Patton's Fighting Bridge Builders: Company B, 1303rd Engineer General Service Regiment

APPENDIX TWO: Ranks and Command

183 APPENDIX TWO Ranks and Command Soldiers are classified as enlisted men, warrant officers, and commissioned of- ficers. Enlisted personnel are either privates and privates first class or noncommissioned officers (corporals and sergeants). Warrant officers are specialists who have a “warrant” from the secretary of war rather than a commission; while they supervise technical operations (in the 1303rd, the sole warrant officer supervised the motor pool), they technically do not have command functions. Command is reserved to “commissioned officers,” who receive their “commission” from the president of the United States, technically with the advice and consent of the U.S. Senate. Commissioned officers exercise command authority over troops. Noncommissioned officers (NCOs) also have command authority. In the field an NCO actually supervises enlisted personnel (privates), who accomplish the task. Officers issue the relevant orders that designate what is to be done, when, where, and by what unit. At each lower level the assignment becomes more defined, and when orders finally reach the company level, a sergeant is given charge of the mission. The sergeant decides, based on his orders, which squad(s) will do particular things in particular places at specified times. His subordinate squad leaders (corporals or sergeants) will assign particular tasks to individual soldiers so that the mission is accomplished with minimum confusion and error. The order to lay a “barrier zone” in the regiment’s “area of responsibility” (AOR) comes from corps or army headquarters. The regimental commander passes the orders to his battalion commanders, who in turn pass them on to one or all of their company commanders. The company commander may designate one platoon to complete the mission or may issue orders to each platoon for their AOR. The platoon commander (a lieutenant) will tell his platoon sergeant to implement the orders. The officer might go with the platoon sergeant to lay out the barrier, or the plan might come from the regiment or battalion commander already drafted and subject to on-the-spot modification. Regardless, the platoon sergeant will call in his squad leaders and give them the orders to take certain mines out of stock, use certain soldiers in certain vehicles, and lay the mines in particular places by a designated time in order to complete the barrier zone. Enlisted personnel wear their grade insignia on their sleeves. Privates (Pvt.) have 184 APPENDIX TWO no insignia. A private first class (Pfc.) wears a single chevron, point up. A corporal (Cpl.), grade 5 (army numbering descends in order—from 7 to 1—as grade and pay increase), wears two stripes or chevrons point up. A sergeant (Sgt., grade 4) wears three chevrons. A staff sergeant (S.Sgt., grade 3) wears the same three chevrons, point up, with a arced “rocker” curving from the outer corner of the bottom edge of the lowest stripe to the other outer corner. A technical sergeant (T.Sgt., grade 2) adds a second “rocker.” In grade 1 are both master sergeants (M.Sgt.), wearing three chevrons and three rockers, and first sergeants (1st Sgt.), with three chevrons, three rockers, and a diamond-shaped lozenge in the space between the first stripe and first rocker. Some troops are considered “specialists,” and even though they do not necessarily command other soldiers, they deserve higher pay for their greater skill and hence require a higher grade. These men are classified as “technicians.” A Technician grade 5 (Tech 5) wears corporal stripes with a “T” underneath. Similarly, a Technician grade 4 (Tech 4) wears sergeant stripes, again with a “T” underneath. A Technician grade 3 (Tech 3) wears staff sergeant stripes with a “T” between the bottom stripe and the rocker. A company “first sergeant” was not a grade 1 but probably grade 2 or grade 3 sergeant. Similarly, a battalion “sergeant major” was usually a grade 3 staff sergeant, perhaps a grade 2 technical sergeant. The regimental “sergeant major” was a grade 1 first sergeant or master sergeant. In the post–Vietnam War era, enlisted grades were rearranged, with the army introducing the grade of sergeant major, which entails the functional position as well as the title. Warrant officers come in two classes, warrant officer and chief warrant officer. The insignia of a warrant officer is a gold bar covered with two squares of brown enamel, while the chief wears a gold bar with a brown enamel border to a inner gold rectangle. These...