Limited Duty Officer

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A Limited Duty Officer (LDO) is an officer in the United States Navy or United States Marine Corps who was selected for commissioning based on his/her skill and expertise, and is not required to have a bachelor's degree. They are used in situations where it is desirable to have an officer with strong, specific deckplate-level technical knowledge.

In the U.S. Navy and U.S. Marine Corps, LDOs and Chief Warrant Officers (CWOs), are former enlisted technicians (petty officers or chiefs). They are experts and leaders in the technical specialty enlisted rates from which they came.

First Class Petty Officers and Chief Petty Officers with less than 16 years of service are eligible for the LDO program, while chiefs with 16 or more years of service, senior chief and master chiefs usually are selected in the CWO program. However CWOs can, and do, move into the LDO program, but do so as a lieutenant junior grade. This is because CWOs rank "with but after" ensigns. A similar process is used for Staff Sergeants and Gunnery Sergeants for LDO, and Gunnery Sergeants and above for CWO in the Marine Corps.

LDOs are technical officer managers while CWOs are considered technical officer specialists. While the scope of a CWO's authority does not change much as one advances from CWO2-CWO5, an LDO's scope of authority broadens and increases as one promotes to lieutenant junior grade, lieutenant, lieutenant commander, commander, etc.

The term "Limited Duty" refers not to an LDO's authority, but rather the LDO's career progression and restrictions. Historically an LDO, prior to World War II, could only advance as far as lieutenant. Later an LDO could be promoted to commander. In the 1990s the ceiling in most communities was raised to captain, and in some cases, LDOs in a few communities could conceivably rise to rear admiral (lower half).

Unlike their Unrestricted Line Officer (URL) brethren, most LDOs cannot aspire to command a major warship, combat aviation squadron, or auxiliary vessel, although for a select few in the right communities this is now a possibility. Many LDOs have qualified for command ashore of certain shore activities, ranging from small activities such as Naval Reserve Centers (renamed Navy Operational Support Centers) at the Lieutenant Commander and Commander level, to large activities such as the Naval Air Technical Training Center at the Captain level.

The LDO/CWO motto is "sursum ab ordine" which means "up from the ranks" to underline a distinction between them and officers commissioned directly from collegiate programs such as the U.S. Naval Academy, Naval ROTC, and similar pre-commissioning officer candidate programs of the Navy and Marine Corps.^{[citation needed]}