The Army Should Rid Itself Of Symbols Of Treason

[GVChamp]

Please ask a black man from the south what he thinks of Jefferson Davis and the confederacy. The confederate flag is to Black Americans as the Nazi flag is to Jews. The fact that they are not viewed as evil and have their statues in prominent locations in southern cities is exactly the problem. Southerners have tried to whitewash their crimes with the Lost Cause and Southern Pride narrative. That needs to be called out for the absolute BS that it is. Pulling down the statues is part of that.

I don't really need to ask anyone what they think about the Confederate flag, they state what they think it means themselves. These symbols mean different things to different people in different times.
Either way, there is evil and there is Evil. Hitler is singularly evil in Western culture. We hanged him. The CSA was not singularly evil: they were rebels fighting for a bad cause. When the war ended, we brought them back into the Union on lenient terms.

It's not even the Confederate flag, it's a specific battle flag by the General who had his crimes white-washed for the purpose of national unity. And, you didn't fight in that war, so why should I care what you think?

Really? I would have put Alexander the Great and Genghis Khan above the Pharaoh. Timur also put any Eygptian to shame but he barely touched Europe, so it can be forgiven the West knew little of him. In fact, I say old Genghis was worst than Hitler. Genghis won.

That's really just how Evil that Evil is! Hitler lost, but had he won, his plans for Eastern Europe would have dwarfed pretty much everyone else.

Pharoah is a title not a name and I would argue that the early Macedonian Pharoahs (the Ptolemies) were wise and 'liberated' among their age; the Great Library of Alexandria was an intentional policy.

Pharoah specifically means the Pharoah from the Bible who held the Jews as slaves and ultimately lost to Moses. The whole account is basically fictional. It basically means we spent most of our modern Western History that the embodiment of evil was the equivalent of Lord Voldemort from Harry Potter, until Hitler came along and everyone gave a collective "woah."

And there's a reason, because there isn't really anyone else who had the idea of industrializing mass murder and depopulating half a continent. The US created reservation systems, the Spanish wanted to lord over the Amerindians as opposed to simply killing them all. Hitler lost, thank god, because had he won, he would hands down have been the absolute worst human being in all of existence and likely would never be surpassed.

[Officer of Engineers]

Pharoah specifically means the Pharoah from the Bible who held the Jews as slaves and ultimately lost to Moses. The whole account is basically fictional. It basically means we spent most of our modern Western History that the embodiment of evil was the equivalent of Lord Voldemort from Harry Potter, until Hitler came along and everyone gave a collective "woah."

Still can't wrap my head around this one. Mongols and Vikings did far worst, butchered more people, including Europeans. Hell, even Caeser did worst.

And there's a reason, because there isn't really anyone else who had the idea of industrializing mass murder and depopulating half a continent. The US created reservation systems, the Spanish wanted to lord over the Amerindians as opposed to simply killing them all. Hitler lost, thank god, because had he won, he would hands down have been the absolute worst human being in all of existence and likely would never be surpassed.

He would not have done anything worst than what Stalin did. Stalin deported 80% of Chechnya and deliberately starved the UKR. Joe was right. Hitler actually could not measure up to Stalin. Stalin was truly more evil than Hitler but because he was our bastard, we gave him a pass.

Historians could easily find people more evil than Hitler. Hitler created death camps so most people don't have to see the butchering. Old Genghis had his people do it by hand (each soldier had to collect 300 heads). Shutting a door to a gas chamber is much more easier than chopping the head of a baby. There's only so many people you can gas before you run out of poison but you can starve an entire population or shipped them off to Siberia to work them to death. This made Stalin a far more ruthless pragmatic monster.

[astralis]

Hitler was a True Believer.

Stalin wasn't. same thing with Tojo. they were realists, albeit power-hungry murdering realists.

note that Stalin never went on the attack against anyone that the USSR didn't outweigh by a significant margin.

Hitler took gamble after gamble after gamble. he took risks when he didn't have to, and he did it because he Believed.

that's ultimately why the West could live with Joe and not with Adolf. France and the UK -tried- feeding the beast and got nothing more than their arms chewed up for their pains.

[Officer of Engineers]

That still made Stalin more dangerous and more evil than Hitler. Hitler believes he can kill you. Stalin knows he can kill you. You can kill the believer far more easily than the realist. You just let the believer see what he wants to see wheras the realist will always evaluate what he does see.

And finally, the proof that Stalin was more dangerous than Hitler, Stalin beaten Hitler and he destroyed half a continent to do it ... and Stalin didn't even blinked an eye.

[Oracle]

I don't really need to ask anyone what they think about the Confederate flag, they state what they think it means themselves. These symbols mean different things to different people in different times.
Either way, there is evil and there is Evil. Hitler is singularly evil in Western culture. We hanged him. The CSA was not singularly evil: they were rebels fighting for a bad cause. When the war ended, we brought them back into the Union on lenient terms.

Hitler committed suicide.

[Albany Rifles]

Hitler committed suicide.

Okay....we didn't get to the son of a bitch. We hung most of his acolytes...a few others (Himmler, Goering) took the cowards way out.

[looking4NSFS]

This author goes into detail thru several different avenues of approach for renaming installations and opens the conversation of renaming to installations beyond just confederate generals. If (as.... when....) the body politic decides to do this renaming, do we put sunset provisions in so that in another 100 years the people of that time have their chance to reassign the names for their reasons?

If in 1918 it made sense to the people alive then, to name a new base in Fayetteville NC "Bragg", and we change it to say..... "Charles Beckwith" who knows what the next 100 years will bring and what social pressures will exist to change the name again?


https://www.realcleardefense.com/art...es_115385.html

Three Directions and a Warning for U.S. Army Base Re-Naming Initiatives
.By Chad StorlieJune 16, 2020
Three Directions and a Warning for U.S. Army Base Re-Naming InitiativesWikimedia Commons
The ongoing and expanding protests about the continuing unfair treatment of African Americans and other minority groups within the United States have literally reached the gates of the United States Army. Since the founding of the country, U.S. Army bases have been named after white, traditional Generals whose legacy, at best, poorly reflects the continuously evolving nature and diversity of the United States population.

In a good start, the U.S. Army has pledged to review all ten of the U.S. Army bases named after Confederate General officers. The U.S. Army review of bases named after Confederate Generals is a good start but does not go far enough. Fort Carson, named after General "Kit" Carson was involved in the Trail of Tears that forcibly removed Apache tribes from their lands. Fort Leavenworth, named after a modest General from the War of 1812, is of little relevance today. The U.S. Army needs to rename all existing bases, depots, camps, and other installations to align the historical image of the Army with the Army's current soldier composition that focuses equally on all groups that contribute to the success of the U.S. Army. For the U.S. Army to review only bases named after Confederate's is a missed historical opportunity.

Army base names are important because an installation's name should reflect, inspire, and build aspirations of excellence for the soldiers that serve there. Serving at Fort Bragg meant lots of parachuting, hard training, combat deployments, and entry into the world of Special Operations. Serving at Bragg did not mean respect or even admiration for older, mostly forgotten Confederate leaders. The current challenge for the U.S. Army is to identify with historical leaders and historical events that reflect the diversity and complexion of the United States and portray the values of honor, respect, duty, sacrifice, leadership, and excellence of the U.S. Army. Furthermore, across the globe, there is an inconsistency in naming U.S. bases. I served at Camp Liberty Bell for a few months, and General Marshall, who led the Joint Staff during World War II, and engineered the simultaneous global military defeat of Japan, Italy, and Germany, only has a small academic center in Europe named after him. I believe, given this opportunity, that the U.S. Army can do better.

Rename Every U.S. Army Base After World War II Leaders
World War II was and remains the seminal event in U.S. Army history. The U.S. Army fought in multiple theaters of operation from Burmese jungles to African deserts to European forests. Furthermore, the large supply of skilled leaders from all branches, including the Women’s Army Corps (WAC) and Army Civilians, ensures an adequate supply of leaders spanning all minorities and genders. Re-naming Fort Bragg, the home of U.S. Army Airborne forces, to Fort Gavin, after General “Jumping Jim” Gavin of the 82nd Airborne during World War II, is a fitting and non-controversial decision that properly continues the history of Fort Bragg.

Rename Every U.S. Army Base After Historical Battles
Renaming bases after battles is an avenue that places the focus on what the U.S. Army does: fights and wins the nation's wars. The use of historical battles as base names allows a complete historical memory of the U.S. Army, incorporates the division of the Civil War, and passes muster among the population of the United States. In this manner, a Fort Wilderness (Civil War), a Fort Ticonderoga (Revolutionary War), or a Fort Remagen (World War II) will use fort names to emphasize the historical actions and victories of the U.S. Army defending the United States.

Rename Every U.S. Army Base After Valor Award Recipients
Valor award receipts are those that received a valor award in direct ground combat. These awards, more than rank, truly signify the respect soldiers have for valor award recipients. The Silver Star, Distinguished Service Cross, and Medal of Honor recipients form a pool of ethnically diverse, primarily lower ranking soldiers. Too many valor award recipients gave, as President Lincoln stated in the Gettysburg address, "their last full measure of devotion" to maintain the United States and protect their fellow soldiers. Schofield Barracks in Hawaii could be renamed Kagawa Barracks after Staff Sergeant Buddy Y. Kagawa, a Japanese American, who received a Distinguished Service Cross (DSC) as a member of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team during World War II.

Renaming U.S. Army Bases Is a Grim Reminder of Misunderstanding History
The names of Benning and Bragg dot my military resume more than five times over 20 years. I’m not opposed to changing a base's name, but I worry that name changing will make us forget aspects of our history that, although vile, need to be remembered and constantly resurfaced because they are vile. A proper remembering of history should make you simultaneously want to cheer and want to cry. It is vitally important to keep the memory of historical mistakes alive least they repeat.

The future direction of the U.S. Army must be to reengage, fully, with the entire U.S. population with the recognition that a force diverse in gender, role, and race is the best defense of the country in the future. The renaming of every single U.S. Army installation, from fort to base to depot, in a consistent and historically researched manner with a consistent selection methodology will closer align the future U.S. Army to the United States population. The existing Confederate naming of U.S. Army bases is a telling representation that the U.S. Army needs to better align its image with the faces and names of those in its ranks.

Chad Storlie is a retired U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel (Special Forces), an Iraq combat veteran, and has 15 years of university teaching experience as an adjunct Professor of Marketing. He is a mid-level B2B marketing executive and a widely published author on leadership, business, data, decision making, military and technology topics. He is an MS, Data Science candidate at the University of Wisconsin.

[snapper]

that's ultimately why the West could live with Joe and not with Adolf. France and the UK -tried- feeding the beast and got nothing more than their arms chewed up for their pains.

Whereas Roosevelt was not at all 'taken in' by Uncle Joe? BS.

[snapper]

Pharoah specifically means the Pharoah from the Bible who held the Jews as slaves and ultimately lost to Moses. The whole account is basically fictional. It basically means we spent most of our modern Western History that the embodiment of evil was the equivalent of Lord Voldemort from Harry Potter, until Hitler came along and everyone gave a collective "woah."

Another of your American delusions like the Bible being the "word of God" but it would be mistaken to include most Europeans in your collectively deluded "we".

[Officer of Engineers]

Okay....we didn't get to the son of a bitch. We hung most of his acolytes...a few others (Himmler, Goering) took the cowards way out.

Don't think Hitler would have ever gotten to trial. The Soviets took Berlin. He would have been skinned/boiled alive ... I don't think anyone would have cared.

[tbm3fan]

If in 1918 it made sense to the people alive then, to name a new base in Fayetteville NC "Bragg", and we change it to say..... "Charles Beckworth" who knows what the next 100 years will bring and what social pressures will exist to change the name again?

It made sense to people alive then because they were all hard core racist in the south and stayed that way till when is the question. Till the 60s, the 70s, the 80s, or still when it comes to whites. Remember those women screaming at a black woman entering college for the first time in the south. They are now in their 70s and their kids are between 45-55 now. Better yet their husbands were the ones rocking blacks in their cars and terrorizing them in the 50s. Think those kids are enlightened with parents like that?

Here is an interesting book review on Driving While Black out my my car forum.

https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog...t-smooth-ride/

[Albany Rifles]

Don't think Hitler would have ever gotten to trial. The Soviets took Berlin. He would have been skinned/boiled alive ... I don't think anyone would have cared.

Concur Colonel

Probably the old Horde trick of the 4 ponies tied to limbs....except it would have been with T-34s.

[Officer of Engineers]

Here is an interesting book review on Driving While Black out my my car forum.

https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog...t-smooth-ride/

Fantastic read. Thank you

[Bigfella]

Concur Colonel

Probably the old Horde trick of the 4 ponies tied to limbs....except it would have been with T-34s.

Perhaps, but I can't shake the feeling that Uncle Joe would have relished to opportunity to humiliate Hitler in front of the world. Having some puppet in judge's robes lord it over the broken down founder of the '1000 year Reich' before sentencing him to death might have been too big a temptation. Joe did like a good show trial.

[astralis]

snapper,

Whereas Roosevelt was not at all 'taken in' by Uncle Joe? BS.

what does Roosevelt have to do with anything?

recall that up until Hitler declared war on the US, the US population wanted nothing to do with the European war, and most were actively hoping the Russians and the Germans would kill each other in as big carload lots as possible.

it's the pre-war comparison that matters. given the position of the French and the UK in the early 1930s, they should have been natural allies of Germany in containing Stalinist Russia; Hitler -really- wanted the UK onboard with his anti-Comintern plan.

but Hitler was so plainly aggressive that neither France nor the UK could do that.

there's a reason why Hitler died in his bunker with his foreign enemies closing in, a fate which Stalin avoided.