Actually, Vice Admiral is the only rank that we do know the corresponding pips for, as both Necheyev and Ross (three pipers) are identified in dialogue as Vice Admirals
Oh, wow. I completely missed the respective references in "Chain of Command pt I" and "Dogs of War" until now. Should have used the search functionality at the Chakoteya site, rather than relying on a manual search...
So yes, Vice Admiral is three pips, and never is anything else. Admiral of course is occasionally four pips, right as it should (Riker in "AGT", say), but that's less definite. And Rear Admiral is only ever used twice, first in reference to the unseen Satie in the "AGT" flashback (she might well have been a two-pipper at the time), then in reference to the four-pipper Bennett in "Dr Bashir, I Presume" (a clear mistake, rationalization pending). And Commodore and pips just plain don't go together in Trek, as previously discussed.
Likewise, I think it's best to assume that Quinn's insignia should actually be a higher one (especially as he was scouting Picard for the two-pip post of Head of Starfleet Academy. However Jameson may have been (semi)-retired or at least exercising a "general portfolio" so warranted "Admiral" merely as courtesy title for a flag officer.
I don't think Quinn needs to have any formal authority to offer the position. He's a supposed close associate ("an old friend") of Picard's - that's his true mandate in "Coming of Age". And in any case, it's just a smokescreen for his
real mission of digging up dirt on the heroes, that is, his
secret mission of finding out whether Picard can be his ally in the great counter-conspiracy.
As for the controversial "Fleet Admiral" and "Fleet Captain" designations, neither of those is straightforwardly associated with insignia, and indeed we can argue that neither of them is a rank.
Fleet Admiral is explicitly something applying to three-pippers. On the other hand, three-pippers are in charge of specific Fleets in DS9, along with some two-pippers. So assuming that Fleet Admiral is a title for a flag officer in charge of a Fleet seems like the safe way to go. In contrast, we have only ever seen one five-pipper, Admiral Marcus in ST:ID, and his title or the formal name of his rank never was Fleet Admiral. We can easily postulate that the title for five pips exists, is distinct from the plain Admiral of four pips, and may be something like Grand Admiral for all we care.
Fleet Captain in turn has only ever applied to a single person in the history of Star Trek: Chris Pike. We have seen him wearing three distinct types of uniform now: the one with single braid or | in "The Cage", where his title was Captain and his exact rank unknown, the one with the triple braid or |:| in DSC S2 where his title was Captain and his exact rank supposedly the same as Kirk's in those formal occasions where the latter captain was officially identified as Captain by rank - and now the one with five shoulder pips in the time crystal vision where he meets his crippled self. Five pips (or four braid) are unhead of elsewhere in Star Trek, if we discount the idea that Pike would share rank with Alexander Marcus in that vision. So perhaps Fleet Captain is an actual rank, an "O-7" with one more pip and one more braid than mere regular "O-6" equivalent Captain.
The out-of-this-world five-pip uniform could of course be considered pure fantasy: either Pike really dreams of being the Boss of Bosses at top flag rank, or then he is wearing an utterly fictional garb for some reason. But if we discount those, we can also discount the idea that Fleet Captain would be a flag rank: it's a continuation of line ranks instead, supposedly the highest of them all. It doesn't step on the toes of this Commodore issue, then.
This of course is subject to additional speculation. When exactly did Pike get that particular promotion? It was before he handed over the
Enterprise to Kirk. Until now, we have been able to think that it was before DSC already, and that three braid or |:| is the insignia going with it, and that the "Fleet" part there is mere additional clarification that this is a Starfleet captain of Captain rank rather than some silly civilian skipper. The dream uniform may be taken to change that. Or then not.
Timo Saloniemi
