America’s First 5-Star General

By Douglas A. McIntyre Published Mar 13, 7:30AM EDT

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America’s First 5-Star General — © nasacommons / Flickr

George Marshall did not distinguish himself in battle. However, he became the first General of the Army (five-star general) when he was promoted to the rank on December 16, 1944. He was the first of five generals to be assigned that rank. All of them were major leaders in World War II. (Click here for 30 of the most legendary warriors in history.)
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Marshall was the Army’s Chief of Staff and ran most of World War II for President Franklin Roosevelt. He was the natural selection to become the Supreme Allied Commander of Europe. Dwight Eisenhower, who became a General of the Army after Marshal did, ran the war in Europe and became the better-known of the two.
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Marshall’s career had an unusual distinction. He was both the Secretary of Defense (1950 to 1951) and the Secretary of State (1947 to 1949). He also was sent to China to broker peace between the Nationalists of Chiang Kai-shek and the Communists of Mao Zedong. The mission failed. Mao took over the mainland, and Chiang moved to Taiwan. The rift continues today, and the tension between China and Taiwan is considered a global military hot spot.

What is known as the Marshall Plan rebuilt Europe after World War II. The plan provided capital between 1948 and 1952.
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Prior to its beginning, Marshall defined the plan in a speech:

Our policy is not directed against any country, but against hunger, poverty, desperation and chaos. Any government that is willing to assist in recovery will find full co-operation on the part of the United States. Its purpose should be the revival of a working economy in the world so as to permit the emergence of political and social conditions in which free institutions can exist.

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Besides Marshall and Eisenhower, the only other five-star generals are Douglas MacArthur, Henry Arnold and Omar Bradley. George Patton might have been a candidate, but he died at the war’s end. On a similar footing in rank, there were several Admirals of the Fleet (five-star admirals). William Leahy, Ernst King, Chester Nimitz and William Halsey each ran a major part of the second world war in the Pacific. No one has held the rank since it was given to World War II leaders. Given the magnitude of the war, it is unlikely to happen again.

About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.