Staff (military) - British / Commonwealth Staff

British / Commonwealth Staff

Up until relatively recently the UK operated its own system, with three branches:

• G Branch. The General branch, responsible for operations, intelligence and training.
• A Branch. The Administration branch, responsible for all aspects of personnel management.
• Q Branch. The Quartermaster branch, responsible for logistic and equipment support.

Positions were labelled as follows:

• GSO1 General Staff Officer (Grade 1). The chief of staff, ranked a lieutenant colonel or colonel. He was in charge of the General Staff Branch, responsible for training, intelligence, planning operations and directing the battle as it progressed. Most orders from the General Officer Commanding (GOC) were actually written up and signed by the GSO1.
• GSO2 General Staff Officer (Grade 2) Ranked a major.
• GSO3 General Staff Officer (Grade 3) Ranked a captain.

The positions may also be styled GSO I, GSO II, GSO III.

"The British did have staff officers as far back as the Crimean War working in these three cells but staff work was looked at with great disdain in the British Army and only became acceptable after the terrible hardships of the Crimean war, brought on by disorganization" The General Staff in Britain was formed in 1905, and reorganized again in 1908. Unlike the Prussian staff system, the British Army was thought too small to support separate staff and command career streams. Officers would typically alternate between staff and command. Beevor, Inside the British Army, says instead that the terrible cleavages between staff and line units caused by the enormous losses during First World War trench warfare meant that British senior officers decided that from thenceforth all officers would rotate between staff and line responsibilities, preventing the development of a separate general staff corps.

In the British system, "staff" is outranked by "command" officers. The staff cannot in theory (and largely in practice) say "no" to a subordinate unit; only the Commander has that ability. In the British system the principal staff officers at any HQ were always outranked by the subordinate commanders, unlike in the US system:

• Lieutenant Colonels commanding battalions or units in a brigade outrank the Brigade Major and the Deputy Assistant Adjutant & Quartermaster General
• Brigadiers commanding brigades in a division outrank the Colonel GS and Colonel AQ
• Major Generals commanding divisions outrank the Brigadier GS and Assistant Adjutant General and Assistant Quartermaster General at a Corps HQ

This ensured a clear chain of command, and reinforced the idea that staff do not command, but exercise control on behalf of their commander. By contrast, in the American system, commanders are frequently outranked by staff officers. For example, within a battalion the S3 is a major while company commanders are captains.