How Military Organizations Work: Who Has Authority Over Your Matter

Outside the most serious offenses, commanders at levels fixed by law decide how a service member’s case is handled: nonjudicial punishment, an administrative action, or referral to a court-martial. The staff who process the paperwork advise. Once a case is at a court-martial, the military judge rules on the law and, in non-capital general and special courts-martial, sets the sentence. The major exception: for serious offenses such as most sexual assault offenses, domestic violence, and murder committed on or after December 28, 2023, independent special trial counsel decide whether charges go to trial.

Sources checked: September 26, 2026

Commanders decide how a case goes forward; staff advise

A military headquarters has a commander and a staff. The staff gathers information, prepares actions, and recommends; the commander signs. Whether a matter moves is therefore a question of which commander has the authority, not which office is holding the file. The one large exception, prosecution decisions for serious offenses, is explained in the special trial counsel section below.

The Army’s staff doctrine names the sections by function and marks them by the rank of the commander they serve: “Organizations commanded by generals have G staffs. Other organizations have S staffs” (FM 6-0, Appendix C). The numbers carry the function: 1 for personnel, 2 for intelligence, 3 for operations and training, 4 for logistics, 6 for communications. The prefix changes by service and setting: J is used “for joint (multiple services) headquarters, including the Joint Chiefs of Staff,” N “for navy headquarters,” and A “for air force headquarters” (Wikipedia, Staff (military))). An “S-1” at a battalion and a “G-1” at a division do the same kind of work for commanders at different levels.

The lawyer in the headquarters is not a neutral party. The same Army doctrine places the “staff judge advocate (SJA)” on “the commander’s personal staff,” alongside the inspector general and the chaplain. The SJA advises the command; the service member’s lawyer is the defense counsel, a separate office, as explained in who represents you and when.

Who has the authority to act

Sources for the table: 10 U.S.C. 815, 10 U.S.C. 823, 10 U.S.C. 822, 10 U.S.C. 824a, 10 U.S.C. 938.

Two things follow from the table. The more serious the action, the higher the commander who must take it, with the special trial counsel exception described below. And the officer with “general court-martial jurisdiction,” a phrase you will meet in paperwork, is a specific senior commander; in the Army that means a separate brigade, division, corps, or higher commander. General courts-martial and Article 138 complaints both end at that level.

The last row is intentionally vague. Who approves an administrative separation is set by each service’s regulation and depends on the kind of separation and the characterization proposed. The defense office can tell a service member who the separation authority is in their case; that name tells you who will read the statements submitted in the case.

Serious offenses: special trial counsel

Since December 28, 2023, the commander is not the one who decides whether the most serious cases go to trial. The Army describes the change this way: “For offenses committed on or after Dec. 28, 2023, special trial counsel have exclusive authority to make certain case disposition decisions regarding covered offenses,” which “include murder, manslaughter, kidnapping, domestic violence, stalking, child pornography offenses, and most sexual assault and sexual misconduct offenses.” Special trial counsel “are independent of the military chains of command of the victim and the accused” (U.S. Army Office of Special Trial Counsel).

The statute gives special trial counsel “exclusive authority to determine if a reported offense is a covered offense,” and, for the charges they take, authority to “refer the charges and specifications for trial by a special or general court-martial,” to “withdraw or dismiss the charges and specifications,” and to “enter into a plea agreement.” Their decision to refer “shall be binding on any applicable convening authority” (10 U.S.C. 824a). Every service has special trial counsel under the same statute; the Army page is quoted because it states the dates and offense list plainly.

For anyone facing or reporting one of these offenses, the practical point is that a commander’s view does not settle whether a court-martial follows.

What commanders do not decide

The authority in the table is authority over disposition: whether and how a case goes forward. It is not authority to decide the case at trial. At a court-martial, “The military judge shall rule upon all questions of law and all interlocutory questions arising during the proceedings” (10 U.S.C. 851); guilt is decided by the members or, if the accused requests and the judge approves, by the judge alone (10 U.S.C. 816); and in general and special courts-martial outside capital cases, “the military judge shall sentence the accused” (10 U.S.C. 853). Separation boards, discharge review boards, and appellate courts make their own decisions at later stages. The defense office, or a victim’s Special Victims’ Counsel, can say whether special trial counsel have the case.

Why decisions take the time they do

A request that needs a senior commander’s signature moves up through the staff of each level between the person and that commander, and comes back down the same way. An action a company commander can sign passes through fewer desks than one that needs the general court-martial convening authority. None of this is a formal deadline, and no source gives a standard processing time; the useful move is to learn which level decides and ask that level’s staff where the action is.

How big each of those levels is, and where the legal offices sit, is laid out in military units explained.

If you are a civilian working with a service member

If you are a lawyer, landlord, employer, or family member trying to move something forward:

• Find the unit and the level that decides. A company-level matter and a division-level matter have different addresses.
• Know whose lawyer is whose. The SJA advises the commander. A service member’s defense counsel represents the service member. Legal assistance helps with personal civil matters.
• Write to the right person in the right form. Ranks, titles, and how to make a written request are covered in communicating with military personnel.

The question to answer first is who controls the next step: for command-level disposition and administrative action, a commander at a set level; for covered offenses, a special trial counsel; at trial, the judge and members. Everything else is how to reach them. This page describes the statutory structure in general; a specific unit’s regulations and the people in it decide the details.