Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has ordered the renaming of military bases that currently bear the names of Confederate officers. His order includes the official discontinuance of a long list of military words that refer to the southern states’ secession, which led to the U.S. Civil War.
The renaming was mandated in a 2020 Defense Authorization budget package passed by Congress. President Donald Trump vetoed the package because of the renaming aspect, but his veto was overridden by Congress. The cost to taxpayers of renaming the bases is estimated to be $20 million.
The Naming Commission spent a year inventorying the military’s references to the Confederacy. In all, the commission found nine Army bases that commission members said need new names:
- Fort Bragg, North Carolina, is to be renamed Fort Liberty.
- Fort Hood, Texas, will be renamed Fort Cavazos, after an Army hero in the Korean and Vietnam wars.
- Fort Benning, Georgia will be known as Fort Moore, for Hal Moore, a cavalry officer represented in the movie, “We Were Soldiers,” and his wife, Julia Moore, whose efforts led the Army to set up survivor support networks and casualty notification teams that consisted of uniformed officers calling on survivors to bring the news.
- Fort Polk, Louisiana will be named after Sgt. William Johnson, a Medal of Honor recipient for valor during World War I.
- Fort A.P. Hill, Virginia, will be named for Dr. Mary Walker, the only woman Medal of Honor recipient for treating the injured soldiers during the Civil War.
- Fort Gordon, Georgia will be named Fort Eisenhower. Gordon was a Confederate major general and a governor of Georgia. Dwight Eisenhower was a general, Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force in Europe, and a president.
- Fort Lee, Virginia will be known as Fort Gregg-Adams, honoring the heroism of two black officers, Lt. General Arthur J. Gregg and Lt. Col. Charity Adams. Gregg is still alive, but is retired.
- Fort Pickett, Virginia will be called Fort Barfoot, after Sgt. Van T. Barfoot, who received the Medal of Honor during World War II. As a footnote, before his death in 2012, Barfoot gained national attention when he successfully fought his homeowners association so that he could keep the American flag flying on a flagpole in his front yard.
- Fort Rucker, Alabama will become Fort Novosel, after Michael Novosel of Alabama, a military aviator, and Medal of Honor recipient who served in World War II, Korea and Vietnam, with a combined 40 years of service.
The commission also found about 1,100 Confederate references that will be scrubbed, including the Navy’s missile cruiser USS Chancellorsville, named for a major Confederate victory, known as “Robert E.Lee’s perfect battle,” in a battle against the North.
“The names of these installations and facilities should inspire all those who call them home, fully reflect the history and the values of the United States, and commemorate the best of the republic that we are all sworn to protect,” Austin said in a statement.
In 2015, the name of the Western Alaska U.S. Census district of Wade Hampton was changed to scrub a Confederate reference. Wade Hampton was a Civil War general who owned slaves. The new name is Kusilvak Census District.
Go right ahead. You go right ahead. Because you’re trying to erase the United States history, you too shall be erased from history just as quickly as we are able.
Commie “playbook” ….re-writing history
How many times has THIS happened throughout history?
The People should be worried
Not re-writing history. U.S. military bases should not be named after traitors who took up arms against this country.
Your whiny complaint does not explain how they WERE actually named after Confederate Generals, who honorably defended the southern states from northern aggression. Therefore, stripping those names from their place in history is a means of erasing their contribution, thus rewriting history. As terms of surrender, the soldiers of the southern army were allowed to keep their dignity as soldiers, and were not hunted down as traitors. You also trying to rewrite history?
Is Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin going to replace the birth certificates of every person ever born in these places?
Obviously Austin has way too much time on his hands.
Erasing history for their own needs. This guy Austin is a load of —-, brainwashed to hate white people, and hate true facts. A deranged man. But a solid Democrat, and chosen by a brain-dead president. No wonder this country is in rapid decline.
Democrats hate America. This bafoon Austin is out to demoralize and neuter our military.
This is the left-over Obama racism at work.
After the Civil War, there was much consideration on how to reunify a badly divided nation.
One of the ways was allowing the military to honor southern facilities to bear the names of southern military heros.
Biden now chooses to rip away a band aid he doesn’t understand or care to. Further dividing a very divided country. This will not help swing seats in the Deep South.
I’m not sure which war Biden wants more. Us at Russia or us at each other. But he desperately wants a war.
The great divorce can’t happen fast enough. Nor his impeachment.
And before any of the woke idiots get started, the Confederacy didn’t commit treason. They attempted succession. It resulted in a war.
The Confederacy didn’t want to overthrow the US. They wanted to leave it.
History and Political Science 101.
The meaning of words and deeds actually matter.
Confederate soldiers killed Americans in order to defend slavery. It doesn’t take a lot of word smithing to understand why American military bases should not be named to honor those SOBs.
MRAK Fan, sorry, you clearly learned revisionist history.
The civil war primarily was a war of economic systems, agrarian in the South and industrial in the North. The southern states felt their livelihood threatened and decided they would be better off on their own. They seceded. War broke out. Slavery was part of the economic model and so part of the issue, but not the main driving force behind the war itself. The best indicator for that was Lincoln’s emancipation declaration was not until 1863 and three years into the war, when things for the North did not go so well. Ironically he only emancipated southern slaves not northern ones (which he actually had the power to do).
As an aside both Yankees and Confederates were Americans defending their state’s right to choose it’s path.
I do not condone slavery. It is unequivocally wrong, yet papering over history, good or bad, robs the next generation of the opportunity to learn from it and see the strides we have made to overcome bad choices as a country and improve on the good ones.
One other aspect of the civil war is the settlement of the issue whether the US was just a conglomeration of independent states or a unit indivisible.
The North could have simply said “goodbye and good riddance” to the southern states. Our north American continent would most likely resemble Europe, with many smaller countries. Instead Lincoln asserted by force, that all states are part of a whole and can not just leave. Clearly he recognized all as Americans.
Cue woke idiot.
Confederates WERE Americans who weren’t necessarily fighting for slavery, but for states’ rights. I’m not making a moral judgement here, that is just the facts.
Many Confederate generals had fought alongside Union generals in the Mexican War. Though it is unpopular for lefties to know history, you should try anyway.
As for this idiot Lloyd, he demonstrates his buffoonery on a daily basis and our military is reaping the consequences.
MRAK Fan,
And what of the ” free” Black’s, some who were in the business of slave trading that fought and supported the Confederacy? What about the poor Black Men lynched in New York in 1863 by Irish gangs upon hearing about Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation?
History gets a little messy, right?
Oh, and last I checked members of the Army of Northern Virginia were Americans too.
I further think you will find that military honors are often bestowed upon respected former enemies of U.S. forces.
Are you suggesting that we rename the Army’s attack helicopters too?
Should the Army replace the name Apache to perhaps, the AL Sharpton?
Understanding history begins with understanding the times and events in which it happened. Only through this process of critical thinking can we ever hope to learn.
You should educate yourself more before you speak
Avenger, The spelling of words actually matters. Secession, not succession.
One of the aspects of the law of unintended consequences. This empty gesture is gonna cost people and companies millions at a time when most have little cash to spare.
But Biden and his merry band of idiots could care less.
Great move! Losers and traitors shouldn’t have military bases named after them
And presidents shouldn’t be allowed to commit treason, but here we are, currently being lead by one.
Sweeney, based on your logic we need to re-name the United States Post Office because our country lost the Vietnam War.
Not lost on me this broke late in the day east/central time. Most effected locations are there.
If Chairman Joe was confident on this he wouldn’t be trying to sneak it past the people most affected.
Just remember: Orange Man was mean so we had to upend society.
Perhaps Austin may want to take a new surname after carrying the surname of a Mexican oppressor and colonizer. How many dead Mexicans did his ancestors kill? Rename Austin.
Ohyes, that will improve readiness and recruitment!!!!! His word as a Biden!!
Love how all the people here who don’t want to be labeled racist when they support racist things are coming to defense of “preserving history,” but they have yet to reconcile how naming bases (or placing confederate statues in town squares) isn’t preserving history, it’s celebrating some serious scumbags. Face facts folks, you are a bunch of bigots afraid of a world you weren’t raised in.
It seems that our forefathers were much more enlightened than you. Here are generations that fought the bloodiest conflict in our history. So many dead on both side, yet they were able to come together to again be one America and recognize brave men on both sides. That takes guts and courage. Reducing these individuals to one facet, slave holder, applying today’s standards, does a great disservices to understanding their accomplishments and contributions. It is also a simplistic approach that speaks to a lack of historical depth of knowledge. Slavery is wrong, in 1861 it was part of life as they knew it.
I pray that future generations will view your actions more thoughtfully.
Apologies. Didn’t mean to brush against you, O holier than us.
When all else fails, call everyone a racist.
Everything should be named by numbers and letters only no names of anything.
Sully’s .. “pride and joy!” Instead of this incessant focus // attention to wokeness, when are we going to see a 10X investment in military infrastructure in AK907??? AK907 is literally the front line of defense. If you don’t think so, just look at a Globe and the proximity of AK907 to:China, Russia, N-Korea, and Iran. We are basically in between all of the nefarious actors and the Lower-48. Hence, more attention // commitment to military infrastructure should be invested here.
Where could that Russian Sub be now? Is it heading the East Coast of the Lower-48? Or, sailing across the Northern Passage, ready to fire conventional nuke and then disappear? Will Fort Greely be able to intercept that in-time, before heading for the Lower-48? Or, will it target something here in AK907?
Its easier and more clear to just spell out “Alaska” than the corny term “AK907” …. which just another failed attempt in the relentless competition to create clever terminology to impress our friends.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Just two more years and thirty LONG days to go until we vote Biden out of the White House. Heaven help us until then.
Impeached in 90 days or less
The radical left has garnered enough power to remove statues and rename places; and that’s about all the power they actually have. How many times has their agenda, through Biden been spanked by SCOTUS already?
The left is spelled with an L, as in LOSERS.
uhmm… it’s also spelled with an R as in WINNERS. Deep meaning is found everywhere it seems.
Well if the guys were alive today and seeing what I see, they wouldn’t want their names attached to these things anyway. I am sure test scores will rise and crime will drop as a result of statue removal, we will have 20 times as many minority doctors and scientists working, and it may even slow global warming by removing all the Lee and Bragg street signs reflecting all that heat back into space. It will be Wankanda and Juneteenth all at once!
Disgusting and dishonoring to those brave Americans who believed they were doing the right thing!!
While we’re at it, let’s rename Fort Elmondorf, Fort Captain Kurk, and Fort Richardson, to Fort Mukluk Marston.
Sarge, wrong, Marston was of Anglo Saxon decent.
Austin is a pathetic role model for our nations armed forces. He needs to discipline himself and push away from the dinner table once and awhile. From the looks of him I doubt he could pass an armed forces physical, but I guess that is ok in the topsy turvy world we now live in where ” rules for thee, but not for me” prevails amongst the “woke” elite.
Those places were named in order to heal the wounds of the civil war, and bring both sides back together. Unity, as opposed to briben’s”respect my authoriteh” idea of unity
this is what the left does DESTROY DESTROY, DESTROY all in the name to get rid of History Loyd Austin is a ?”WOKE LEFTIST” He got 13 brave folks killed in Afghanistan
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