Officers and Enlisted Personnel (cont'd.)

Officers and enlisted personnel are addressed differently within the ranks of the military as well as outside the military. Enlisted personnel address officers either by their appropriate title (lieutenant, captain, major, and so on) or by using "sir" or "ma'am." Junior ranking officers address senior officers in the same way.

Figure 4.3 shows the ranks, grades, and insignia of officers. Click on either chart to see a larger version.

An online version of the chart is at:  http://www.defenselink.mil/specials/insignias/officers.html

Aside from the Marines, who routinely use rank titles in all situations, military personnel, when speaking in the third person, often refer to a rank using the pay grade designation, such as "sergeant E-5," particularly at the NCO level. However, one should not address an individual by pay grade. This is primarily done to distinguish the various grades of sergeant in the Army and the Air Force and of petty officers in the Navy. Because most Army and Air Force sergeants below the grade of E-9, regardless of their rank, are addressed as "sergeant," this practice provides a way to instantly determine the seniority of the individual, an ability that is especially handy when dealing with the most junior-ranking sergeant. For instance, if one knows that a sergeant is an E-5, one instantly knows his or her status and seniority. Likewise, lieutenant colonels and colonels are identified as O-5 and O-6, respectively, because it is acceptable for both officers to respond to and describe themselves as "colonel" in everyday, informal conversation.

The Navy has a singular rank structure for commissioned officers. Some naval rank titles—such as admiral, for instance—are found only in the Navy, and some other Navy titles identify officers who are actually senior to officers in the other services who have the same title. For example, a lieutenant in the Navy is an officer in pay grade O-3, whereas in the Army, pay grade O-3 identifies a captain. However, in the Navy, a captain is an officer in pay grade O-6. The Navy no longer maintains a rank of commodore, but the term has survived as a title. Modern-day commodores are senior captains in command of groups of ships. One other nuance to the use of U.S. Navy rank is the term "captain," which is not only a rank, but is used to address the commanding officer of any ship regardless of rank.

As mentioned earlier, warrant officers in the Army and the Marines hold one of five pay grades. The most junior warrant officers are known simply as "warrant officer" (WO) and hold the pay grade of 1 (and thus are referred to as WO1); all succeeding grades of warrant officers carry the title of "chief warrant officer" and have a pay grade of between 2 and 5 (CWO2, 3, 4, or 5). Warrant officers are referred to as "Mr." or "Ms.," although once promoted to CWO2, they are typically referred to informally as "chief." In the Marines and the Navy, warrant officers are formally addressed as "sir" or "ma'am" by subordinate enlisted personnel.

All officers, commissioned and warrant, outrank all enlisted personnel. Almost invariably, officers are college graduates either from a civilian college or from one of the service academies. Many civilian colleges offer the Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) program for students who are interested in entering the military as officers. The Army, Navy, and Air Force have academies to which qualified high school seniors may apply and compete for congressional or presidential appointments. Each of the service academies also has a preparatory school that helps selected enlisted personnel compete for an appointment. Like many nations, the United States has competitive programs through which enlisted personnel may be trained as officers. The Army has its Officer Candidate School (OCS), to which appropriately qualified enlisted soldiers may be recommended by their commander. In addition, enlisted soldiers at the expiration of their enlistment may enroll in the ROTC program at a civilian college, and on completion of their degree program may be commissioned as officers.

Continue to The Role of the Reserve and the National Guard