Joint Chiefs of Staff
The Joint Chiefs of Staff is the body of the most senior uniformed leaders within the United States Department of Defense, which advises the president of the United States, the secretary of defense, the Homeland Security Council and the National Security Council on military matters. The composition of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is defined by statute. It consists of a chairman, a vice chairman, the chiefs of the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, and Space Force, and the chief of the National Guard Bureau. Each of the individual service chiefs, outside their Joint Chiefs obligations, works directly under the secretaries of their respective military departments, e.g. the secretary of the Army, the secretary of the Navy, and the secretary of the Air Force.
Following the Goldwater–Nichols Act in 1986, the Joint Chiefs of Staff do not have operational command authority, either individually or collectively, as the chain of command goes from the president to the secretary of defense, and from the secretary to the regional combatant commanders. Goldwater–Nichols also created the office of vice chairman, and the chairman is now designated as the principal military adviser to the secretary of defense, the Homeland Security Council, the National Security Council and the president. The Joint Staff is a headquarters staff in the Pentagon, composed of personnel from each of the six service branches, that assists the chairman and the vice chairman in discharging their responsibilities and is managed by the director of the Joint Staff.
Role and responsibilities
After the 1986 reorganization of the Armed Forces undertaken by the Goldwater–Nichols Act, the Joint Chiefs of Staff do not possess operational authority over troops or other units. Responsibility for conducting military operations goes from the president to the secretary of defense directly to the commanders of the unified combatant commands and thus bypasses the Joint Chiefs of Staff completely.Today, their primary responsibility is to ensure personnel readiness, policy, planning, and training of their respective services for the combatant commanders to utilize. In addition, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff acts as the chief military advisor to the president and the secretary of defense. In this strictly advisory role, the Joint Chiefs constitute the third-highest deliberative body for military policy, after the National Security Council and the Homeland Security Council, which includes the president and other officials besides the chairman of the Joint Chiefs. While serving as the chairman or vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, chief of staff of the Army, commandant of the Marine Corps, chief of naval operations, chief of staff of the Air Force, or commandant of the Coast Guard, basic pay is $18,808.20 a month, plus a $4,000 per year personal money allowance.
Current members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Non-member attendee
| Position | Photograph | Name | Service | Serving since | Nominated by | Flag |
| Commandant of the Coast Guard | Admiral Kevin Lunday | 15 January 2026 | Trump |
Although it is a branch of the Armed Forces pursuant to, the Coast Guard operates under the Department of Homeland Security rather than the Department of Defense, except when the president transfers it to the Department of the Navy. The commandant of the Coast Guard is not a de jure member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff but is sometimes regarded as a de facto member, being entitled to the same supplemental pay as the Joint Chiefs, and occasionally will attend meetings of the JCS by invitation. Unlike the Joint Chiefs, who are not actually in the military's operational chain of command, the commandant is both the administrative and the operational commander of the Coast Guard.
History
Joint Board
As the U.S. military grew in size following the American Civil War, joint military action between the Army and Navy became increasingly difficult. The Army and Navy were unsupportive of each other at either the planning or operational level and were constrained by disagreements during the Spanish–American War in the Caribbean campaigns. The Joint Army and Navy Board was established in 1903 by President Theodore Roosevelt, comprising representatives from the military heads and chief planners of both the Navy's General Board and the Army's General Staff. The Joint Board, acting as an "advisory committee," was created to plan joint operations and resolve problems of common rivalry between the two services.Yet, the Joint Board accomplished little, as its charter gave it no authority to enforce its decisions. The Joint Board could not originate its own opinions and was thus limited to commenting only on the problems submitted to it by the secretaries of war and Navy. As a result, the Joint Board had little to no impact on the manner in which the United States conducted World War I. After World War I, the two secretaries agreed in 1919 to reestablish and revitalize the Joint Board. The mission of the General Staff was to develop plans for mobilization for the next war. In these, the U.S. was always designated "blue" and potential enemies were assigned various other colors. Now, the Joint Board's membership was to include the chiefs of staff, their deputies, and the chief of war plans division for the Army and the director of plans division for the Navy. Under the Joint Board was to be a staff called the Joint Planning Committee to serve the board. Along with new membership, the Joint Board could initiate recommendations on its own initiative. However, the Joint Board still did not possess the legal authority to enforce its decisions.
World War II
U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt and British prime minister Winston Churchill established the Combined Chiefs of Staff during the 1942 Arcadia Conference. The CCS would serve as the supreme military body for strategic direction of the joint U.S.–UK war effort. The UK portion of the CCS would be composed of the British Chiefs of Staff Committee, but the United States had no equivalent body. The Joint Board's lack of authority made it of little use to the CCS, although its 1935 publication, Joint Action of the Army and Navy, did give some guidance for the joint operations during World War II. The Joint Board had little influence during the war and was ultimately disbanded in 1947.As a counterpart to the UK's Chiefs of Staff Committee in the CCS, and to provide better-coordinated effort and coordinated staff work for America's military effort, Admiral William D. Leahy proposed a "unified high command" in what would come to be called the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Modeled on the British Chiefs of Staff Committee, the JCS's first formal meeting was held on 9 February 1942 to coordinate operations between the War and Navy Departments. The official history of the Army Air Forces noted that although there was "no official charter establishing this committee...by the end of February it had assumed responsibilities toward the American war effort comparable to the CCS on the combined level." On 20 July 1942, Admiral Leahy became the "Chief of Staff to the Commander in Chief", with all individual service chiefs operating under his authority.
The first members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff were:
| Name | Service | Position |
| Admiral William D. Leahy | USN | Chief of Staff to the Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy and Special Presidential Military Advisor |
| General George C. Marshall | USA | Chief of Staff of the United States Army |
| Admiral Ernest J. King | USN | Commander in Chief of the United States Fleet and Chief of Naval Operations |
| General Henry H. 'Hap' Arnold | USA | Chief of the Army Air Forces and Deputy Chief of Staff for Air |
File:The Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1959.jpg|thumb|The Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1959. From left to right: Gen. Lyman L. Lemnitzer, USA; Adm. Arleigh A. Burke, USN; Gen. Nathan F. Twining, USAF ; Gen. Thomas Dresser White, USAF; and Gen. Randolph M. Pate, USMC
Each of the members of the original Joint Chiefs was a four-star flag or general officer in his service branch. By the end of the war, each had been promoted: Leahy and King to fleet admiral; Marshall and Arnold to general of the Army. Arnold was later appointed to the grade of general of the Air Force.
One of the Joint Chiefs of Staff's committees was the Joint Strategic Survey Committee. This committee, "one of the most influential planning agencies in the wartime armed forces", was an extraordinary JCS committee that existed from 1942 until 1947. Members included Lieutenant General Stanley D. Embick, U.S. Army, chairman, 1942–1946, Vice Admiral Russell Willson, U.S. Navy, 1942–1945, Vice Admiral Theodore Stark Wilkinson, U.S. Navy, 1946, and Major General Muir S. Fairchild, U.S. Army Air Force, 1942–?.