President Donald Trump will sign an executive order renaming the Department of Defense on Friday to its former namesake.
The president and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth have indicated in recent days that they want to change the name of the agency back to the Department of War, as part of the president’s ‘warrior ethos’ campaign within the Pentagon.
A White House official has since confirmed that Trump will roll out the name change on Friday in an executive order that calls for the term ‘Department of War’ to be used as a secondary title to the Department of Defense and terms like ‘Secretary of War’ to refer to Hegseth’s position.
The order also instructs Hegseth to propose legislative and executive actions to make the name change permanent.
Implementing the executive order will now require the federal government to change its websites, as well as signage at the Pentagon – including changing the name for the press briefing room to the ‘Pentagon War Annex,’ a White House official said.
The United States had called its military agency the Department of War up until 1949, when it was changed in accordance with the National Security Act of 1947 to the Department of Defense.
But Trump has suggested he would like to change the name back.
‘Everybody likes that we had an unbelievable history of victory when it was Department of War,’ he told reporters on August 25. ‘Then we changed it to Department of Defense.’
President Donald Trump will sign an executive order renaming the Department of Defense to the Department of War on Friday
Implementing the executive order will now require the federal government to change its websites, as well as signage at the Pentagon
Hegseth has also expressed his support for the name change, and has even started referring to himself as the Secretary of War.
‘We won WWI, and we won WWII, not with the Department of Defense, but with… the Department of War,’ he said in an interview Wednesday on Fox & Friends.
‘As the president has said, we’re not just defense, we’re offense.’
Hegseth added that the president has ‘reestablished at the Department the warrior ethos.
‘We want warriors, folks that understand how to exact lethality on the enemy. We don’t want endless contingencies and just playing defense,’ Hegseth said.
‘We think words and names and titles matter. So we’re working with the White House and the president on it,’ he added.
It remains unclear whether the name change will require Congressional approval, as the legislative branch has the constitutional authority to establish federal departments.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has expressed his support for the name change, and has even started referring to himself as the Secretary of War
But Trump has expressed his confidence that he doesn’t need Congressional approval – and if he does, lawmakers will get in line.
‘We’re just going to do it,’ the president said in his remarks on August 25. ‘I’m sure Congress will go along if we need that. I don’t think we even need that.’
It seems President Trump already has the support of Republican Utah Sen. Mike Lee, who introduced a bill on Tuesday to change the name of the department.
‘I’m proud to introduce the Department of War Restoration Act to make President Trump’s return to tradition permanent in federal law,’ he said, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.
‘It should always be clear to anyone who would harm our people: American’s don’t just play defense.’
Lee also declared on social media that the Department of War is ‘the only name that captures the full range of America’s military capabilities.’
