In this new post at The Atlantic, the former 4-Star General and Director of Central Intelligence forcefully gives his support to renaming those US military bases named for traitors to the United State. Posted at 6:15 this morning EDT, the sub-title of the piece puts it bluntly:
It is time to remove the names of traitors like Benning and Bragg from our country’s most important military bases.
After a first paragraph, in which Petraeus talks about his three times being based at Fort Bragg, names for Confederate General Braxton Bragg, he offers this paragraph to set the tone of the piece:
The United States is now wrestling with repeated instances of abusive policing caught on camera, the legacies of systemic racism, the challenges of protecting freedoms enshrined in the Constitution and Bill of Rights while thwarting criminals who seek to exploit lawful protests, and debates over symbols glorifying those who fought for the Confederacy in the Civil War. The way we resolve these issues will define our national identity for this century and beyond. Yesterday afternoon, an Army spokesperson said that Secretary of the Army Ryan McCarthy is now “open to a bipartisan discussion” on renaming the bases. That’s the right call. Once the names of these bases are stripped of the obscuring power of tradition and folklore, renaming the installations becomes an easy, even obvious, decision.
define our national identity
That is part of what is happening right now with these national protests. And yes, I know, Trump will resist what Secretary McCarthy said, not even being interested in such a discussion an almost certainly attempting via Twitter to make this a wedge issue to motivate his “base.”
Besides Braxton Bragg, Petraeus notes that also served military installations named for Pickett, Post, Jackson, Lee, Hood, Rucker, Gordon, and Benning. That is 8 US Army and Guard installations named for Confederate Generals. And of the last, Henry Benning, Petraeus writes
At the time, I was oblivious to the fact that what was then called the “Home of the Infantry” was named for Henry L. Benning, a Confederate general who was such an enthusiast for slavery that as early as 1849 he argued for the dissolution of the Union and the formation of a Southern slavocracy. Fort Benning’s physical location, on former Native American territory that became the site of a plantation, itself illustrates the turbulent layers beneath the American landscape
There is much that is thoughtful in this piece, which I urge you to read. And Petraeus rightly notes that
In the course of their professional development, soldiers often study the tactical and operational skills of leaders who fought for dubious causes. Learning how to win a particular kind of battle is different than learning how to win a war. Intellectual appreciation of a given general’s tactical genius, however, should not become wholesale admiration or a species of devotion. When
But there is something beyond that. Petraeus does acknowledge early on the offensive nature of these names to among other African American soldiers. But he also goes further:
It also happens that—Lee and Jackson excepted—most of the Confederate generals for whom our bases are named were undistinguished, if not incompetent, battlefield commanders. Braxton Bragg, for example, left a great deal to be desired as a military leader. After graduating from West Point in 1837, he served in the Second Seminole War and the Mexican War. His reputation for physical bravery was matched by one for epic irascibility. Bragg’s temper was so bad, Ulysses S. Grant recounted in his memoirs, that an old Army story had a superior once rebuking him, “My God, Mr. Bragg, you have quarreled with every officer in the army, and now you are quarrelling with yourself!” Bragg’s inability to cooperate diluted his effectiveness until his resounding defeat at the Battle of Chattanooga, in November 1863, precipitated his resignation from the Confederate army.
OUCH!
Petraeus notes
Fort Bragg and most of the other posts in question were established either during World War I, at one peak of the Lost Cause movement, or in the early 1940s, as the country was feverishly gearing up for World War II.
and that in the latter case, there was a concerted effort to gain the support of the population around those bases in the former Confederacy.
This essay is wide-ranging, and I cannot cover all the issues Petraeus thoroughly addresses. For example, there is extensive commentary on Robert E Lee, who after all was a distinguished graduate of the USMA at West Point from which he graduated with no demerits during his academic studies, and who after all had been offered command of the Union Army. Petraeus does not argue for erasing all representation and memory of Lee, yet he cautions us
But remembering Lee’s strengths and weaknesses, his military and personal successes and failures, is different from venerating him.
He goes on to note that over time we have as a nation been more willing to look more criticaly — and thus more completely — at notable figures including Jefferson, Teddy Roosevelt, and Wilson as well as Lee, then reminds us
It is indicative of the complexity of the problem that while the stained-glass window honoring Robert E. Lee in the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., was removed, that of Wilson, an ardent segregationist, remains (after a healthy debate).
It is further true that the treason of these men is clearly indicated by the fact that the vast majority of them resigned from the US Army to take arms against the country in whose army they had served.
In his penultimate paragrapn Petraeus notes that we could easily disqualifying these men from being memorialized with their names on Army installations on the grounds that we are honoring them actions and achievements not done in the service of that Army but in taking up arms against it, although he would prefer to do so by the words of the appropriate regulation:
“Memorializations will honor deceased heroes and other deceased distinguished individuals of all races in our society, and will present them as inspirations to their fellow Soldiers, employees, and other citizens.”
all races in our society
clearly these men represent a racist ideology that is offensive to African Americans and should be to the rest of us
inspirations to their fellow Soldiers, employees, and other citizens
they are NOT inspirations to many Americans. How can they be inspirations to the soldiers who train and/or are stationed there when they fought against the Army whose installations inappropriately -, no, OFFENSIVELY- memorialize them?
And I will close by pushing fair use and giving you ALL of the final paragraph by Petraeus because you should read it, even if you read nothing else from this piece:
he magic of the republic to which many of us dedicated our professional lives is that its definition of equality has repeatedly demonstrated the capacity to broaden. And America’s military has often led social change, especially in the area of racial integration. We do not live in a country to which Braxton Bragg, Henry L. Benning, or Robert E. Lee can serve as an inspiration. Acknowledging this fact is imperative. Should it fail to do so, the Army, which prides itself on leading the way in perilous times, will be left to fight a rear-guard action against a more inclusive American future, one that fulfills the nation’s founding promise.