President Trump signed an executive order on Friday allowing the Department of Defense to be called the Department of War, restoring a name that had been used from 1789 to 1947.
“We won the first World War, we won the second World War, we won everything before that and in between, and then we decided to go woke and we changed the name to Department of Defense. So we’re going Department of War,” Trump said in the Oval Office. “I think it’s a much more appropriate name, especially in light of where the world is right now.”
Asked what message the rebranding sends to enemies, allies and the American people, Trump said it was a message of victory. “I think it sends, really, a message of strength. We’re very strong. We’re much stronger than anyone would really understand.”
A formal renaming would require an act of Congress, and Trump allies on Capitol Hill are proposing legislation to do so. Without such legislation, Trump’s order authorizes the use of “Department of War” as a secondary title and allows officials including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to use titles such as “Secretary of War” in official correspondence and public communications. The order reportedly also directs Hegseth to recommend actions leading to a permanent renaming as the U.S. Department of War.
Hegseth said Friday that the United States hadn’t won a major war since the Defense Department name was adopted. “This name change is not just about renaming, it’s about restoring,” Hegseth said. “We’re going to go on offense, not just on defense.”
Under President Harry S. Truman, the War Department was split into the Department of the Army and the Department of the Air Force in 1947, with those two new entities joining the Department of the Navy, created in 1798, as part of the “National Military Establishment (NME).” In 1949, the NME was renamed the Department of Defense, and the secretary of defense was given more control over the military departments. The 1949 changes also created the position of chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Truman said the changes were “a major step toward more responsible and efficient administration of the military affairs of the Nation” and would provide “better financial management.”
Politico notes that an official renaming would have a financial impact: “It would likely cost billions of dollars to change the names of hundreds of Pentagon agencies, their stationary, emblems, plaques and other signage at the Defense Department, along with bases around the world. The expense could put a serious dent into the administration’s efforts to slash Pentagon spending and waste.”
Asked about the cost of his change, Trump downplayed the expense.
“Not a lot,” he said. “We know how to rebrand without having to go crazy. We don’t have to re-carve a mountain or anything. We’re going to be doing it not in the most expensive — we’re going to start changing the stationery as it comes due, and lots of things like that.”
He went on to criticize the renaming of nine military bases that had honored Confederate leaders. The Trump administration restored the previous names, but to get around a ban on honoring people who fought against the United States, the military used the names of service members that are similar to the Confederate ones that had been removed.