Interesting. How did unranked military systems work on a practical basis? Was there a way to figure out the relative importance of a specific soldier (e.g. Soldier X is a nobody who has to obey orders from everyone and nobody needs to obey his “orders”, while Soldier Y is really really important and you’d better obey him or else…something, despite the fact that he doesn’t outrank you), or were things truly done on a democratic or consensus basis? E.g. if I was a soldier in an unranked army and another unranked soldier came up to me and told me to go out on patrol, how would I know whether to do it immediately or whether I could tell him to go pound sand or at least try to negotiate something out of him in exchange?
They had positions and appointments rather than ranks.
Company Commander
Battalion Commander
Brigade Commander
Most ranks were once positions anyway.
…and it’s not like in ranked armies random officers may just come up to any troops around and order whatever is on their minds. Comrade Footsoldier would know who is who in his own immediate chain of command and his orders would come through them.
Of course Comrade Yu the company commander suddenly not being around any more, replaced by Comrade Wei who yesterday was a ditchdigger and two years ago was a Division Adjutant, was ptobably more common than in other armies but that’s another story…
Harry is saluting palm out because he is in the army. The man next to him is presumably Navy, they salute palm down.
Actually, the man at Harry’s left is a US Army officer (some grade of general, from the hat and sleeve braid and lapel pins) and all the US services use the palm down salute.
So he’s the spare for the heir of the heir apparent?
He used to be anyway. Now the heir has a heir so he’s the spare.
Harry is the heir to the spare of the heir of the heir of the heir now.
Edward’s children’s unofficial title is probably “chopped liver”.
When I was stationed there, Governor’s Island was the largest base the U.S. Coast Guard had. Over 6,000 Coasties were stationed there. The senior officer there was a Vice Admiral who was the Atlantic Area Commander. And the 3rd District Commander. And the Base Commander. And there were several schools, a Support center, homeport for several High Endurance Cutters, etc. That all being said, although required, nobody seemed to like salutes in non formal situations. There seemed to be an unwritten rule that you didn’t have to salute an officer on the sidewalk on the other side of the street.
The coffee mess for the staff and students of my school (at least the ones on the first deck) was in the office I shared with the rest of the instructors in my section. One afternoon after lunch, our Warrant Officer (School Chief) came in for some coffee and to piss and moan a bit. It seemed his timing to leave for lunch was off that day, or he went to lunch somewhere different, and his complaint was about having to return the salutes of so many enlisted men. Which, after a moment’s thought, I understood. Then he went on to comment that some enlisted men can say “sir” like it was the dirtiest insult they could say. I couldn’t help myself, and replied “What do you mean by that … SIR!”
And there was the time I was approaching our building and my previous Warrant Officer had stepped out for some reason. It was pretty apparent to both of us that sooner or later I’d get close enough that exchanging salutes couldn’t be avoided. Wise man that he was, he defused the potentially uncomfortable situation by turning around and heading back into the building.
Makes sense, thanks.
On a slightly different note: there is a Dutch medal for bravery under fire, the Willemsorde, which is given really, really rarely, as in once in a blue moon. The recipients of the order no longer have to salute their superiors, their superiors have to salute them instead.
There is an unwritten tradition in the U.S. that Medal of Honor recipients will be saluted first as well, even by those who are their superiors.
Note that any salute always mandates that the person being saluted return the salute and greeting, so in the U.S. anyway, there is never a situation where one party is saluting the other unilaterally. In other words, there is never a situation where one party is saluting “instead” of the other. The only question is who initiates the exchange.
This whole discussion reminds me of the classic response that a senior enlisted sailor (e.g. a Master Chief Petty Officer) makes when [improperly] saluted, “Don’t salute me, son, I work for a living!” 
“Don’t call me ‘sir’ - my parents were married!” 