Rank represents an officer or crewman's experience and seniority and provides an easy visual indication of their place in the chain of command.

While personnel from a number of different national armed services are members of the ISDC, a common uniform and rank system is used to avoid confusion (except for dress uniform which is that of the officer's or crewman's native service). An officer or crewman's native rank is translated to the most appropriate ISDC equivalent.

Rank is indicated by stripes worn on epaulets ("slides") or on the sleeve (depending on the version of uniform being worn).

commissioned officers

The below table shows commissioned officer ranks used in the ISDC in descending order of seniority.

warrant officers

Warrant Officers wear slightly different insignia to identify their particular place in the chain of command.

As Warrant Officers are not routinely expected to assume command roles, the position they hold will be a better indication of authority - exact equivalents between Warrant and Commissioned ranks are therefore not specified.

Like crew, warrant officers are technical specilaists and so wear their specialisation above their rank stripes, displayed in yellow.

crew

Crewmen bring specialist technical skills to the organization, and so the rank structure emphasizes their specialisation as much as their rank. For this reason, crew wear their specialisation with their rank insignia (see examples below).