The proportion of officers varies greatly. Commissioned officers typically make up between an eighth and a fifth of modern armed forces personnel. In 2013, officers were the senior 17% of the British armed forces,[1] and the senior 13.7% of the French armed forces.[2] In 2012, officers made up about 18% of the German armed forces,[citation needed] and about 16.4% of the United States armed forces.[3]

Historically armed forces have generally had much lower proportions of officers. During the First World War, fewer than 5% of British soldiers were officers (partly because World War One junior officers suffered high casualty rates). In the early 20th century, the Spanish army had the highest proportion of officers of any European army, at 12.5%, which was at that time considered unreasonably high by many Spanish and foreign observers.```