Youse Got a Pretty Interesting Definition of Defense
I’m listening to Talk of the Nation on NPR where they’re discussing the proposed Gates budget and even as a person who acknowledges the need for geo-political military force and seeks to articulate a clearer, cleaner, and acceptable application of that force, the irony of calling that section of government responsible for US military force “the Department of Defense” is not lost on me.
Ah the subtle tyranny of euphemistic nomenclature…
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13 comments
The old “War Department” nomenclature was quite a bit more accurate, no?
“Gentlemen! You can’t fight in here! This is the war room!”
Also interesting– the Department of Homeland Defense is an entirely different agency than the Defense Department. Discuss.
Indeed, I wasn’t aware of the history, interesting. Of course, you couldn’t go back to calling it the Dept. of War, no matter the accuracy. I wonder what would balance the various dynamics in an acceptable manner…
It’s actually a pretty tough exercise when you put yourself to it. You have to find something that not an obvious lie, while not tipping into rhetoric.
Thanks, Freddie. Someone had to do that.
The separation of the two is weird given that one would assume that DoD is in charge of defending, you know, the homeland. What else would it be defending… sarcastic pause…?
Maybe the entire practice of governmental nomenclature is an exercise in Freudian slippage.
At least we don’t have a Department of Peace calling our military shots yet – war is peace, after all…
We have too many departments in general, not just in the defense sector; like Commerce and Treasury for instance. I think we could do a little belt-tightening, though I’d certainly go after Defense/Homeland Security first. Bloated, ineffectual and self-serving.
All we are saying, is give Peace a chance, man.
One does have to admit that the current Somali pirate-US stand-off seems to vindicate Gates’ budget proposals…
What’s depressing is that the military budget contains neither the budgets for the Department of Homeland Security, nor the Department of Energy, which pays for and is responsible for our nuclear arsenal. So our military budget is even bigger than most people realize.
In his latest book, which I’m closing in on finishing, Thomas Barnett, who I mention a lot, makes the claim that the size of the US military is an important factor in maintaining some degree of geo-political stability by playing the role of the only viable global leviathan.
Not sure how I feel about that idea, but I thought it was perhaps worth throwing out here.
As an aside, have you read Yglesias’ Heads in the Sand, Freddie? I think it’s next on my docket.
When did it change from Department of War to Department of Defense? Given that America’s territory has been attacked by a foreign power a grand total of twice since 1814 (Pearl Harbour and 9/11), the current name really doesn’t fit at all.
But then, if they wanted accuracy they’d call it the Department of Empire. Like the European powers tended to bundle together the Department of Navy and the Colonies.
Katherine, see the wiki link in Scott’s first comment. The renaming occurred in the late 1940s, under Truman, as bart of the National Security Act which also created the National Security Council and was a major part of the beginning of the Cold War, when admittedly the name made a bit more sense. Only a bit, though.
Katherine, you are rapidly becoming one of my favourite commenters, no snark underlying. Truth to power, sister. Truth to power.
Freddie: “Also interesting– the Department of Homeland Defense is an entirely different agency than the Defense Department. Discuss.”
Somebody once said that, after 9/11, when it became clear that the USA might actually need to be defended, they created a new department. Perhaps because the DoD wasn’t interested in defence?