The National Order of the Legion of Honour, formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour, is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon Bonaparte, it has been retained by all later French governments and regimes.
Field marshal is the most senior military rank, ordinarily senior to the general officer ranks. Usually, it is the highest rank in an army, and as such, few persons are appointed to it. It is considered as a five-star rank (OF-10) in modern-day armed forces in many countries. Promotion to the rank of field marshal in many countries historically required extraordinary military achievement by a general. However, the rank has also been used as a divisional command rank and also as a brigade command rank. Examples of the different uses of the rank include Austria-Hungary, Pakistan, Prussia/Germany, India and Sri Lanka for an extraordinary achievement; Spain and Mexico for a divisional command ; and France, Portugal and Brazil for a brigade command.
The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by King George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate medieval ceremony for appointing a knight, of which bathing was an element. Knights so created were known as 'Knights of the Bath'. George I constituted the Knights of the Bath a regular 'Military Order'. He did not revive the Order of the Bath, which had not previously existed as an Order, in the sense of a body of knights governed by a set of statutes and whose numbers were replenished when vacancies occurred.
Generalfeldmarschall was a rank in the armies of several German states and the Holy Roman Empire (Reichsgeneralfeldmarschall); in the Habsburg monarchy, the Austrian Empire and Austria-Hungary, the rank Feldmarschall was used. The rank was the equivalent to Großadmiral in the Kaiserliche Marine and Kriegsmarine, a five-star rank, comparable to OF-10 in today's NATO naval forces.
General admiral or Admiral general was a Danish, Dutch, German, Russian, Portuguese, Spanish and Swedish naval rank. Its historic origin is a title high military or naval dignitaries of early modern Europe sometimes held, for example the (nominal) commander-in-chief of the Dutch Republic's navy.
Wonsu is the highest military rank in the armed forces of North Korea and South Korea.
A Generaloberst was the second-highest general officer rank in the German Reichswehr and Wehrmacht, the Austro-Hungarian Common Army, the East German National People's Army and in their respective police services. The rank was equal to a four-star full general but below a general field marshal. The rank was equivalent to a Generaladmiral in the Kriegsmarine until 1945 or to a Flottenadmiral in the Volksmarine until 1990. It was the highest ordinary military rank and the highest military rank awarded in peacetime; the higher rank of general field marshal was awarded only in wartime by the head of state. In general, a Generaloberst had the same privileges as a general field marshal.
Constantin Sănătescu was a Romanian general and statesman who served as the 44th Prime Minister of Romania after the 23 August 1944 coup after which Romania left the Axis powers and joined the Allies.
The General Staff of the Turkish Armed Forces is highest staff organization in the Turkish Armed Forces.
Grand marshal is a ceremonial, military, or political office of very high rank. The term has its origins with the word "marshal" with the first usage of the term "grand marshal" as a ceremonial title for certain religious orders. The following are some additional usages of the term grand marshal:
The Constable of France was lieutenant to the King of France, the first of the original five Great Officers of the Crown and the commander-in-chief of the Royal Army. He was, at least on paper, the highest-ranking member of the French nobility.
Ettore Bastico was an Italian military officer before and during World War II. In addition to being a general of the Royal Italian Army, he was also a senator and governor. He held high commands during the Second Italo-Ethiopian War, the Spanish Civil War, and the North African campaign. He is considered one of the best Italian commanders in World War II.
Mohamed Hussein Tantawi Soliman was an Egyptian field marshal and politician. He was the commander-in-chief of the Egyptian Armed Forces and, as chairman of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, was the de facto head of state from the ousting of President Hosni Mubarak on 11 February 2011 until the inauguration of Mohamed Morsi as president of Egypt on 30 June 2012.
Prior is an ecclesiastical title for a superior in some religious orders. The word is derived from the Latin for "earlier" or "first". Its earlier generic usage referred to any monastic superior. In abbeys, a prior would be lower in rank than the abbey's abbot or abbess.
A five-star rank is the highest military rank in many countries. The rank is that of the most senior operational military commanders, and within NATO's standard rank scale it is designated by the code OF-10. Not all armed forces have such a rank, and in those that do the actual insignia of the five-star ranks may not contain five stars. For example: the insignia for the French OF-10 rank maréchal de France contains seven stars; the insignia for the Portuguese marechal contains four gold stars. The stars used on the rank insignias of various Commonwealth of Nations are sometimes referred to colloquially as pips, but are stars of the orders of the Garter, Thistle or Bath or Eversleigh stars depending on the wearer's original regiment or corps, and are used in combination with other heraldic items, such as batons, crowns, swords or maple leaves.
Dayuanshuai was a Chinese military rank, usually translated as grand marshal or generalissimo.
In many nations, the highest military ranks are classed as being equivalent to, or are officially described as, five-star ranks. However, a number of nations have used or proposed ranks such as generalissimo, which are senior to their five-star equivalent ranks.
Generalissimus of the Soviet Union was a military rank proposed for Joseph Stalin following World War II. It was styled after a similar Imperial Russian Army rank held by Aleksei Shein, Prince Alexander Danilovich Menshikov, (reportedly) Duke Anthony Ulrich of Brunswick, and Count Alexander Suvorov. However, Stalin eventually rejected the rank, deeming it too ostentatious. It would have been the highest military rank in the Soviet Union.
The Ordre national du Mérite is a French order of merit with membership awarded by the President of the French Republic, founded on 3 December 1963 by President Charles de Gaulle. The reason for the order's establishment was twofold: to replace the large number of ministerial orders previously awarded by the ministries; and to create an award that can be awarded at a lower level than the Legion of Honour, which is generally reserved for French citizens. It comprises about 185,000 members; 306,000 members have been admitted or promoted in 50 years.
