President Trump, apparently trying to shore up his support in the old Confederacy, is putting the American military at risk by threatening to veto a bipartisan defense authorization bill in a dispute about the names of military bases.
It was a Senate committee controlled by Trump’s own Republican Party that approved an amendment to set up a system to rename bases currently named after Confederate generals. Trump is badly misguided about renaming, but even if he weren’t wrong on the names, he would be wrong to veto a crucial bill just because of the names.
I’ve written before about how senseless it is to have U.S. military bases named after military leaders who fought against the United States. Even apart from the immorality of slavery, which clearly was the primary casus belli for the Confederacy, the sheer illogic of the base names is astonishing.
Even worse, some of the Confederates whose names adorn the bases weren’t even good military leaders. Braxton Bragg was generally considered one of the worst (and perhaps the worst) of the generals in the entire Civil War. He lost battle after battle and was generally despised by his own men. John Bell Hood was a courageous leader, but he was promoted at the wrong time into circumstances where his predilections proved disastrous on the battlefield. George Pickett graduated last from his class at West Point and failed miserably as a general at both Gettysburg and Five Forks.
So, why would the U.S. military want bases named after ineffective generals?
Moreover, a growing consensus supports renaming the bases. The genuinely bipartisan move in Congress would not rename the bases willy-nilly, but instead take thoughtful, considerate steps to consider it after gaining input from the local communities affected. The Pentagon itself already was considering changing the base names, with one former Trump official acknowledging the military’s leadership was “shocked” that Trump would so vociferously oppose even a review process.
Yet, even if Trump somehow can make theoretical arguments that the Confederate names are still appropriate, it would be reckless of him to threaten to veto this bill over something so trivial. The National Defense Authorization Act is one of the only pieces of legislation that usually garners bipartisan agreement (25-2 in the Senate Armed Services Committee), and it is particularly important this year. It will bolster general levels of support for American troops, invest in great logistics and intelligence capabilities, and improve the lethality of weapons systems.
Crucially, it also will allocate billions of dollars in new spending toward improving the U.S. military’s power in the Pacific to counter the growing threat and saber-rattling coming from China.
Yet, Trump is willing to put all this at risk for the sake of salvaging base names honoring generals who betrayed the Union and weren’t even necessarily good military leaders.
It is fine for Trump to offer his defense of the names and to try to persuade Congress not to go through with its plans. It is not fine for him to threaten to veto the whole bill on that basis.
What Trump is doing is putting the military last — and also putting America last. It is shameful.
