General of the Armies That a Commander of the United States shall be appointed and commissioned by the style of General of the Armies of the United States and the present office and title of Lieutenant General shall thereafter be abolished. The rank of General of the Armies was intended for bestowal upon George Washington, who held the rank of "General and Commander-in-Chief" which was a grade senior to all American major generals and brigadier generals from the American Revolutionary War. However, only a few months after the Congressional proposal, Washington died on December 14, 1799. The United States Army at that time had
General of the Armies would continue for the next twenty years and lapse only with his death in 1964. The rank of General of the Armies was revisited with a posthumous promotion of George Washington in 1976. In 1981, upon the death of Omar Bradley, brief consideration was given for another posthumous promotion; however, no action was taken beyond designing a potential "modern day" insignia for General of the Armies. The most recent reference to the rank of General of the Armies occurred in 2008 when the Army authorized the Army Service Uniform as the new standard uniform for United States soldiers. As part