Military Ranks Explained

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SOURCES & FURTHER READING

[NameExplain]

Any military people watching? What rank are/were you?

[gamingmoth]

In the United States we consider everyone in the Army as a "Soldier". Who you would call "Soldiers" we call "Enlistees" (or "Enlisted"). On the other hand, calling someone in other service branches a of the military a "Soldier" wouldn't really sit well with them. People in the Marine Corps like to go by the name "Marines". The Airforce have "Airmen". The Navy has "Sailors". Lastly, the Coast Guard have the creative name of "Coast Guardsmen".

[jfdavis]

Lance is a spear, not a sword. A spear a horseman uses.

[jfdavis]

Colonel comes from column, but as in a military column, a group of soldiers marching together. It evolved over time to be the regiment. A colonel commanded a column of troops.

[joaovitormatos]

I love how "Coronel" and "Colonel" are almost the same word, have the same meaning but have completely different etymologies.

While "Colonel" comes from Column (watch the video), "Coronel" (the equivalent in Spanish and Portuguese) comes from the Latin "Coronalis", officer of the crown

[SantomPh]

A Staff Sergeant is called "Staff" normally.

A WO is an NCO given a warrant by the monarch to lead their specific discipline-training, motor pool, helicopter pilots or a staff function on base.

A Colonel actually is the highest on-field officer rank as Generals are meant to be at staff HQ behind the lines. Colonels were also given "general" duties in the Britsh army such as the Wagonmaster General.

[babanas]

Corporal doesn't come from caput (head) but from corpus (body). The genitive of corpus is corporis

Corporis - corpor - corporal

And, like many said, lances are spears or polearms used by horsemen and cavalry

[HalfEye]

Are you sure "Corporal" doesn't come from the latin word "corpus" meaning body?

[SampoPaalanen]

As others too have pointed out a lance is heavy cavalry SPEAR (those long spears knights use, those are lances), I've never heard lance being used as term for a sword

[cennethadameveson]

In previous times a Field Marshal, marshaled troops on a battlefield. The traditional marshal's baton (part of the rank badge) was used to signal the troop movements.

[nebulan]

So in the US the navy and coast guard don't use colonel or major and captain is instead the leader. It's ensign -> LT -> commander -> captain (with some intermediate terms between like LT. Cmd)

[jedispartancoolman]

Did warrior class nobles such as knights have ranks in the military?

[herrgodfrey]

In the US Army, the currently held highest rank is General. However, there are technically two higher ranks. One is General of the Army (5 star) and General of the Armies (6 star). Only two men have held the 6 star rank. One was George Washington who was given that rank posthumously. The other and only person to hold it while alive, was John J Pershing. This said, Pershing never wore more than four stars. Pershing was famous for his exploits during The Great War. He was also the second highest paid person holding a government position. The only higher paid person was the President of the United States.

[nessesseda]

Could be interesting, if you made an adendum just for the german speaking world. Because while most of our ranks have the same names, Sergeant and Colonel are particularily different and could be fun to explain.

[mattgyure]

Dude, I love your videos but this is so poorly researched. I’m now questioning some of your other videos and how accurate they are.
Most of these ranks are very old, and when the names were created, the hierarchy wasn’t the same as it is now.
1. Private, used to refer to private soldiers, i.e. mercenary’s.
2. Lance Corporal, another likely theory is the fact that a lance was a small unit of 5 to 10 men in medieval times. Also, a Lance is a type of spear.
3. Corporal, either comes from the Latin corpus as in body, or from the Italian capo corporale, not directly from caput.
4. Sergeant, your etymology is correct however, it used to refer the average soldier i.e., one who serves in the army.
5. Staff sergeant, they served as members of staff they did not carry staffs; regular sergeants would carry pikes at certain periods through history to address ranks and formations. Also called Color sergeants, would protect those carrying the colors and have a red sash denoting rank.
7. Warrant officers are called so because they have received a warrant rather than a full commission.
8. 2nd lieutenant, this one is pretty much spot on actually the second Lieutenant is the same thing as second mate or second class
9. Lieutenant, also fine, no problems here.
10. Captain, the etymology is correct however, captains are often the ones in charge of things, companies or specialized attachments lieutenants are usually the second in command.
11. Major, it’s fine no problems
12. Lieutenant Colonel, the problem is with Colonel.
13. Colonel, well, it probably does from come from column. It refers to a military column, not a pillar.
14. Brigadier, spot on.
15. Major general, originally used to be called sergeant major general after the sergeant major in old rank in the British military now an honorary position. Also, this is the reason why major general was a lower rank than Lieutenant General.
16. Lieutenant General, no problems.
17. General, no problems
18. Field Marshal, I think it’s fine, but I’m not sure.
i’m sorry for the long post. This is by far the longest comment I’ve ever written on YouTube but this really frustrated me. This is a topic I enjoy and this is a horribly under research video. Most of the list here was comprised of stuff I remembered cross-referenced with a quick Google search.

[lornenoland]

Ranks are based on layers upon layers of traditions over centuries. If we were to start again from scratch, no doubt it would be quite different

[samuellawrencesbookclub]

Might be interesting to do videos on other branches of the armed forces, and perhaps differences between the names of ranks in other languages.

[skyden]

Coming from a USAF family, I can share a few other ranks within that branch of service, specifically in the ranks of "non-commissioned officer" (NCO). In the USAF the lowest rank is "Airman basic, " after that "Airman, " then "Senior Airman, " "Staff Sergeant, " "Technical Sergeant, " "Master Sergeant, " "Senior Master Sergeant, " finally "Chief Master Sergeant" (Although a Chief Master Sergeant can have 3 variations of rank similar to a General being 1 to 4 star(s)).
My dad served 20yrs in the USAF, achieving the rank of "Technical Sergeant." Because of achieving this rank, our family would have to move from Travis AFB, CA to Scott AFB, IL due to my dad being assigned as senior NCO of Scott AFB's (Medical) Orthopedics Sector. My maternal grandfather would serve 30 yrs. in the USAF and earn the rank of "Chief Master Sergeant, " a rank which would place him as senior NCO over all of the USAF's "Red Horse" Western Division, ("Red Horse" being the USAF's hostile environment civil engineering branch, i.e., the personnel that constructed flight-lines and supporting infrastructure in hostile/combat regions.)

[DevonLv]

The “Warrant” part of Warrant Officer, I believe, comes from naval terminology. An official “warrant” from the sovereign designating an officer’s role on a ship (Gunner, Boatswain, etc). In the US, we still use Warrant Officers as technical experts and engineering technicians.

[johnwalters]

You could have mentioned the most famous Brigadier, from Dr Who. Also that Willhem II of Germany was a Field Marshal of the UK until the outbreak of WWI.