Former President Donald Trump has pledged to return Fort Liberty in North Carolina to its previous name of Fort Bragg if he is reelected to the presidency, The Hill reported.
Speaking at a town hall in the Tar Heel State on Friday evening, Trump said, "The first question that I asked: Should we change the name from Fort Liberty back to Fort Bragg?"
The question was followed by applause from the audience in Fayetteville, with Trump adding, "So here's what we do: We get elected. I'm doing it."
In 2021, the U.S. military renamed nine installations, including Fort Bragg, as part of congressionally mandated process to remove the names of Confederate soldiers. The move was in response to the George Floyd and Black Lives Matter protests during the summer of 2020.
The base was named for confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg in an effort by the Department of Defense to win Southern support for World War I by appealing to the region's Confederate roots.
As military historian Victor Davis Hanson, noted, "the bases were not named to glorify racists" but as part of wider strategy to "obtain bipartisan congressional support for their funding, and to address the need in the decades-long and bitter aftermath of the Civil War to promote 'healing' between the still hostile former opponents."
Hanson did note that Bragg was not a particularly effective commander "worthy of such majestic base commemoration."
Trump doubled down on his plan later when he was asked by an activity duty soldier his thoughts on missile defense.
"I think I just learned the secret to winning absolutely and by massive margins," Trump answered. "I'm going to promise to you ... that we're going to change the name back to Fort Bragg.
"We have a great military, and we have a military that's not woke," he said. "You may have a few people at the top who are woke, and we're going to get rid of them so damn fast your head is gonna spin."
James Morley III ✉
James Morley III is a writer with more than two decades of experience in entertainment, travel, technology, and science and nature.
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