- Address:
- 5111 Leesburg Pike Skyline 5, Suite 810
Falls Church, VA 22041
- Phone:
- (703) 681-0064
- Website:
- http://www.defenselink.mil/
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- Company Information:
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We are America’s oldest , largest, busiest and most successful company.
With our military units tracing their roots to pre-Revolutionary times, you might say that we are America’s oldest company. And if you look at us in business terms, many would say we are not only America’s largest company, but its busiest and most successful.
How We Evolved
The Army, Navy, and Marine Corps were established in 1775, in concurrence with the American Revolution. The War Department was established in 1789, and was the precursor to what is now the Department of Defense.
The Department of the Navy, and the U.S. Coast Guard, were founded in 1798.
Congress, in 1947, established a civilian, Cabinet-level Secretary of Defense to oversee an also newly created National Military Establishment.
The U.S. Air Force was also created, along with a new Department of the Air Force. The War Department was converted to the Department of the Army.
Finally, the three services, Army, Navy, and Air Force, were placed under the direct control of the new Secretary of Defense.
In 1949, an amendment to the Act consolidated further the national defense structure, creating what we now know as the Department of Defense, and withdrawing cabinet-level status for the three Service secretaries.
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