Download the form
Treat DD Form 456 as Department-level, which changes how you look for it. Title: DD Form 456, Interrogatories and Deposition, May 2000. Function: Interrogatories and Dispositions. Because the number carries DD rather than a service prefix, the same edition covers all military departments and the defense agencies at once. Nobody issues a Navy copy or an Air Force copy.
not stated is the prescribing publication and not stated the office responsible for the document. Deadlines belong to local implementing guidance, not to either of those, so a submission date is a question for the receiving office.
Edition not stated, status not stated. That comparison is the first thing worth making, because a DD form supersedes centrally and an old copy in a shared drive is out of date for every office, not just yours.
Formats: PDF. Length 4 pages, approximately 65 entries. Pick on the basis of how you will complete it.
Fillable pdf is the default choice. Its boxes hold typed entries inside the document; the printable release is a static image of the same page with no interactive layer. Since DD forms routinely cross between services and agencies before they are filed, typed entries matter more here than on a form that stays inside one office.
Skip xfdl unless the viewer is already installed. It is the IBM Lotus Forms format, adopted Department-wide for electronic forms and still present in the set for that reason; ordinary pdf software reports it as unreadable.
All formats are free. One operational note: save the file locally and open it in a desktop reader. Browser-embedded viewers drop field properties and lose typed data without warning.
What the form asks for
- Deposition of: enter name.
- stationed or residing at: enter location
- By: enter convening authority, line 1.
- Dated: enter day and month.
- You will take or cause to be taken the deposition of the above-named witness on the following interrogatories, cross-interrogatories, and additional interrogatories, if any. If it is desired to give special instructions, add: special instructions attached. By:
- of:
- United States versus: enter name.
- In the matter of: enter case.
- to be read in evidence before a: enter general, special or summary court-martial, military commission, court of inquiry or military board.
- Year.
- Enter day and month.
- Enter year.
- Press this Reset button to clear the data from all fields.
- of the United States, convened to meet at: enter locationConvened to meet at (location).
- Convening authority, line 2.
- To: insert name or title of person who is requested to authorize the taking of the deposition. A separate letter complying with R C M 702 c 2 should be enclosed. It is requested that you authorize the deposition of the above named witness to be taken on the following interrogatories.
- Trial counsel or other person requesting deposition. a. Typed name: last, first, middle initial.Trial counsel or other person requesting deposition. a. Typed name (last, first, middle initial).
- b. Official title.
- c. Unit or command name.
- d. Legal qualifications, such as certified in accordance with article 27 b, member of the bar of the Supreme court of, et cetera. If none, so state.
- e. Signature of person requesting deposition.
- f. Rank.
- g. Date signed.
- Address or title.
Edition check comes first, ahead of any entry. Compare the printed date to not stated and replace anything older. Department-level supersession is simultaneous across the services, so a superseded blank is not merely out of date locally; the office receiving it is already working from the new field structure whichever branch it belongs to.
Work the printed sequence: header, body, signature block. The order is functional rather than decorative, since entries below frequently key to identifying data above them.
Mark inapplicable items N/A rather than leaving white space. Use the date format the form specifies. This matters more on Department forms than on service forms: the record may be reviewed by personnel outside your branch who share none of your office conventions.
Privacy Act Statement first, personal entries second. It names the authority for the collection, what the data is for, who else routinely sees it, and whether you have to answer at all.
Sign last, in ink or with a credentialed digital signature. A typed name in a signature field certifies nothing. CAC-based signing is the usual electronic method where the receiving system supports it. Date the block immediately — unsigned and undated certifications account for a large share of returns.
Check before submitting. The recurring failures are edition mismatch, gaps in required boxes, unreadable scanned handwriting, wrong date format, and certification without signature or date. Field-level questions go to the printed instructions, then to not stated, which is authoritative.
Send it as not stated or local guidance specifies. Save a copy. Cross-service and cross-agency routing is normal for Department forms, and a lost original outside your own organization is harder to chase down.
Related forms are found by number alone. The DD sequence is one unified Department-wide series, so a cited number resolves to exactly one document with no branch qualifier needed.
Where a procedure cites both a service form and a DD form, the two are unconnected. Service numbering answers to a service proponent, DD numbering to not stated or another Department office, and the two sequences were never aligned. Matching numbers mean nothing whatever.
Three drivers of revision: directive reissue, altered collection requirements, updated statutory notice text. No notification accompanies any of them, so download fresh and confirm not stated rather than reusing an archived file.
What is here is the blank form and a description of it. What is not here is legal guidance or any assurance about a particular filing — this page is not the issuing authority and does not speak for one. Those questions go to not stated, to your servicing administrative office, or to the authority identified in not stated.
Questions and answers
- What is DD Form 456?
- DD Form 456, Interrogatories and Deposition, May 2000
- Which edition is current?
- Not stated by the publisher
- Who is responsible for this form?
- Not stated
- In which formats can it be downloaded?