So working on your theory there, what would happen to Rear Admiral? Your statement suggests removing a rank and adding a rank in both sectors
bajoran militia ranks
- Thread starter BlackFire3
- Start date
Actually, Starfleet appears to be more of a hybrid as it has Ensigns (characteristic of the USN), but it also -- apart from a short period during the 2350s and 2360s -- appoints it's most junior Flag Officers to the rank of Commodore (per Commonwealth practice) rather than Rear Admiral Lower Half (as per USN) or Flotilla Admiral (common non-Anglophone practice).
Likewise, based on primary canon, the Bajoran Militia is also something of a hybrid as the known ranks below the senior ranks are Ensign, Lieutenant and Major. There may be two grades of lieutenant as two different shapes of insignia have been seen (a mirrored version of the ensign pin and a smaller one that only the inner/lower and middle parts of the major's in). A captain's pin was apparently produced, but as this was never specifically stated in dialogue then we don't have to accept it. Similarly, there is costuming evidence for at least two if not three different ranks of colonel (differences between Day Kannu and Kira Nerys' pins could be an error but Lenaris Holem's insignia has a obvious rim around the badge so it's certainly a different one).
On balance, given that the BM rank system probably originated from the need to establish chain-of-command to interface with Starfleet (the Resistance had a much looser system), then it's reasonable to assume that they have the same number of officer ranks as Starfleet, even if they sometimes use different names for them. Therefore:
O1 = Ensign (UFPS), Ensign (BM).
O2 = Lieutenant JG (UFPS), "Junior" Lieutenant/Second Lieutenant (BM).
O3 = Lieutenant (UFPS), "Senior" Lieutenant/First Lieutenant (BM).
O4 = Lieutenant Commander (UFPS), Major (BM).
O5 = Commander (UFPS), "Junior" Colonel/Lieutenant Colonel/Field Colonel (BM)
O6 = Captain (UFPS), "Senior" Colonel/Bajoran Colonel (BM)
Starfleet ranks were established by TOS, and were based on USN ranks in the 1960s and before. The USN used commodores in the Civil War and WW II, when groups of ships needed to operate as a unit with one person in charge of the unit, but the unit was too small to jusify an admiral's position. The USN didn't start using the awkward "read admiral lower half" phrase until 1986.
Rear Admiral would be renamed Vice Admiral, just as Vice Admiral had been renamed Admiral and Admiral had been renamed Chief Admiral.
I'm not actually talking about changing the ranks themselves - in terms of salary, precedence, or workload - but rather getting the nomenclature to line up.
All three systems have their identifiable key terms, but then they also have finer gradations using modifying adjectives.
With the army and navy the modifiers are aligned for the top posts - a full General is equivalent to a full Admiral (OF-9), a Lieutenant General is equal to a Vice Admiral (OF-8) (both terms implying that the job is to deputise for someone greater) and a Major General* is equal to a Rear Admiral** (OF-7).
The air force, however, is one step out, because a full Air Marshal is only equivalent to the first deputy of the General or Admiral, while an Air Vice Marshal - the Marshal's first deputy - is equivalent to their second deputies. It's only the Air Chief Marshal who's an OF-9, whereas the Generals and Admirals do not need that modifier.
*The rank of General originally being Captain-General. Just as an ordinary Captain had his Lieutenant and his Sergeant Major, so a Captain-General had his Lieutenant-General and his Sergeant-Major-General.
*Juniority implied because the ships towards the rear of an advancing squadron were in the least danger and thus in least critical need of supervision.
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