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Marrakech – US President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Friday rebranding the Department of Defense as the Department of War, restoring a name the agency last held until 1949. The order permits the use of titles like “secretary of war” but does not formally rename the department, as that would require congressional approval.
The Pentagon will initially use “Department of War” as a secondary title while the administration seeks congressional approval to make the change permanent. The department’s website has already changed from defense.gov to war.gov, and signage throughout the Pentagon has begun to be updated.
“I think it sends a message of victory. I think it sends really a message of strength,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office after signing the order. He added that the original name was only changed because the government at the time went “woke.”
Trump has argued that the US had “an unbelievable history of victory” in both world wars under the previous name. “So 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,” Trump said.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who will now be known as secretary of war, has been a strong advocate of the change. He has argued it would help cement a “warrior ethos” in the military.
America back to projecting strength across the globe
The executive order instructs Hegseth to recommend legislative and executive actions to move towards a permanent renaming of the department. “This name change is not just about renaming, it’s about restoring,” Hegseth said during the signing ceremony.
Hegseth outlined a more aggressive approach under the new designation: “We’re going to go on offence, not just on defence. Maximum lethality, not tepid legality. Violent effect, not politically correct. We’re going to raise up warriors, not just defenders.”
The Department of War was established in 1789 and existed until 1947, when Congress passed the National Security Act consolidating all military services into a single entity led by a secretary of defense. The name was officially changed to Department of Defense in 1949.
Historians note the name was changed in part to signal that in the nuclear age, the US was focused on preventing conflict rather than waging it.
Several Republican lawmakers have already introduced legislation to make the change permanent. Sens. Mike Lee of Utah and Rick Scott of Florida, along with Rep. Greg Steube of Florida, submitted bills on Friday supporting the renaming.
The White House has not yet provided details on how much a complete rebrand would cost, but US media reports suggest a billion-dollar price tag for updating hundreds of agencies, emblems, email addresses and uniforms.
Democratic Senator Andy Kim of New Jersey criticized the renaming as a childish idea, saying: “Americans want to prevent wars, not tout them.”
The renaming comes as Trump has taken several aggressive military actions in recent months, including bombing campaigns in Yemen, Iran and the southern Caribbean Sea. Last week, the US conducted an aerial strike on an alleged drug-smuggling boat in international waters of the Caribbean Sea, killing 11 people.
The rebrand also follows other name changes under the Trump administration, including returning Confederate names to military bases that had been renamed during the previous administration and dubbing the Gulf of Mexico the “Gulf of America” in federal documents.
Trump’s executive order marks his 200th since taking office in January. The move comes shortly after China unveiled a range of new weapons, drones and other military hardware in a massive parade that many interpreted as a message to the US and its allies.
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