Rank , Command and Ship Size

[aramis]

My home grown setting ranks:
Actual grades and rank titles (Naval/ground if if differnet, insignia in parenthesis)
O0 Cadet (3 pointed star)
O0.1 Midshipsman/Subaltern (2 three pointed stars)
O1 Ensign/3Lt (1 bar)
O2 LtJG/2Lt (2 bar)
O3 LtSG/1Lt (3bar)
O4 LtCdr/Major (Disk)
O5 Cdr (2 disk)
O6 LtCol (low,wide triangle, 1:3 )
O7 Col (two triangles)
O8 Flag Colonel (triangle within torse)

The next three are not ranks, but positionals with rank-like features.
C0 Jr Captain (commands auxillaries) Expected to be O3-O5 Insignia is an empty wreath below the rank insignia
C1 Captain (non captial ships) (expected to be O4-06) Wears wreath around rank insignia
C2 Sr Captain (leads line of non caps or single captial) Expected to be O5-O7. doubled wreath around rank insignia
C3 Line Captain (Leads line of capital ships) expected to be O6+ Trebled wreath around rank insignia.
Captains aboard another's ship are addressed by rank.

Ground forces don't use the command system, but all company and higher unit commanders have a baton below their rank. The baton has notches corresponding to level of command 1 is co, 2 is Bn, 3 is Rgt, 4 is Bde, after which command is by flag grades.

The following flag ranks are by appointment; Some are O6's, most of rest are O7's, actual pay grade held ranges from O6 to O8; only nobles may be flag ranks, so promotion to F1 is accompanied by knighthood.
F1 Commodore/Brig Gen (crown dancety of 3 voided)
F2 Rear Admiral/Col Gen (as F1, plus 4 point star below)
F3 Deputy Admiral/Maj Gen (as F1 plus 2x4point stars below)
F4 Vice Admiral/Lt Gen (as F1, plus 3x 4point stars below
F5 Fleet Admiral/Gen (Crown dancety of 3)
F6 Marshal (Crown within wreath)
F7 Grand marshal (Crown and baton inside wreath)

Upon retirement, flag grades revert to O-rank... hence no retired admirals... but SH'LOADS of retired Flag Colonels who were admirals. Their noble patents are, however, kept... So a retired flag colonel wihtout noble insignia on his pips was never a flag officer.

All retirees are entitled to wear their epaulette with hollowed insignia of rank (IE, outlines), either on dress (Service or mess) uniform, or pendant from left breast pocket.

Active duty wear it on eppaulettes, and on cuffs (both trouser and sleeve).

All use metal or field color by service:
Space naval: Silver insignia on black flashes, gray field insignia on black flashes
Wet naval: Gold/Brown on blue
Ground: Gold on green/black on cammo
Marine: Red-brass on black, maroon on cammo
Royal Intel: Black on sky/ gray on gray if worn...
Royal Post: matte silver on sky/matte silver on sky

The royal legions (huscaurles) have a compressed rank structure:
Lt (one diamond) non-command; adjutant to major
Maj (two diamonds per pale) commands century
Lt Cdr (Two diamonds per chevron) adjutant to Cdr
Cdr (three diamonds in triangle) commands legion
Col (wreath) commands all legions attached to a particular noble house

All Noblemen wear a coronet of rank pin on their epaulettes, as well; in dress uniform may wear coronet of rank on head:
Knight: torse with colors of order
Baronet: circlet of 8 low points (5 visible)
Baron: circlet of 8 low points with pearls
Viscount: Circlet of 1 tall and 3 short points (1 and 2 visible)
Count: Circlet of alternating Tall and Short points (3T 2S visible)
Marquis: Circlet with emballtements (modern count)
Duke: Circlet with 3 or 4 sets of leaves (3 visible)
Archduke: alternating leaves and pearls
Prince: Crown of 4 arches and star top (much like brittish major's rank); informal wear coronet is alternating leaves and points.
Emperor: formal crown is points and arches, star top. No "insignia" version.

These coronets are 3cm wide, 1 cm (2 for prince) tall.

I use alternate noble rank sstem,as well. Soc is 2d6-1; on 11, roll 1d, on 1-4 knight,5 knight additional order and roll again, 6 Baronette and roll 1d for 6, on 6, promote and roll again, etc... highest is Prince; PC's are assumed to be heirs. Emperor is elected from the current princes simple (Honor) and official (landed).

 

[Straybow]

Ah, you were just begging for someone to ask, weren't you.

if one assumes a minimum of three years time-in-grade for each rank, it would require an unblemished career of thirty six years (after college) to attain maximum admiral.

Well, interpreting standard Traveller aging rules that would be bad. But any sensible milieu should have slower aging than 21st cen humans suffer. 3600 years from now ordinary humans should be "youthful" into their 50s and vibrant into their 70s, even if the life expectancy plateaus near the century mark.

 

[Hemdian]

Originally posted by Straybow:
I've seen the Stuff Online page and also T5 going up to O10, but that falls rather short of the organizational structure needed for such a humongeous military.

There's more to the IN hierarchy than just the simple rank structure.

I don't see the top of the IN hierarchy so much as a hierarchy of individuals as it is a hierarchy of staffs: the Grand Admiral has a staff (the Admiralty), every Sector Admiral and Fleet Admiral on down has a staff, until you reach ship crews (and even then the Captain of a ship of the line would have a staff). And each of these staffs would have its position in the hierarchy anchored by the rank of the officer they support.

So, for example, a Fleet Admiral would have a staff of several Captains (specialising in areas such as security, intelligence, logistics, JAG, planetary liaison, etc) as well as more junior planners. And though technically only Captains as far as pay scale is concerned their staff position gives them 'advisory superiority' over the fleet's Commodores and other ship Captains in their respective areas of expertise.

Then there are parallel lines of reporting. Only during combat does the standard hierarchy have primacy (providing the unambiguous chain of command required by those situations). At other times, for example, the Intelligence Officer of a Fleet Admiral's staff not only reports to the Fleet Admiral but also to the office of the Director of Naval Intelligence (in the Admiralty).

IMTU the Admiralty (the Imperial ministry that controls the IN) has approx 150 serving officers split between 14 functional divisions with technical ranks of O8 and O9, yet even the O8s dictate general policy to the Sector Admirals (O9) in the field. (Those divisions are: Fleet Operations, Base Operations, Logistics Support, Personnel, Security, Naval Intelligence, Science, Engineering, Medical, Justice, Mapping, Space Safety Board, General Accounting, and Planetary Relations.)

Also IMTU, Sector Admirals are so called because historically they controlled all fleets in a sector. But more recently they control the key fleet in a theatre ... and theatres have shrunk to 3 or 4 subsectors each. Thus there *is* a gap between Sector Admirals and the Admiralty which the IN is considering filling with Domain Admirals.

Add in the nobility (a civilian hierarchy), the mega corps, and the right of member worlds to conduct their own affairs as they see fit, and that makes the life of a senior officer in the IN *very* political.

Regards PLST

 

[Uncle Bob]

In WWII we had a hierarchy of,
Divisions
Corps
Army Groups
Theater of Operations
Commanding General of the Army

That is five levels of comand occupied by three pay-grades (later four), so there does not have to be a one-to-one correlation.

In the Soviet Army of the 1970s there was a disconnection between rank and job title. For example, if there was an opening for a Battalion CO the regiment would give the job to the best Company Commander, and promote him later if he workd out. So you could have Captains, maybe even Senior Lieutenants doing Lt Cols jobs and bossing Majors.

Five-star rank was added to give American senior commanders parity with British "Field Marshals". Supposedly General Marshall vetoed caling our guys Field Marshal because he didn't want to be known as, "Marshal Marshall".

But "General of the Army" (five stars) has a long tradition as a job title, but men like Grant and Pershing had rank as a four-star with the title and authority.

 

[Glen Allen Mcinnes]

Don't you love how every one defults to theit own cultural background when ever somthing comes up, why not use the Russian modle? where they have can mutipaial captians (some even out ranking the skipper) on the same vessal, but this probaly derivives from a linguistic thing of having the rank name and the role name having differant words (i supose as I don't know russian from any other eastern european lanwage)

 

[BetterThanLife]

On the other hand we had at least 5 O10s come out of WW2. Marshall, Eisenhower, Bradley, McArthur and Nimitz. And three of those were in the same chain of command. Bradley reported to Ike who in turn reported to Marshall.

(And they were probably all calling each other by first names anyway.

)

Originally posted by Uncle Bob:
In WWII we had a hierarchy of,
Divisions
Corps
Army Groups
Theater of Operations
Commanding General of the Army

That is five levels of comand occupied by three pay-grades (later four), so there does not have to be a one-to-one correlation.

In the Soviet Army of the 1970s there was a disconnection between rank and job title. For example, if there was an opening for a Battalion CO the regiment would give the job to the best Company Commander, and promote him later if he workd out. So you could have Captains, maybe even Senior Lieutenants doing Lt Cols jobs and bossing Majors.

Five-star rank was added to give American senior commanders parity with British "Field Marshals". Supposedly General Marshall vetoed caling our guys Field Marshal because he didn't want to be known as, "Marshal Marshall".

But "General of the Army" (five stars) has a long tradition as a job title, but men like Grant and Pershing had rank as a four-star with the title and authority.

 

[Falkayn]

IMTU the Julian Protectorate's Star Legion has:

Officers
O9 » Grandmaster
O8 » Strategist
O7 » Semi-Strategist
O6 » Commander
O5 » Semi-Commander
O4 » Tactician
O3 » Semi-Tactician
O2 » Leader
O1 » Semi-Leader

Enlisted
E7 » Veteran
E6 » Semi-Veteran
E5 » Senior
E4 » Semi-Senior
E3 » Junior
E2 » Semi-Junior
E1 » Recruit

In terms of what you are doing at each rank:

For an officer:
A Grandmaster commands 100,000+ men, fleet/horde
A Strategist commands 10,000+ men, battle ship/fleet
A Commander commands 1,000+ men, large ship/wolfpack
A Tactician commands 100+ men, medium ship
A Leader commands 10+ men, small ship

For an enlisted man:
A Veteran has 10+ years experience
A Senior has 5+ years experience
A Junior has 2+ years experience
A Recruit has 0+ years experience

from:
http://www.falkayn.com/traveller/jp/starlegion.html

 

[Drakon]

Actually, the "captain" of a row boat would be the coxswain, would it not?

Yes, a lot of naval tradition is pretensious, that is the point. It does make officers out to be more than they are, but the Navy needs officers to be more than they are. Its a tough job, and mere mortals are the ones doing it. So they inflate a bit of cerimony here, snaz up the uniform there, all to give the appearance that the officer is more than he is.

In the hopes that such appearance will be taken as fact, and indeed evenually become fact.

 

[aramis]

Actually, the russian is roughly pronounced "Kaptin", just like the western militaries.

some rough tranliterations of soviet GF ranks... Mladshee roughly means junior or lesser, starshee roughly means superior or senior.

Soldat/Preevet (this one varies widely by both time and specific service)
Mladshee Caporal
Caporal
Mladshee Serzhant
Serzhant
Starshee Serzhant
Starshina

Mladshee Praporshik
Praporshik
Starshee Praporshik

Mladshee Laytenant
Laytenant
Starshee laytenant
kaptain
mayzhor
podpolkovnik
pokovnik
starshee polkovnik (Not always used)
general Brigadzeer
general polkovnik
general mayzhor
general laytennant
general
marshall
Marshall v'Armee
Marshall v'EsEsEsAir

My above list is actually strongly soviet and imperial russian influenced.

The multiple captains aboard ship issue is actually IDENTICAL to US and UK practice: non-CO's holding captain grade are addressed by position title, according to the russians I've talked to. Naval ranks in the USSR and Late Imperial russia were basically the same as british, with the exception of adding Senior Lieutenant. The russian model is essentially the french and english models hybridized. Russian post1930 is nothing more than a change of specific insignia from the late tsarist period. Trotski re-tsarified the military in order to keep the military functioning.

 

[BetterThanLife]

Interesting. I never saw a Corporal rank in Soviet structure, nor a Senior Colonel. I also seem to have missed various ranks within their Warant ranks, thought for some reason Podpraporschick seems to stand out instead of Mladshi Praporschick.

One point though the Colonel General outranks the Major General. (But not the Lieutenant General.) But this is Army rank not Naval rank.

(Somewhere around here I do have Naval Rank.

) It has been a while though and my expertise tends to be skewed towards Soviet instead of Imperial Russian ranks.

Originally posted by Aramis:
Actually, the russian is roughly pronounced "Kaptin", just like the western militaries.

some rough tranliterations of soviet GF ranks... Mladshee roughly means junior or lesser, starshee roughly means superior or senior.

Soldat/Preevet (this one varies widely by both time and specific service)
Mladshee Caporal
Caporal
Mladshee Serzhant
Serzhant
Starshee Serzhant
Starshina

Mladshee Praporshik
Praporshik
Starshee Praporshik

Mladshee Laytenant
Laytenant
Starshee laytenant
kaptain
mayzhor
podpolkovnik
pokovnik
starshee polkovnik (Not always used)
general Brigadzeer
general polkovnik
general mayzhor
general laytennant
general
marshall
Marshall v'Armee
Marshall v'EsEsEsAir

My above list is actually strongly soviet and imperial russian influenced.

The multiple captains aboard ship issue is actually IDENTICAL to US and UK practice: non-CO's holding captain grade are addressed by position title, according to the russians I've talked to. Naval ranks in the USSR and Late Imperial russia were basically the same as british, with the exception of adding Senior Lieutenant. The russian model is essentially the french and english models hybridized. Russian post1930 is nothing more than a change of specific insignia from the late tsarist period. Trotski re-tsarified the military in order to keep the military functioning.

 

[aramis]

Podpraporshik and mladshi praposhik are roughly synonymous; different times, the terms have both been used.

Senior Colonel (Starshi Polkovnik) is seldom used in the army; it has been used off and on.. Captain of the first grade is in naval use, and much more consistantly. Both are two colored stripes, and 4 large stars.

I don't have the naval ranks committed to memory nearly as well... small stars are lietennants...
Lt Commander, and commander,
captain 2d and captain 1st
the admiral grades, then the marshals.
Interesting side notes:
the warrants (Praporshiki) serve roles similar to US SNCO's, but apparently rate salutes. (I've seen footage and photos of praporshiki receiving salutes in report situations, in soviet manuals. UAA has several interesting russian field manuals on the shelves...)
There are 4 company grades
there are 4 field grades; not all branches use the O8 grade.
there are 5 grades of general, which follow the german pattern. (BG, ColGen, MajGen, LtGen, Gen)
there are three grades of marshal; Marshall of (service) is one per service, Marshal of the USSR is their Senior officer pan-service, much like the chairman of the JCS.

 

[rancke]

Originally posted by Aramis:
The multiple captains aboard ship issue is actually IDENTICAL to US and UK practice: non-CO's holding captain grade are addressed by position title, according to the russians I've talked to.

I've yet to see any documentation above the anecdotal level that this is the US and UK practice (mind you, the scant evidence I've seen that it isn't US and/or UK practice is anecdotal too). I've tried checking the official websites for the USN and the USMC, but neither of them mention it either way. I've also checked snopes.com; no luck there either.

I thought about writing to the USN and USMC contact offices, but I forgot about it again.


Hans

 

[Ran Targas]

1) There was a anecdote about when Catherine the Great was asked who the greatest Russian admiral was, she answered, "John Paul Jones". Jones was commisioned by Catherine the Great to bring the Imperial Russian Navy into the 18th century. He actually wore the rank of Rear Admiral.

The model he used to refashion the Imperial Russian Navy? The Royal Navy.

2) From personal experience I can tell you that an O-6 Captain on ship as a guest is still addressed as Captain despite any confusion it may cause to the uninitiated. Everyone onboard knows who the ship's captain is, there is normally no question as to who is being addressed.

If he is the commander of a group, task force, or squadron he is addressed as Commodore.

If he is the Chief of Staff for a group or task force commander or the Chief Staff Officer of a squadron, then he is addressed as Chief of Staff or CSO, as the case may be.

Otherwise, if he is ship's company, he is addressed by the title of his position; i.e. the Chief Engineering Officer is addressed as Engineer or CHENG. Despite seeming too familiar it is still acceptable for ship's company to address him so.

3) I've tried googling for a good site on US Navy traditions and practices but didn't have any luck. One site worth visiting though is:

http://www.hazegray.org

It is an unofficial site with excellent historical information.

Another interesting site for naval traditions is:

http://users.sisna.com/justinb/unifhome.html

It has some good articles on uniforms items, the history of different naval ranks, and other stuff.

 

[fredofmars]

If there were ever a project to rename the ranks in the military, there are two suggestions I would make.

1. All rank names would be a single word, like lieutenant or major or sergeant (no ranks like second lieutenant or lieutenant major or staff sergeant). This would require some new words for some ranks, but that shouldn't be too hard.

2. Captain and Commander would no longer be a rank name in any service. They would be used for a person in a specific type of command role and nothing else. A ship would have a Captain, but they might have a rank of lieutenant or gesnigget or whatever (depending on the size of crew they command). Anything that wasn't a ship (wet or vacuum navy) would have a Commander (who again would have whatever rank was appropriate for the number of people they commanded). For example, this would stop the whole silliness of having to pretend that a Marine Captain was a Major while on board (at least in the Honor Harrington universe) - the Marine in question would be both on and off the ship addressed with the rank he had which would not be titled Captain.

- Joseph

 

[BetterThanLife]

So you recommend flying in the face of history and tradition? I strongly recommend against it. Remember a Military without History and Tradition also hasn't earned any honor. You take away the bits of ribbon, the traditions and the history and what do you have? An armed mob.

Originally posted by Joseph Kimball:
If there were ever a project to rename the ranks in the military, there are two suggestions I would make.

1. All rank names would be a single word, like lieutenant or major or sergeant (no ranks like second lieutenant or lieutenant major or staff sergeant). This would require some new words for some ranks, but that shouldn't be too hard.

2. Captain and Commander would no longer be a rank name in any service. They would be used for a person in a specific type of command role and nothing else. A ship would have a Captain, but they might have a rank of lieutenant or gesnigget or whatever (depending on the size of crew they command). Anything that wasn't a ship (wet or vacuum navy) would have a Commander (who again would have whatever rank was appropriate for the number of people they commanded). For example, this would stop the whole silliness of having to pretend that a Marine Captain was a Major while on board (at least in the Honor Harrington universe) - the Marine in question would be both on and off the ship addressed with the rank he had which would not be titled Captain.

- Joseph

 

[BetterThanLife]

Funny, when addressing Senior Officers, their rank almost never comes into it, it is usually Sir. When Superiors address Subordinates then it is usually by name. (Unless you are in deep crap then it is rank and last name.) Now when refering to senior officers, out of earshot, the only Skipper or Captain or Old Man is going to refer to the Commander. Everyone else is going to be Capt. Jones, or Admiral Starke, (unless it is more derogatory, though usually, when you reach the O-6+ Realms it is still going to be Capt. Jones and Admiral Starke.)

Of course Pilots are different. So the CAG is probably referred to as the CAG.

Now calling a Marine Captain on a ship a Major is more tradition and comes out of trying not to confuse people, than it is a necessity, these days. Though when you are talking to a Sailor and you are talking about a Captain they think O-6 (Which is serious rank) instead of O-3 which is, especially in the Navy, still pretty junior.

Originally posted by rancke:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Aramis:
The multiple captains aboard ship issue is actually IDENTICAL to US and UK practice: non-CO's holding captain grade are addressed by position title, according to the russians I've talked to.

I've yet to see any documentation above the anecdotal level that this is the US and UK practice (mind you, the scant evidence I've seen that it isn't US and/or UK practice is anecdotal too). I've tried checking the official websites for the USN and the USMC, but neither of them mention it either way. I've also checked snopes.com; no luck there either.

I thought about writing to the USN and USMC contact offices, but I forgot about it again.


Hans </font>[/QUOTE]

 

[BetterThanLife]

Originally posted by Ran Targas:
1) There was a anecdote about when Catherine the Great was asked who the greatest Russian admiral was, she answered, "John Paul Jones". Jones was commisioned by Catherine the Great to bring the Imperial Russian Navy into the 18th century. He actually wore the rank of Rear Admiral.

The model he used to refashion the Imperial Russian Navy? The Royal Navy.

But of course it was. The RN was the premier Naval force in the world until after WWI. And the Greatest Russian Marshalls, responsible for more victories than any Commanding Officer the Russian or Soviet Army ever had? Marshall January and Marshall February.

 

[aramis]

Marshal Yanvar ee Marshal Fevral... Da. Etee balshoi Marshali...

If I get motivated, I'll find the table of ranks put in place by Balshoi Pyotr (Peter the Great)... which includes naval, army, and civil service, plus the Nobility....

BTW, on the low end, several different terms have been used for both privates (Preevat, Privyet, Soldat) and Corporal (Caporal, Yefreytor). Podpraporshi and Mladshi praporshik both have been used, for the same rank.

The nice thing about the soviet rank structure is that it is easy to understand the progression.

NCO's all wear horizontal stripes. Color by service
Corporal: 1 stripe (note: these are almost always 1st term individuals... top 10% of basic, and passing an NCO course)
JrSgt: 2 stripes (Almost always second term)
Sgt: 3 stripes
Sr Sgt: 1 thick stripe
Master Sgt (Starshina): Thick stripe with thin vertical stripe.

Praporshiki (warrants) are 1-3 stars on a plain epaulette

Company Grade officers wear 1-4 small stars on an epaulette with 1 vertical stripe of specialty color.

Field Grade officers wear 1-4 large stars on an epaulette with two vertical stripes of specialty color.

General officers wear stars on gold or silver epaulettes

Marshals wear huge stars and branch insignia on gold or silver epaulettes.

Marshal of the USSR wore a huge star, and the crest of the USSR, on a gold epaulette. Really spiff.

And I did put Col Gen and Maj Gen out of order.

One of the nice things about the russian rank system overall: very clear, concise, you know exactly where to look. Enlisted will have their branch denoted under their stripes. Since all the dress uniforms are similar, in town, you can quickly figure out who defers to whom. Everybody's rank is on the shoulder... Naval officers also sometimes wear sleeve lace (i've seen the lace on some soviet naval uniforms) but I have yet to figure out the pattern and/or uniforms for which its authorized. (UAA had the Army uniform manual...)

Another good model would be the Japanese and chinese models. They have very different systems of rank insignia.

 

[fredofmars]

Originally posted by Bhoins:
So you recommend flying in the face of history and tradition? I strongly recommend against it. Remember a Military without History and Tradition also hasn't earned any honor. You take away the bits of ribbon, the traditions and the history and what do you have? An armed mob.

Only the history and tradition of what the rank title is. My suggestion would leave the ranks, insignia, and all else intact. The minor change of what a particular rank is titled should have minimal negative effect beyond a short-term confusion (and requiring a conversion table to be published). The long-term effect should be an easier time referring to someone's actual rank.

Example: Assume a group of officers, in which there are two Lieutenants both surnamed Smith, but one being a First Lietenant and the other a Second Lieutenant. Should someone call out to them "Hey Liutenant Smith!", both would look towards the caller. With my proposal, the call would only refer to one of them, saving some amount of confusion.

- Joseph

 

[Straybow]

Many of our English rank titles are French-derived (Lieutenant, Colonel, and General). Why not use titles derived from other languages for ranks to avoid some of the confusion?

I introduce some German terms in place of Lieutenant and Captain in the Marines. Zugleiter means "platoon leader," which is not a German rank per se but will do for this purpose. Hauptmann is an Army rank (literally, "company man") as distinct from naval Kapitän.

To make the distinction between field officers and general officers I've reclassified the general officers with the A1-A7 designations. The A8 rank serves the Emperor by his appointment.

        Navy              Marines         Army            Scouts          Merchant
E0  Recruit             Recruit         Recruit         Probate         Trainee
E1  Spacehand Appr.     Private         Private         Deckhand 3      Apprentice
E2  Spacehand           Lance Cpl       Private FC      Deckhand 2      Shiphand
E3  Able Spacehand      Corporal        Corporal        Deckhand 1      Able Shiphand
E4  Petty Officer 3     Sergeant        Sergeant        Petty Officer 3 Foreman
E5  Petty Officer 2     Staff Sergeant  Staff Sergeant  Petty Officer 2 Journeyman
E6  Petty Officer 1     First Sergeant  First Sergeant  Petty Officer 1 Superintendant
E7  Chief Petty Officer Gunnery Sgt     Technical Sgt   Chief PO        Chief Shiphand
E8  Technical CPO       Armory Seagent  Armory Seagent   --             Master Shiphand
E9  Master CPO          Master Seagent  Master Seagent   --              --
EE  CPO Major           Sergeant Major  Sergeant Major   --              --

WA  Jr Warrant Officer  JWO             JWO             JWO             JWO
WB  Sr Warrant Officer  SWO             SWO             SWO             SWO
WC  Chief WO            CWO             CWO             CWO             CWO
WD  Master WO           MWO             MWO             MWO             MWO

O1  Ensign              Zugleiter       2nd Lieutenant  Scout Agent 3   4th Officer
O2  Sub-Lieutenant      Unterhauptmann  1st Lieutenant  Scout Agent 2   3rd Officer
O3  Lieutenant          Hauptmann       Captain         Scout Agent 1   2nd Officer
O4  Sub-Commander       Major           Major           Scout Lieut.    First Officer
O5  Commander           Lt Colonel      Lt Colonel      Sc Commander    Captain
O6  Sub-Captain         Colonel         Colonel         Sc Captain      Senior Captain
O7  Captain             High Colonel    High Colonel     --              --
O8  Line Captain         --              --              --              --
O9  High Captain         --              --              --              --
OO  Flag Captain         --              --              --              --

A1  Sub-Admiral         Sub-Brigadier   Sub-General     Sub-Commodore    Jr Vice President
A2  Rear Admiral        Major Brigadier Major General   Commodore        Sr Vice President
A3  Vice Admiral        Brigadier       General         Fleet Cmdore     President
A4  Admiral             High Brigadier  High General    High Cmdore      Director
A5  Fleet Admiral       Brig. Marshall  Field Marshall  Grand Cmdore     Chair
A6  High Admiral        Brig. of Corps  High Marshall    --               --
A7  Grand Admiral        --             Grand Marshall   --               --
A8  Admiral Consul      Brig. Consul    Marshall Consul Scout Consul     Inspector Consul

The idea here is that the IN needs a cohesive command structure across the entire empire. They need several distinct lower flag ranks instead of just one (or two, if you count Commodore) and the afore-mentioned 6 levels of functional admirals.

Marines, on the other hand, are not used in army-sized groups. I posit that their command structure is subsector oriented, with service for individual marines almost always remaining within the subsector to which they are assigned after training or commission. The Brigadier Consul is the glue holding the Marines to the Imperium (a job for which I envision interesting powers).

Army chain of command is not empire-wide but planetary (or whatever local/colonial government unit applies), except for the Marshalls. Armies may be called up to serve the Imperium in some other system or sector, but their chain of command would remain distinct below Field Marshall.

I've found the notion of ISS being entirely without ranks nonsensical. Informality or no, a command structure is essential. They aren't civil servants with nothing but seniority and politics to drive the pecking order. Their ranks are spare, using warrant officers for many jobs where other services would use commissioned officers. IMTU they don't recruit civilians, only IN or IM personnel already holding skills sought.

Lastly, Merchant service should have enlisted "ranks" (labor), warrant officers (management), and corporate officers distinct from ship officers. But that's another matter.

[many edits for spelling and formatting later...]