This Abu Graib felon Army Spc. yadda yadda yadda…
Is Army Spc. an actual rank? It seems like a qualifier of a rank, not a rank that I’ve ever heard of. Where in a list of ranks does it fit?
Specialist.
It’s not a rank afaik, just means the guy got some kind of training beyond boot camp (instead of being a “generic gun-toter” he may be a “lab tech” or MP or…). But I’m not military, so I imagine you’ll get better responses.
incorrect, Specialist IS a rank. (i am a specialist)… E-4, same as Corporal E-4, see this link. However, Corporal usually donotes a leadership position, where Specialist is mearly a working grunt. The Army used to have Specialists upto E-8, (i.e. Spec-8)… but did away w/ that.
Your MOS (job title) can also have the word Specialist in it (i.e., I am a Personel Records Specialist), but it has no direct bearing on your rank, it mearly signifies the rank “usually” held by the soldier in that position, (i.e. Sergeants are usually in a job position of Personnel Records Sergeant)
Specialist is indeed a rank in the US Army. It is one grade lower than sergeant and one grade higher than private first class. I may be wrong, but the rank of Specialist denotes a soldier who does not have a combat leadership role. The equivalent rank of a soldier with combat leadership responsibilities is Corporal.
No, It IS a rank. It has nothing to do with being “specialized” in anything. That’s kinda a misnomer. Well, not really. Because back in the day, technical jobs in the military were full of specialists. As it stands now, an Army SPC is an E-4. So he’s above all three levels of privates. He is also referred to as a Spec 4.
I don’t know when it stopped, but back around WWII days or so, one could be a Spec 5 or Spec 6, etc. So their pay grade would be E-5 or E-6 or whatever, but they would not be an NCO. This allowed them to get pay promotions but not be an NCO. So a wrench turner could never talk down to or smoke an infantry SGT.
But things have changed since then. Spec 4 is the only Specialist rank left.
The other rank for the E-4 pay grade is Corporal. But you don’t see many of those around anymore. A CPL is the lowest NCO in the Army.
No, that’s not really correct either. Ranger BN doesn’t bother with the CPL rank. And a tabbed out Spec in Ranger Bat is an entity to be feared. He is in charge of all the privates – and they pretty much worship him. If a SPEC is worth a damn, and has passed Ranger School, he’ll soon be promoted to SGT. If he is not worth it, they just release him to Mother Army.
I’m not aware of too many infantry units that bother with CPL rank. Except maybe some National Guard units. The reasoning there is that to become a SGT, one has to attend PLDC. It’s hard to get guardsmen to voluntarily leave their job for a month to attent PLDC. That’s why the Guard is FULL of SPEC4s. So it makes sense for them to take advantage of the CPL rank.
In the active Army, your unit will send you to PLDC if they want you to wear stripes, so there’s really no need for CPL. Now if someone was so high-speed and the unit sent him to PLDC and they want him in a SGT’s position, but he doesn’t have enough Time in Service or Time in Grade to qualify for SGT, they might make him a CPL until he’s promotable. Or something like that. Pretty much every CPL I’ve met (myself included) has a particular reason they’re a Corporal and not a SGT…
A couple of thoughts on the Specialist Charles Graner conviction. It struck me that Graner, aged 36, was kind of old for an Army Specialist. It indicates to me that he was probably a bad apple to begin with.
Where were the junior officers when the abuses were happening at the Abu Ghraib prison? When I served in the Marines years ago, there was always a second or first lieutenant around. Wouldn’t there have been an army lieutenant in charge of Graner’s platoon (or whatever)? Why aren’t they hanging him or her out to dry?
See my post above for an explanation of this. Though I’m not defending his shitbagedness, it is not uncommon for Guardsmen to not be promoted past SPC. Mainly, because it would require them to voluntarily leave their home and their job for a month. So many just dont bother going.
That makes sense…thanks.
Career Spc’s in the National Guards isn’t all that uncommon, lack of promotable slots.
In all likelihood this is outdated information. In the old Army (1960 -1972) there were two ways to designate an enlisted member’s position in the hierarchy. One was by pay grade, the other was by rank. The number in, for instance, Specialist Fourth Class, SP4, refers to the pay grade. The guy was in the fourth level on the salary ladder. He drew the same pay as a Corporal. Both were in the pay grade E-4. In the old army there were higher Specialist grades. I worked with SP5s and SP6s who were pretty senior legal clerks and court reporters. I am told that the higher Specialist grades have been abolished but I don’t know that to be a fact.
At any rate, the distinction between a SP4 and a CPL is that the CPL is a noncommissioned officer while the SP4 is just another enlisted soldier, albeit with enhanced authority. Thus when you sassed a CPL you risked a charge of disrespect/insubordination and if you disobeyed him you were looking at a charge of disobedience of a superior NCO. When you sassed a SP4, however, you were looking at worst at conduct prejudicial to the good order and discipline. If you disobeyed the SP4 you were looking at disobedience of a lawful order. Getting cross ways with a SP4 was a less serious offense than getting in hot water with the CPL. The real problem was with “Acting Jacks” – a Specialist given temporary appointment as a Buck Sergeant (SGT, E-5). He looked like a NCO, he wore NCO insignia of rank but deep down he was just another puffed up high private.
LOL 
You don’t know when he joined the Army. He could have enlisted at age 35, although that is unusual. If he was in the reserves, it could be that promotions are hard to get and take a long time. The regular army does have a version of “up or out” for enlisted personnel.
As a minor incidental note, the Canadian army also has specialists but it defintely isn’t a rank. It indicates specialized training and comes with a higher pay scales, though. I, for example, hold the reserve rank of corporal and the trade of LCIS technician. Thus I draw “Specialist 1” pay, which is signficantly higher than a non-specialized corporal (and in fact is comparable to a non-specialized sergeant). A higher Specialist 2 scale exists for more complex trades, with the determination typically made by the amount of time spent in training and the civilian demand for persons with such training. I’m not sure, but I would guess a military dental hygienist would be drawing Spec 2.
Just curious…what does an LCIS technician do?
Tries to looks busy, mostly.
Just kidding. The Land Communications and Information Systems technician repairs and maintains communication equipment for the army (i.e. “land” forces). Typically, I fix radios, computers, telephones and stuff like that. The capacity of radio operators (and soldiers generally) to break stuff is immense.
Hi there. Army National Guard Sergeant checking in here. I was also a Specialist in the Active Duty Army.
First, I think there’s a little jargon in this thread which may be confusing to non-military types. “NCO” is a Non-Commissioned Officer. It doesn’t really mean “officer without a commission”. NCOs are sort of like an officer’s right-hand man. The officer will make the plans or tell the NCO the plans from higher-up and the NCO’s job is to make it happen. A Commander will have an non-commisioned counterpart; Platon Leaders have a Platoon Sergeant, Company Commanders have a First Sergeant, Battalion Commanders and higher have a Sergeant Major.
Bear_Nenno said “…but they would not be an NCO. This allowed them to get pay promotions but not be an NCO. So a wrench turner could never talk down to or smoke an infantry SGT.” When he says “smoke” he means order someone to do push-ups or some other exercise for punishment.
Bear_Nenno also said “… Now if someone was so high-speed and…”. “High-Speed” means squared away, someone who is very professional; has his sh*t together.
In the active duty Army, I was in a tank battalion. We had plenty of Corporals…we just didn’t have them for long. The rank was pinned on a Specialist who had been approved to attend PLDC (Primary Leadership Development Course). Since he had already been approved to attend the school, he only wore the Rank of Corporal until he went to the school. When he came back, he would wear the rank of Sergeant.
I think that Bear_Nenno may have a liiiiiiittle bias against the National Guard. But hey, all active duty military looks down at the Guard and Reserves. I did too. I called 'em the usual names; No-Gos, Nasty Girls, you name it. However, things have changed in just the few years since I left Active Duty (I got out in Oct. 2000). The high number of deployments have seen Guard and Reserve members serving alongside active duty military. They are getting a lot more training than is possible when serving 2 days a month and two weeks in the summer. They are also fighting…and dying…for their country.
As for Guard members remaining in the Specialist rank forever, it’s not really true. PLDC is still attended by Guard members. LOTS of schools are attended during deployments (if the soldier is away from his family/job/you name it for 12-18 months, then attending a school puts no strain on his personal life). All these deployments are really changing the “old school” National Guard.
…yeah, I heard about some documentary which chronicled the activation and deployment of an Arkansas Guard Battalion. It was on NPR a few days ago. Yes, they were pretty screwed up during training. Going to Iraq changed things for them. They will come back as totally different people. Also remember that wearing the uniform 50 days ayear puts some limitations of what can be done. IMHO, a better idea would be one weekend a month and a quarterly field exercise that lasts a week. It’s not gonna happen though. Don’t hate the player, hate the game 
Naaah.
I’m actually in the National Guard. Though things might be changing here in a couple weeks. . .
Referring to a question asked earlier in the thread: the Army finally switched all the remaining upper grades of Specialist 5 and Specialist 6 to “hard stripes” (Sgt., Staff Sgt.) effective FY1986, meaning 1 October 1985. At that point, “Spec. 4” became simply “Specialist”. I went into Basic in an Army with Spec-5s, I went to AIT in one without them.
The specialists had replaced the “T” ranks we often see in WW2 movies (chevrons with a T = technician) At the time they were introduced, there were only 7 pay grades and the top guy was ranked a “Master Specialist”, with 1st, 2d, 3d. class going down. When in 1958 they went to 9 grades the ranks were redone so that the number went upwards with the Pay Grade and the whole range was covered so you had Specialist 4 to Specialist 9.
Specialists 8 and 9 did not last too long – grades were eliminated in 1965. Spec 7s were similarly also discontinued in 1978. Mostly as a result of changes in training requirements. The Army figured if you wanted senior NCO pay, you had to assume Senior NCO leadership. Eventually the Army figured that a parallel structure was unnecessary. For a while in the 80s, both the Army and Air Force had the phenomenon of having both NCO and “junior enlisted” versions of grade E4; in 1991 USAF finally phased out completely their E4 “sergeant” rank that had been coexisting with Senior Airman for years; and as mentioned the Army pretty much turned Corporal into a “frocking” for someone about to become Sgt.