There are currently some 400,000 plus soldiers in the US Army. However there are only ten divisions in the army each of about 10,000 or so men. Than what units are the rest of the 300,000 plus troops part of since I don’t think there are that many independent brigades or battalions.
There are ten divisions currently active in the Regular Army. The National Guard has another eight or so, and then there is the Army Reserve, which has a bunch more. Of the latter two, not all components of all divisions are on active duty at all times.
Also, depending on the type, US Army divisions may range anywhere from 10,000 to 20,000 people total.
We have over 700 bases around the world. That eats up a few.
Not answers to the question. The Regular Army has more than 500,000 troops; adding in the Reserve and the Guard brings the total to over a million, and of course many (most?) of our overseas units are separated from regular divisions. The answer is that there are more than twice as many independent brigades, regiments, and other groups as there are divisions, and these more or less double the size of the US Army Forces Command to about 240,000. The remainder of the army consists of the Training and Doctrine Command, which is responsible for recruitment, training, doctrine, etc., the US Army Materiel Command, which is responsible for R&D, logistics, procurement, etc., and a dozen or so units that report directly to the Chief of Staff or someone else in the Pentagon – the CID, the Corps of Engineers, the medical command, the academy, base management…
It’s hard to tell exactly how many soldiers are in all these units, as some tend to hire a lot of civilians who get added to the reported force size. But I think that accounts for the “rest of the army.”
A US Infantry Division is around 17,000 men. And an Armoured Divsion slightly larger.
And of course you have independent brigades as well. As well as battalions which are attached to larger formation.
Better questions, why all the bloody 4 stars? You need 1 4 star (the head of the army), three three stars for the thee active corps (perhaps a couple more for Senior Staff Appointments) a dozen or so major generals. But the US has them overflowing from everycup.
Well, no, they don’t; the Army usually has 11. There are a set number of positions requiring 4-star generals. Most generals wearing 4 stars wear them because they are appointed to a position that requires them, and their 4-star status is more position than rank. Examples would be the Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in Europe, Commander of U.S. Joint Forces Command, Commander of the U.S. Army Material Command, and other important positional roles.
It’s got 12 now. Generals Casey (US Army Chief of Staff), Ward (Africa Command), Campbell (US Army Forces Command), Petraeus (Central Command), Sharp (United Nations Command Korea), Chiarelli (Army Vice Chief of Staff), Ham (US Army, Europe), Odierno (Multinational Force, Iraq), Dunwoody (Army Materiel Command), Dempsey (Army Training and Doctrine Command), McChrystal (International Security Assistance Force, US Forces Afghanistan), and Alexander (Director, National Security Agency).
For what it’s worth, this is also true in the Navy, where men are named full Admirals (4 star) not as a ‘standard’ promotion from Vice Admiral but because they hold one of the (I believe nine) positions that require full-Admiral rank. (This came out in the number-of-ships-vs.-number-of-admirals thread a month or two ago.)
Further, ever since World War II (and possibly before that) the Army has been set up on a ‘cadre’ basis – we maintain just enough men in uniform to carry out needed functions (including ongoing training of forces stationed stateside so they will be ready for immediate deployment) – but with the officers in place and trained to handle a much larger army, in case one is needed. It takes little training to be an effective private or P.F.C.; it takes substantially more (and longer) training to successfully command a company or battalion, so we have two or three trained men for each such unit, so that if we should suddely need an army half again as large as the one we have, the officers to lead it will be available and fully trained.
There’s a lot of people in corps-level units, independent units, army-level units, training commands, etc…
Not everyone in the Army is in a combat division, just like not everyone in the Navy is deployed at sea or on a ship’s crew.
Indeed, and this is the real answer to the OP’s question. In a modern army, most soldiers are not in combat units. They are in logistics, training, and intelligence; all making an ever-smaller number of troops ever-more effective. This has been the trend in warfare for several centuries.
see this:
To the best of my military knowledge, civilians are never reported as part of the military force (as in troops) size, as established by law or regulation. There are, of course, civil service types assigned to various units and those individuals are reported as such: civilian workers, not military.