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Naming Commission

Legacy Name	Location	New Name
Fort Benning	Georgia	Fort Moore
Fort Bragg	North Carolina	Fort Liberty
Fort Gordon	Georgia	Fort Eisenhower
Fort A.P. Hill	Virginia	Fort Walker
Fort Hood	Texas	Fort Cavazos
Fort Lee	Virginia	Fort Gregg-Adams
Fort Pickett	Virginia	Fort Barfoot
Fort Polk	Louisiana	Fort Johnson
Fort Rucker	Alabama	Fort Novosel

In January 2023, Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment William A. LaPlante directed all Department of Defense organizations to begin full implementation of the DOD Naming Commission recommendations. This directive includes the renaming of nine Army installations by January 1, 2024. The affected Army installations will undergo official Naming Ceremonies and will retain their former names until those Ceremonies are held and the Secretary of the Army officially approves each change. A total of nine installations were officially renamed by the 01 January 2024 deadline.

The United States had a non-political Army. It was one of the few countries in the history of the world that has never had a military coup d’ ´tat, and it is partly because the military are non-political. The military depends on lots of African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans. That is just a reality. And in any event, the Army decided that it wanted to rename military bases that had been named, not after U.S. generals, but after Confederate generals who joined the Confederacy in rebellion against the Union. Who is politicized this question? Was it the people who go along with the Army’s decision to say who bases should be named after, or the people who wanted to stick with the old Confederate names? It was a reminder that there had been such divisive conflict in this country that people were willing to use violent force to seek a resolution.

As recently as 2015 the Army argued that the names did not honor the rebel cause but were a gesture of reconciliation with the South. To recruit from the most diverse generation in history, the US also needs a military that looks like America, a cohesive military which does not allow bigotry within its ranks. The idea that, "wokeness" is a top national security threat does not make any sense. Army Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a House committee in June 2020 the Confederacy doesn't deserve to be commemorated in this way. “It was an act of rebellion, it was an act of treason at the time, against the Union, against the Stars and Stripes, against the U.S. Constitution," he said. “And those officers turned their back on their oath. Now, some have a different view of that. Some think it's heritage. Others think it's hate.”

Lieutenant Colonel Matthew Lohmeier (Ret.), testified 11 January 2024 before the House Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs, against the " over-politicization of the military workplace and the forcing of trainings that are anti-American, that criticize our founders, that allege that White supremacy is a problem within the military ranks, which has never been proven. And all of that rhetoric that occurred once Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin took office led to a bunch of moaning and bitching and complaining behind closed doors of our service members. And I heard it as a commander, and so I wrote a formal written IG complaint about it that was dismissed by senior leaders because they were afraid of the political and racial climate that we have created in this country, and so they were afraid to hold one another accountable for their politics... The diversity, equity, and inclusion industry is steeped in critical race theory and is rooted in anti-American Marxist ideology."

Will Thibeau, Director, American Military Project, testified " the military must only consider factors of personnel, programs, and policy that genuinely better the armed forces’ ability to fight and win our Nation’s wars. ... the existence of a professional, permanent standing military demands that the institution exists apart from ideologies and politics prevalent in modern-day American, regardless of their political affiliation. ... . When diversity goals exist for military units or the service academies, standards become minimum expectations to meet before fully evaluating other parts of a participant’s career or life. Standards are no longer how the military selects the best, based on an order of merit list, but just how you get in the door. "

Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment William A. LaPlante on 05 January 2023 directed all Department of Defense organizations to begin full implementation of the Commission on the Naming of Items of the Department of Defense ("Naming Commission") recommendations. This announcement followed a congressionally mandated 90-day waiting period that started when the Naming Commission shared the third and final part of its report with the Secretary of Defense and U.S. Congress in September 2022. The complete report included the Naming Commission's plan to remove the names, symbols, displays, monuments, and paraphernalia that honor or commemorate the Confederate States of America.

The Civil War impoverished Confederate lands and ankrupted its treasury. The defeated Confederates lived in the literal ruins of the slave society they had fought to perpetuate. While the United States government took forceful steps to end the causes of slavery and subordination through Constitutional Amendments and direct interventions, the destruction caused by their triumph in the war also led it on a path of clemency towards former Confederates. To some extent, this binding of the nation’s wounds was inevitable, as it was the only way to prevent a long-lasting, immensely difficult, and perhaps logistically impossible occupation of the defeated and devastated Confederacy.

During both World Wars, the U.S. Army opened dozens of new training camps and supply depots throughout the nation to train and equip close to 20 million military personnel. The bases were ultimately placed and named largely due to regional and political considerations. The Army often deferred to local sensitivities and regional connections of a namesake while naming them. White Southerners advocated for names they had been raised to revere: Benning, Bragg, Gordon, Hill, Hood, Lee, Pickett, Polk, and Rucker. As such, the federal government named many Southern bases after Confederates. Some Southerners concluded these names were little more than a Yankee trick to encourage Southern boys to fight in Yankee wars, but this was a minority view.

Black Lives Matter movement began in July 2013 when George Zimmerman was acquitted of fatally shooting Trayvon Martin, a 17-year-old unarmed black teenager. The movement gained national ground a year later in July 2014 with the death of Eric Garner. While the movement to “eradicate white supremacy" enjoyed broad support from African Americans, it has been criticized by conservatives, with some Republican politicians accusing it of fostering anti-police bias. George Floyd, a black man, died 25 May 2020 after a Minneapolis police officer pressed a knee on his neck even after Floyd pleaded for air while handcuffed and stopped moving. Soon street protests flooded American cities with the heightened awareness of racial injustice that followed the death in police custody of George Floyd.

The Naming Comission noted: "commemorations highlight individuals, movements and moments that epitomize the highest values of our present and motivate us as we shape our societies of the future. History recounts, explains, and examines. Commemoration celebrates, affirms, and extols. History is about who we were. Commemoration is about who we strive to be. In passing the 2021 William M. “Mac” Thornberry National Defense Authorization Act, the United States Congress determined that Confederates and the Confederacy no longer warrant commemoration through Department of Defense assets. ... In the full view of history and with the nation’s steadfast dedication to equality under the law as a guiding light for all Americans, it seems certain that these current Confederate names will only become even more inappropriate over time."

During visits to the nine Army installations in 2021, the Commission participated in listening sessions with military commanders and community leaders to gain feedback on their process, preferences for new names and an understanding of local sensitivities. Over the course of those initial sessions and a public comment period via its website that closed Dec. 1, 2021, the Commission received more than 34,000 submissions related to naming activities, which included 3,670 unique names – of individuals, locations, values and more – for consideration. Between January and April 2022, the Naming Commission developed a short-list of potential new names for the nine installations before re-engaging the same community groups through virtual listening sessions to gather more input on their naming preferences.

Names on the short list included: Charity Adams; John Aiso; Alexander Augusta; Vernon Baker; Van Barfoot; Powhatan Beaty; Roy Benavidez; Omar Bradley; Ruby Bradley; William Bryant; Jose Calugas; William Carney; Alwyn Cashe; Richard Cavazos; Cornelius Charlton; Charles Chibitty; Ernest Childers; Mary Clarke; Mitchell Red Cloud; Harold Cohen; Felix Conde-Falcón; Courage; Bruce Crandall & Ed Freeman ; Benjamin Davis, Sr.; Ernest Dervishian; Desmond Doss; Dwight Eisenhower; Marcario García; James Gavin; Eduardo Gomez; Gary Gordon & Randall Shughart; Arthur Gregg; Barney Hajiro; Kimberly Hampton; Anna Hays; Rodolfo Hernández; Robert Howard; Lawrence Joel; Henry Johnson; Hazel Johnson-Brown; Charles Kelly; Mildred Kelly; Charles Kettles; Milton Lee; José López; John Magrath; George Marshall; Frank Merrill; Jimmie Monteith, Jr.; Hal & Julia Moore; Sadao Munemori; Audie Murphy; Michael Novosel, Sr.; Elsie Ott; John Page; Emmett Paige, Jr.; Frank Peregory; Emily Perez; Pascal Poolaw; Colin Powell; Ralph Puckett; Matthew Ridgway; Ruben Rivers; Roscoe Robinson, Jr.; Tibor "Ted" Rubin; James Rudder; Alejandro Ruiz; Benjamin Salomon; Ruppert Sargent; Paul Smith; Donn Starry; Freddie Stowers; Jon Swanson; Central Texas; Charles Thomas; Hugh Thompson, Jr.; Harriet Tubman; Humberto Versace; John Vessey, Jr.; Francis Wai; Mary Walker; George Watson; Homer Wise; Rodney Yano; Alvin York; Charles Young; and Rodger Young.

The Commission used the following categories from their Naming Criteria to reduce the list of individuals:

• Individual is deceased (although living candidates could be considered).
• If a person/persons, man or woman, that person during their life distinguished themselves through courageous and valorous acts and/or through a life of service to the United States of America.
• Although not required, a person/persons ideally has some affiliation with the State the base is located in or the mission of the base.
• The names selected will honor either a person(s) or a subject/theme (such as Duty, Honor, Country) that exemplifies the core values of the U.S. military and nation.
• Aggregated list of candidates reflects the Armed Forces population.

In October 2022, Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III concurred with all of the Commission's recommendations, including giving nine Army installations and other DoD assets new names that are rooted in their local communities and that honor American heroes whose valor, courage, and patriotism exemplify the very best of the U.S. military. In his memorandum, Secretary Austin also thanked the Commission for its tremendous work and dedication. Each responsible DoD organization submitted a comprehensive plan of action and milestones to implement the Commission's recommendations by its January 1, 2024 deadline.