Talk:Brigade

Untitled
The "Origin" section needs heavy revision. It speaks with certainty about Units that were hardly as well organized as is implied.

"Old wars" is terribly vague.

I am removing the line:

'In the United States Army the term brigade is used instead of the term regiment, except in the cavalry. This is because a regiment has a fixed structure, whereas a brigade can be changed to suit the mission's needs.'

because it is inaccurate, and I can't think of a better replacement for it.

In the US Army, the term brigade does _not_ replace regiment. Rather, regimental units, such as 1-77 AR (1st Battalion, 77th Armor Regiment), are formed into brigades. To wit, the 2nd Brigade of the US 1st Infantry Division is currently comprised of 1-77 AR, 1-18 IN, and 1-28 IN. To these core units, other units, such as military intelligence, military police, engineers, and cavalry are assigned to form the Brigade Combat Team.


 * However - it is true to state that as an echelon of command between division and battalion, the brigade did replace combat commands in the armored divisions and battlegroups (themselves a replacement for the regiments used by World War II infantry divisions) in the Pentomic infantry divisions. The assignment of battalions to brigades in the U.S. Army is also far looser than was the case of regimental affiliations, thus I have to agree with the second sentence of the quotation you cited. W. B. Wilson 08:06, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

It would be true to say that regiments are generally only used for heraldic purposes. While regiments do have commanders, it is usually a secondary title for the Battalion or Brigade Commander that the regiment's unit(s) belong to.


 * Except in the case of cavalry regiments, who wisely chose to retain their traditional structure and have thereby reaped the benefits of regimental cohesion for decades since the ROAD changes. It can be argued that the 1960s brigade concept was a case of change for the sake of change. The U.S. Army in World War II employed regimental combat teams that also allowed for reinforcement as necessary and enjoyed the benefits of regimental cohesion. Thus, a successful model for this kind of structure already existed but the U.S. Army chose to no longer use it. W. B. Wilson 08:06, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Brigade commanders

 * A brigade is usually commanded by a Brigadier General...

Does this currently occur in any modern army? In every instance I'm aware of, brigade commanders are either brigadiers, or colonels; further examples might be useful, or else clarifying if this only occurred historically. Alai 04:39, 1 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Brigadier (British) is equivalent to brigadier general (U.S.) Sunray 05:56, 1 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Kinda-sorta. They're on equal for inter-service pecking order/NATO rank equivalancy purposes, but they a) have different names (which is pertinent here, as the article lists the two separately), and b) brigadier is a senior field officer, not a general officer rank. So, point/question stands. Alai 06:55, 1 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, OK, but to respond to your original question: yes it is common for brigadiers or brigadiers general to command brigades in NATO operations. Calling a brigadier a "senior field officer" seems to me to be splitting hairs. The rank replaced "brigadier general" in the British and Commonwealth armies and is equivalent to brigadier general (which is a general rank) in the U.S. and several other armies.


 * My original question was not about brigadiers. Brigadiers are indeed the officer customarily in charge of commonwealth brigades: that was never the point at issue. Canada appears to be the main exception; I've no idea what Canadian BGs do. If you think it's "splitting hairs" to observe that "brigadier" is in fact not the same as a "brigadier general", then why does it make sense for the article to list them separately, as if they were, well, not the same? (They are in fact, not the same, and I suggest you review the articles on each if you're unclear as to why this is the case.) So to return to my actual original question: do brigadier generals command brigades (in NATO, or otherwise)? It certainly isn't their usual role in the US Army, at any rate. Alai 18:27, 1 July 2006 (UTC)


 * As I said in my last post, yes brigadeer generals command brigades. For example the brigade commander in Kabul is a Canadian brigadier general. I assume that one would mention both brigadier and brigadier general in the article because they are different (albiet equivalent) ranks in use in several English-speaking countries. Sunray 19:00, 1 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Your last message was rather unclear on that but, but that's a very useful and interesting example; thanks. Canadian practice seems generally to be similar to the US's, i.e. colonels commanding "domestic" brigades (or brigade groups, to use their terminology), so perhaps this practice is particular to multinational formations (either because of differences in composition, or for transnational rank-equivalency reasons). If the US makes such appointments on a similar basis, that would tend to confirm that. Alai 20:19, 1 July 2006 (UTC)


 * You are quite right that domestic brigades in Canada are usually commanded by colonels; though sometimes they are commanded by brigadier generals. In the U.S. brigades are normally commanded by colonels unless they are functioning as "separate brigades," in which case they are commanded by a brigadier general. Sunray 21:18, 1 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm not familiar with separate brigades; if you have information on them to hand, it might make a useful addition to the article (or else to the United States Army article). Poking around some .mil sites, it seems that these are mostly commanded by colonels too (though with colonels as deputy commanders too, which seems almost as weird as the four naval captains per USN CVN). I did find one, the 256th Infantry Brigade, that had recently been commanded by a BG, but he'd been appointed as a colonel, and was recently replaced by a colonel, so at first sight the extra rank looks superfluous to the appointment. Granted you've demonstrated this does occur; I've reworded to indicate the usual case, with an addendum covering this. Alai 04:06, 2 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Certain US Army Reserve units are GOCOM's (General Officer Commands) at a brigade level, for example, the 804th Medical Brigade, the 300th MP Brigade, the 800th MP Brigade, 220th MP Brigade. I cannot confirm whether Active Duty MP Brigades are also commanded by Brigadier Generals, but eh reserve brigades ARE.--Vidkun 20:20, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Can I suggest no more indentations? Its making things harder to read! David.j.james 16:41, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

List of brigades
"In the armies of colonial powers, such as the British Empire, brigades frequently garrisoned isolated colonial posts, and their commanders had substantial discretion and local authority." This seems to contradict the regiment page, which says that regiments did this sort of duty. As far as I know in the British army brigades were only formed for major campaigns not garrison duty. David.j.james 16:41, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

My understanding is that British colonial forces were deployed by battlion with regiment being an administative unit. I would assume any garrison over a single battlion would be considered a brigade. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.137.70.194 (talk) 17:03, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

List of brigades
I don't think this really belongs in the Dab, where i was going to put it under "== See also ==". They are gleaned from the first fifty Wiki-Search hits on "brigade:

Strict-sense brigades:
 * 1st Vermont Brigade (American Union Army)
 * Texas Brigade (American Confederate Army)
 * Brigade of Gurkhas (British Army)
 * British 7th Armoured Brigade (British Army)
 * Brigade 6 (Norway)
 * 500 Brigade (or Kfir Formation, Israel)
 * Kfir Brigade (or 900 Brigade, Israel)
 * 7th Brigade (or Sheva' Brigade, Israel)
 * Zimbabwean Fifth Brigade
 * Nyland Brigade (or Uusimaa Brigade, Swedish)
 * Lowland Brigade (Scottish)
 * Pursuit Brigade (or Fighter Brigade, Polish Air Force)
 * Bomber Brigade (Polish Air Force)
 * 160 (Wales) Brigade (British Army)
 * Armoured Brigade (Finnish Army)
 * British 43rd Infantry Brigade
 * Light brigade, British cavalry unit of Charge of the Light Brigade

Non-traditional military units:
 * Jewish Brigade (British Army)
 * Lafayette Escadrille (French Air Service)
 * International Brigades (Spanish Republic)
 * Abraham Lincoln Brigade (Spanish Republic)
 * Black Brigades (Italian Fascist)
 * Brigade 2506 (American CIA)
 * Red Brigades (Italian revolutionaries)
 * 055 Brigade (Al Quaida)

Civilian international organizations:
 * Venceremos Brigade (Cuba)
 * Boys' Brigade

Music:
 * The APF Brigade
 * Youth Brigade (band)
 * DC Youth Brigade
 * Brown Brigade

Other:
 * Brigade de cuisine (or classic(al) brigade)
 * Fur brigade

--Jerzy•t 06:35, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

Individual armies QUERY
The queried expression (before editing) was "Regular Force CMBG strengths are ~4, 000 personnel." (Spacing and tilde as this--all copied and pasted). Ive made it just 4,000 but the original author might like to review it. Incidentally, I was looking at this because a WWI close relative, a (British) horse-artillery gunner/driver, was reportedly "the sole survivor of his brigade" when repatriated to Wales in early 1919. However, a few weeks later, he was killed when thrown by an unbroken horse he was riding home from a fair. Cheers Aeronian 07:00, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

In Britain
My sense from a recent reading of Graves's Good-Bye to All That is that at that time brigades and regiments differed in purpose in the British army. A regiment was a peace-time unit; officers and men were all permanently assigned to a regiment, the regiment was loosely geographically-based, and for officers, at least, there was a strong sense of identity with the regiment. However, at this time, regiments were not a tactical unit - individual battalions served separately, and were integrated into different brigades with battalions from other regiments. The brigade, on the other hand, was temporary, but had tactical significance - a brigade would be composed of battalions from a somewhat random assortment of regiments. I'm not really familiar with whether this is the usual procedure, though. Some of this might be better clarified in the article, I think. john k (talk) 08:16, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Other brigades
I think that this page needs more information about other armies. It only shows brigades in western armies, and even shows brigades in Argentina and partially recognized Taiwan/Chinese Taipei/RoC, but yet doesn't show brigades in the Russian Federation or PRC. Why is this so? Di the Albanian (talk) 15:54, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

NATO Standard Organisation
"The typical NATO standard brigade consists of approximately 5,000 troops." I keep seeing such references to NATO standard organisations floating around Wikipedia, but I can never find an explanation or citation/link to what this actually is. Does anyone know more about it? If it isn't somehow classified information, shouldn't this standard be cited? Or if it isn't an actual written standard but just a "typical NATO brigade (of standard denomination)", the source of this analysis should be cited. Sinthorion (talk) 11:18, 7 October 2023 (UTC)