General officer brigadier general is brigadier, which is not always considered by these armies to be a general officer rank, although it is always treated as equivalent to the rank of brigadier general for comparative purposes. As a lieutenant outranks a sergeant major; confusion often arises because a lieutenant is outranked by a major. Originally the serjeant major was, exclusively, the commander of the infantry, junior only to the captain general and lieutenant general. The distinction of serjeant major general only applied after serjeant majors were introduced as a rank of field officer. Serjeant was eventually dropped from both rank titles, creating
General of the Armies "six-star general" and "general of the armies". When MacArthur died in 1964, proponents for his promotion petitioned both the Army and Congress to grant a posthumous promotion to General of the Armies, and even went so far as to obtain a vote of neutral support from Harry S. Truman (meaning he would neither support nor attempt to scuttle the promotion). In 1965, the Deputy Chief of Staff for Army Personnel contacted the Institute of Heraldry and requested the feasibility of creating a six star general insignia in the event that MacArthur was in fact posthumously promoted. At the same time,