Captain Golding wrote:RN Commodores could be "big" or "small and in Nelson's day the flags were different.
Small was the senior Captain in a group or station. He remained Captain of his own Ship while having operational authority over the other vessels in the group or Station.
Large was the Junior Admiral. He had his flag Captain etc.
Neither rank was permanent - as some body else said its the Job not the career. So when the deployment was over the Broad Pennant (Of a Commodore) was lowered and the Officer was once more a Captain.
In the 20th Century Commodore was also the rank used for the Officer in charge of a Convoy, That said he was not in charge of the Escort. These were normally long service RNR Officers called back for the Duration.
Discussing CLAC's and LAC Wings, The RMN does not have a history of Fighting Small craft so no seperate rank structure for officers within the LAC Squadrons and Wings as the USN and FAA use. The First CLAC seemed to have a senior staff of Admiral's - ok when developing the Concept where all that experience is needed but not so good long term once the roles are understood. Since we don't have a Rank of Wing Commander then "Commodor" makes sense. Mind you we again end up with Captains (SG) giving orders to Commodores (CLAC). Note there is a lot of role definition between the Captain of a CVN and his CAG and the Admiral who is probably on board which defines authority and how it's used. (The Loss of HMS Glorious in WW2 is a fine example of when the Ship Captain does not understand and work well with his CAG (Not that they used that term)).
Tremaine's pathway does imply that he ended up in a backwater for too long. Not promoting successful LAC commanders into Destroyers seems to me a weakness that BuPers is not likly to suffer from. Still promotion up to "CAG" without real ship experience would be a significant weakness. Did Scotty insist on playing with his toys to long ? :->. Like Michelle it took an outside kick to rectify that.
A Captain in charge of a Destroyer is going to be responsable for far more independant action than any senior LAC commander on a CLAC. Even Depot LAC deployment probably don't result in the LAC commander being independant of higher authority. That experience is something that Scottie needed to show and probably had not.
Note that with Our current Naval Personel Sat Comms etc. mean that interms of freedom of action there is not a lot of difference between Naval Officers and Naval Air Force Officers (FAA USN USMC etc.) of a given rank. Something not true in the Honourverse. Promoting a Squadron Commander to command a CVN via a short commission in charge of an Oiler to learn ship handling does not change much at the higher levels where at least in a peace time navy it's all about man and political managment with a large chunk of logistics for a Destroyer Captain or a Squadron commander.
I suppose it is a disadvantage of clinging to Honor. But the advantage is they were kept alive. Now that I think of it, does Commodore represent the highest rank achieved by a member of Honor's inner Circle?
Well, except for myself. I reached Fleet Admiral as cthia.
