In Defense of 'Defense'

"Well, that's a bit of an oversimplification. Like the more recent Department of Homeland Security, the current Department of Defense brought together a new government entity with several preexisting ones. In the Pentagon's case, the National Security Act of 1947 consolidated the Department of War, the Department of the Navy, and the newly minted Department of the Air Force after the Second World War. The military branches fully fell under the secretary of defense beginning in 1949."

"But a return to what's old is at least partly what Trump has in mind. "We won World War I [and] World War II. It was called the Department of War. To me, that's really what it is," he said last month. "I'm talking to the people. Everybody likes that. We had an unbelievable history of victory when it was Department of War. Then we changed it to Department of Defense.""

President Donald Trump is advocating renaming the Department of Defense to the Department of War to evoke past military victories and a sharper wartime focus. The Department of Defense originated in 1947 when the National Security Act consolidated the Department of War, Department of the Navy, and the new Air Force, with unified civilian leadership beginning in 1949. Supporters including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and some Republican lawmakers have promoted the idea and polled favorably among social media respondents. Legislation has been introduced to make the change permanent rather than relying on executive action. The proposal also aims to prioritize lethality over DEI initiatives in military policy.

Read at The American Conservative