We
transitioned between two staff systems in about 1970: British to Continental/American. In the process there was a bit of a bugger's muddle.
First, the one with which most member are most familiar:
The American version of the Continental system uses a letter/number system. The letter are
Joint,
Navy,
Air and
G Army division and higher and
S Army brigade and below. The numbers
were 1 = Personnel, 2 = Intelligence, 3 = Operations, 4 = Logistics, 5 = Civil Affairs, Military Government, CIMIC, etc, 6 = Signals/C3I, etc - there is now a 7 and 8,
I think. In NATO and in some Continental armed forces these branches are grouped to form a
bi-functional staff:
1. J2 and J3 become the Operations Staff; and
2. J1 and J4 become the PANDA (Personnel and Administration) staff.
The others are
special staff branches.
The British system, which we used until about 1970, was
tri-functional; there were three branches: G, A and Q - the
General Staff, the
Adjutsnat General's Staff and the
Quatermaster General's Staff. In Ottawa, and in London and Canberra too, the G staff was headed by the VCGS and there was, also, reporting to the CGS, an AG and a QMG. In field formation the tri-functional staff continued down to corps level, after that (at division and brigade) it switched to a bi-functional system. Thus, at 1(BR) Corps HQ we had a BGS (Brigadier General Staff) and AAG (Assistant Adjutant General and an AQMG (Assistant QMG) - all brigadiers, but, in the British system, there is also a principle of
Operations primacy so they are not quite equal - the BGS is a "little more equal" than the others. At Division we had a Colonel GS, head of the G Staff, and a Colonel AQ, head of the combined A and Q staffs; at brigade we had the BM (Brigade Major) - the principle G staff officer, the chief of staff) and the DAA&QMG - the Deputy Assistant Adjutant and Quartermaster General - the principle administrative and logistics staff officer. The three separate functions were still there, there was a Staff Captain A and a Staff Captain Q in the brigade HQ - they just reported to a combined AQ staff branch chief - for convenience.
We indicated staff
rank by grade numbers in the G staff: GSO3 = captain, GSO2 = major and GSO1 = LCol. It was a bit more complicated with AQ staffs but, typically, a DAAG (Plans) was a LCol at Corps and a AA&QMG was a LCol assistant to the Col AQ at Division - all clear, right? :
It made for good memory tests on promotion exams but it all made good, fairly simple sense in the field, as I recall.
There were, at every level,
specialist staffs - the CRE, CRSigs, etc.
Another major difference between the British and US systems was the principle of
superiority. In the British system the principle staff officers at any HQ were always outranked by the subordinate commanders:
"¢ The LCols commanding units in a brigade outrank the BM and the DAA&QMG;
"¢ The Brigadiers commanding brigades in a division outrank the Col GS and Gol AQ; and
"¢ The MGens commanding divisions outrank the BGS and AAG and AQMG at Corps HQ.
The purpose of this principle is to ensure that the chain of
command is always clear; the staff do not command, they exercise
control on behalf of their commander.
The Americans see things differently. Commanders are, frequently, outranked by staff officers - it starts within the battalion where the S3 is a major while the company commanders are captains. There is no doubt that staff officers and deputy (and assistant) commanders can, and do, give orders - their own orders - to subordinate commanders.
(There is no room, here, to discuss how the respective 19th century military experiences - small units in colonial operations for the British/small units on the Western frontier for the Americans - shaped their staff systems. Someone doing a History MA at might want to investigate.)
We began the switch in 1969 when we prepared to move from Soest/British to Lahr/US - first the BM became the SSO Operations, a LCol, to conform to the US system. I think 4CMGB actually experimented with S1, S2, S3 etc - but my recollection is that during the '70s and '80s we adhered to a uniquely Canadian
tri-functional system.
The big difference between the British (and uniquely Canadian) and US systems was the
position of the
specialists. In the US system the G2, G5 and so on are staff branches
comme les autres; in the British system the Intelligence and Signals staffs, for example, are specialist staffs, with direct access to the commander, reporting through the operations staff chief.
I hope that helps some of you.
Edit: corrected typos
. And he said that was just a small part of everything he had.
