- Congress approval was necessary, but Republicans who are unlikely will oppose.
- Critics claim that the name change is expensive and unnecessary distraction.
- Move would put Trump’s stamp on Govt’s largest organization.
US President Donald Trump is planning to sign an executive order on Friday to rename the Department of Defense “War Department,” a White House official said on Thursday, a step that would put Trump’s stamp on the government’s largest organization.
The order would approve defense secretary Pete Hegeth, the Department of Defense and subordinate officials to use secondary titles such as “War Secretary”, “War Department” and “Deputy General Secretary” in official correspondence and public communication, according to a fact sheet in the White House.
The move will instruct Hegeth to recommend regulatory and executive actions required to make the renovation permanent.
Since joining in January, Trump has tried to rename a number of places and institutions, including the golf of Mexico, and to restore the original names of military bases that were changed following racial protests.
Changes in the department’s name are rare and require congressional approval, but Trump’s co -Republicans have slim majorities in both the Senate and the House of Representatives, and the party’s congress leaders have shown some appetite to oppose any of Trump’s initiatives.
The US Department of Defense was called the War Department until 1949, when Congress consolidated the army, fleet and air force in the wake of World War II. The name was partly chosen to signal that the United States in nuclear age was focused on preventing wars, according to historians.
Changing the name again will be expensive and demand updating of signs and letter heads not only used by Pentagon officials in Washington, DC, but also military installations worldwide.
An effort by former President Joe Biden to rename nine bases that honored Confederacy and Confederate Leaders were set to cost the army $ 39 million. This effort was reversed by Hegeth earlier this year.
The Trump Administration’s Government’s degradation team, known as the Department of Government Efficiency, has tried to implement Pentagon cuts in an attempt to save money.
“Why not put this money on supporting military families or to hire diplomats that help prevent conflicts from starting in the first place?” Mentioned Democratic Senator Tammy Duckworth, a military veteran and member of the Senate’s armed services.
“Because Trump would rather use our military to score political points than strengthen our national security and support our brave service members and their families – that’s why,” she said Reuters.
Long time in creation
Critics have said that the planned name change is not only expensive but an unnecessary distraction for the Pentagon.
Hegeth has said that the change of the name “not just about words – it’s about warrior.”
This year, one of Trump’s closest congressional all -all -time, Republican U.S. representatives’ supervision committee, James Comer, introduced a bill that would make it easier for a president to reorganize and rename agencies.
“We just want to do it. I’m sure Congress will go with if we need it … The defense is too defensively. We’ll be defensive, but we’ll be offensive too if we’re going to be,” Trump said last month.
Trump also mentioned the possibility of a name change in June when he suggested that the name was originally changed to be “politically correct.”
But for some in the Trump administration, the effort goes much further back.
During Trump’s first period, the current FBI director Kash Patel, who was briefly on the Pentagon, had a cancellation on his emails that read: “Staff for the employee secretary and the war department.”
“I consider it a tribute to the story and inherit from the Ministry of Defense,” Patel told Reuters In 2021.
