Draft talk:Six-star rank

Why this page

The six-star rank article has long been problematic, see its talk page.

The current article reads A six-star rank was a short-lived 1955 proposal for a special grade immediately superior to a five-star rank, to be worn by a proposed General of the Armies of the United States. That's the entire lead. No mention even of the earlier 1945 proposal for both Macarthur and Chester W. Nimitz, who would have become Admiral of the Navy and one rank above the five-star rank of Fleet admiral which he and several others already held.

Fixing it depends of course on finding sources for other proposals and/or awards of six-star rank. But it's fairly certain that Goering was promoted in 1940 to Reichsmarschall, one rank above the five-star rank of Generalfeldmarschall, and that Stalin was awarded such a rank but refused it. Our article on Generalissimus of the Soviet Union currently describes it in the infobox as NATO rank Six-star rank, but then links to an article that makes no mention of it. Of course we can't cite that article as a source.

And there may also be contenders in North Korea and France.

But I must stress and restate, we need sources! And it's hard to find them online owing to the enormous number of US-centric pages that swamp search results.

This is a place to develop an article from a global perspective (while trying to avoid the errors in the US material). Once we have a well-sourced stub here, I intend to propose that the current article be moved to Six-star rank (United States), and this draft moved to Six-star rank in its place. The current article has always been scoped to the US only, so that article history belongs with the US scoped article. The previous deleted version was more global, so there may be a case for a history merge.

It's been a long process, but it should be fixed. Andrewa (talk) 08:36, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Redir created

I've redirected Six-star rank (United States) to Six-star rank so the draft doesn't contain a redlink. Andrewa (talk) 09:03, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Progress

As I see it the draft is now more or less complete except for sources... that is, except for the most important part! I think it should be as short and focused as possible.

A few more illustrations would also help.

And the links to the Wikipedia articles on North Korean ranks are not ideal, but this just reflects the poor and inconsistent (and unsourced) coverage we currently have of these ranks.

While this version is not suitable for the main namespace, I hope it might provide the basis for one that is (which is exactly what the draft namespace is for). Andrewa (talk) 19:30, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Another problem finding sources

Another problem finding sources is that the bar is sometimes set very low with existing articles.

• Unsourced statements.
• Unreliable sources.
• Sources do not support the claim in the article.

Again I refer to the current five-star rank article.

The first sourced statement is in the lead: A five-star rank is a very senior military rank, first established in the United States in 1944, with a five-star insignia,[1]. Now that's questionable, on two grounds. Firstly, the concept of star gradings has been widely applied to ranks such as Field marshal (United Kingdom) that preceded the 1944 establishment of these US ranks, and this appears to be the intention of the US authorities at the time and others (NATO for example) since then. So while the concept dates from 1944, some of the ranks predate it. Secondly, it sounds as if a five-star rank always has a five-star insignia. This is false, inconsistent with many of our other articles (again see field marshal (UK)) but widely believed, and Wikipedia should be as correct as it can. [1]

It's sourced to Oxford English Dictionary (OED), 2nd Edition, 1989. "five" ... "five-star adj., ... (b) U.S., applied to a general or admiral whose badge of rank includes five stars;". It would be very interesting to see the rest of this OED entry. Andrewa (talk) 16:18, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Sources

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Wehrmacht-Essential-Figures-Hitlers-Germany/dp/1907446958 looks promising as a source on Goering, cited by other websites, author looks something of an authority. Andrewa (talk) 16:21, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Sources from the existing article

The mainspace article currently has twelve inline references.

• US Senate Joint Resolution 26, 21 January 1955.
• Weintraub, Stanley (2007). 15 Stars: Eisenhower, MacArthur, Marshall: Three Generals Who Saved the American Century. Simon & Schuster. p. 488. ISBN 9781416545934. A few MacArthur devotees in Congress, like Representative Martin, tried to organize support for honorary six-star rank for the general, but as that would have been a slap at Eisenhower, such legislation had no chance.
• Foster, Frank C. (2011). United States Army Medal, Badges and Insignias. Medals of America Press. p. 19. ISBN 9781884452673. effort was made to reward General Douglas MacArthur, this time with specifying a six-star rank, but it never came to fruition
• Korda, Michael (2009). Ike. HarperCollins. p. 190. ISBN 9780061744969. Congress would twice try to promote him from the new rank of General of the Army—a five-star general—to the unique rank of General of the Armies: a proposed six-star general.
• Department of the Army Order 31-3, (13 March 1978). Department of the Army order to enact Public Law 94-479.
• Dooley, Joseph (April 6, 2013). "Sunday Reflection: How the 'indispensable man' became America's only six-star general". Washington Examiner.
• "Washington Gets Star". The New York Times. October 13, 1976. President Ford signed today a bill that posthumously promoted George Washington to the rank of six-star General of the Armies
• Kilian, Michael (August 5, 1976). "Foursquare opposed to a six-star Washington". Chicago Tribune. p. A2.
• Dooley, Joseph (April 6, 2013). "Sunday Reflection: How the 'indispensable man' became America's only six-star general". Washington Examiner. Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., ... noted, [Washington] is "the only six-star general in the nation's history."
• Cont'l Cong., Commission for General Washington, in 2 Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774-1789 96-7 (Library of Cong. eds., 1905).
• Cont'l Cong., Instructions for General Washington, in 2 Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774-1789 100-1 (Library of Cong. eds., 1905).

(more to follow) Andrewa (talk) 23:04, 18 January 2018 (UTC)