in the hands of a civil authority, such as through government ministers or legislative bodies, or the democratic apparatus of the Crown in constitutional monarchies. Allowing the civil component of government to retain control over the military or state security illustrates the power of the citizenry, a healthy respect for democratic values, and what can be described as good governance. Giving power to the civil component of the government over what the military can do and how much money it can spend protects the democratic process from abuse. Nations that can achieve legitimate relationship between the two structures serve to be more effective and provide accountability between government and military.
United States military seniority in the context of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (CJCS) is the presiding officer of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS). The chairman is the highest-ranking and most senior military officer in the United States Armed Forces and the principal military advisor to the president, the National Security Council, the Homeland Security Council, and the secretary of defense. While the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff outranks all other commissioned officers, the chairman is prohibited by law from having operational command authority over the armed forces; however, the chairman assists the president and the secretary of defense in exercising their command functions.
The chairman convenes the meetings and coordinates the efforts of the Joint Chiefs, an advisory body within the Department of Defense comprising the chairman, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the chief of staff of the Army, the commandant of the Marine Corps, the chief of naval operations, the chief of staff of the Air Force, the chief of space operations, and the chief of the National Guard Bureau. The post of a statutory and permanent Joint Chiefs of Staff chair was created by the 1949 amendments to the National Security Act of 1947. The 1986 Goldwater–Nichols Act elevated the chairman from the first among equals to becoming the "principal military advisor" to the president and the secretary of defense.