Military Rank
Military ranks are a system of hierarchical relationships in armed forces, police, intelligence agencies or other institutions organized along military lines. Usually, uniforms denote the bearer's rank by particular insignia affixed to the uniforms. Ranking systems have been known for most of military history to be advantageous for military operations, in particular with regards to logistics, command, and coordination; as time continued and military operations became larger and more complex, military ranks increased and ranking systems themselves became more complex.
Within modern armed forces, the use of ranks is almost universal. Communist states have sometimes abolished rank (e.g., the Soviet Red Army 1918–1935, the Chinese People's Liberation Army 1965–1988, and the Albanian Army 1966–1991), only to re-establish them after encountering operational difficulties of command and control.
Read more about Military Rank: Modern Ranks, Appointment, Types of Rank
Famous quotes containing the words military and/or rank:
“Personal prudence, even when dictated by quite other than selfish considerations, surely is no special virtue in a military man; while an excessive love of glory, impassioning a less burning impulse, the honest sense of duty, is the first.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“I sometimes compare press officers to riflemen on the Somme—mowing down wave upon wave of distortion, taking out rank upon rank of supposition, deduction and gossip.”
—Bernard Ingham (b. 1932)