I always see, for example, military units, like the 126th division or whatever, but I never see any mention of divisions 1-125, or 127 and beyond, etc. The numbers always seem so arbitrary, but there has to be a reason they’re used to name the units. Can someone please explain how this works to me? Thanks.
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Unit designations were for a time issued numerically on demand. So 1st division, then 2nd, etc
The reason for the discrepancies is that many of those units were stood up during the 2nd World War or other conflicts and were then later deactivated as the US (and other Western) military was downsized post-war. The remaining equipment and personnel from deactivated units were folded into other units.
However rather than just keeping the lower digit units active, many famous units like the 101st Airborne were kept active because of their reputations while less well known units were deactivated which is why there’s so many unused numbers today.
When a new unit needs to be raised, such as a need for a new Squadron in the Air Force, it’s common for a defunct squadron number to be re-activated.
The military has a strong sense of tradition and heritage and as such the newly created unit will often adopt the original badge and unit name as well as the motto and mascot of the old unit.
418 Squadron in Canada for example was recently re-activated to fly the C-295 Kingfisher search and rescue aircraft. It had previously been de-activated in 1994 but traces it’s lineage back to WW2.
Side note all Canadian Air Force Squadrons start with 400 because that’s what was assigned to us by the British in WW2 and we just kept it.
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