Recently, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper and U.S. Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy expressed openness to renaming Army installations currently named for Confederate generals.[1] One Confederate general, who has a post named after him, would have agreed. After the American Civil War, Robert E. Lee opposed the creation of monuments to the Confederacy and its leaders over concerns that they would be divisive and delay reconciliation. In 1866, for example, he opposed a monument to Stonewall Jackson, arguing “that however grateful it would be to the feelings of the South,” construction of such a monument would undermine recovery and reunification.[2] Later, in 1869, he refused an invitation to attend a Gettysburg memorial involving both Union and Confederate officers believing that holding such a memorial would “keep open the sores of war.”[3]

One hundred-and-fifty-five years after the end of the Civil War, as the growing movement to remove memorials and monuments to Confederacy suggest, it appears Lee was right in his opposition. Moreover, whatever one believes about Lee’s decision to fight for the Confederacy, it is well past time to take his advice. The point here is not to rehabilitate Lee or other Confederate leaders; nor is it to suggest the Confederate cause had merit. After all, whatever their personal reasons for taking up arms, the Confederacy did fight to enslave others. Moreover, this taking up of arms cannot be adequately excused by the times in which they found themselves. Many, including Lee, were well aware of arguments against slavery, which the Confederacy’s ambivalent ally, Great Britain, abolished in 1807, 54 years before the start of the American Civil War. Moreover, it does not matter much that Lee and others may have expressed moral doubts about owning slaves.[4] One gets few points for questioning a practice while still benefiting from it.

Having said all this, it is also important to remember the power war can have in shaping human behavior. War empowers communal ties, strengthening the influence the community has over what one does, even when it may not align with what one believes or prevents one from seeing. Michael Walzer makes this point when he argues for the moral equality of soldiers since all soldiers are coerced onto the battlefield either by the enemy, their leaders, or other factors that are beyond their control.[5] As he observes, soldiers will submit to the “discipline of the state” independent of any patriotic sentiments or belief in the cause, but rather because they think they must “for the sake of their families and their country.”[6]

In a powerful expression of this feature of human psychology, novelist Tim O’Brien explains in similar terms why he answered the draft for the Vietnam War, which he opposed:

I feared the war, yes, but I also feared exile. I was afraid of walking away from my own life, my friends and my family, my whole history, everything that mattered to me. I feared losing the respect of my parents. I feared the law. I feared ridicule and censure.[7]

O’Brien imagines himself on a lake near the Canadian border and considers crossing over to avoid the draft. Despite not only his strong opposition to the war, but his anger at the fact his community largely supported it, he states that fleeing to Canada was something he just could not choose. More importantly, it was not a matter of reason. He relates that he did decide to go, but physically could not do it. He attributes this failure to the feeling that his community comprises the audience to his life and whose mocking and ridicule he could not intentionally provoke.[8] The communal ties he felt constrained the actual choices he had.

The point here is not to excuse the Confederate cause or those who fought for it. But it is important to understand the choices persons on both sides felt they actually had. Understanding how others perceive their alternatives explains not only how a morally bankrupt cause like slavery can mobilize a community to fight on its behalf, it also helps explain why its symbols endure. Most of the bases in question were built when the U.S. Army expanded during World War I and World War II. Naming the posts was typically the responsibility of local commanders with an interest in taking input from local communities who often wanted the bases to honor local heroes.[9]

The difficulty, of course, is doing so did not take into account the entire community, just those in power, effectively marginalizing those who were not. This effect was amplified when Confederate symbols were co-opted by those who opposed the civil-rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s, reinforcing the ties between these symbols and racism.[10] By continuing to embrace those symbols, the U.S. Army further tied itself to the marginalization of African Americans.

It is time to undo that tie. It is time to rename forts, camps, streets, and anything else named after Confederate leaders. It is also time to remove Confederate battle streamers from unit colors. Doing so does not mean one cannot find other ways to acknowledge the courage of individual soldiers who may have been more motivated by community than cause. But it is time to stop accommodating any sentiments that continue to divide and marginalize Americans.

As it has done before, it is time the U.S. Army contributes to building a more inclusive community and nation. Fortunately, there is precedent. Many military and congressional leaders, and much of the public, initially opposed President Harry S. Truman’s 1948 Executive Order 9981 ending segregation in the military out of fear desegregation would undermine unit cohesion. However, man-power shortages in the Korean War forced military leaders to integrate anyway, and they found integrated units fought as well as all-white ones. As a result, the military dropped its opposition to desegregation, even while public and congressional opposition endured.[11]

So, it is time to drop the remaining vestiges of a cause that continues to divide Americans. As O’Brien’s example suggests, we should also learn from this experience. The first lesson to learn is that our communal ties, however we conceive them, can give rise to moral blind-spots where we may not be fully aware of the harm certain practices and institutions in which we participate may cause. So, when someone or some group complains of marginalization the individual and institutional response should be to listen. The U.S. Army should have had this conversation a long time ago. It should not have taken a national crisis to force it.

The second lesson deals with the need to promote awareness of how community ties can create such blind-spots and proactively identify ways to remove them. As Peter Olsthoorn points out, social cohesion sets conditions for physical courage within a group while at the same time undermining moral courage.[12] Soldiers will risk their lives rather than let their fellows down, but at the same time fail to stand up for much the same reason. This point suggests the military, which depends on highly cohesive units, can set itself up for moral failure. The U.S. Army should investigate where this dynamic provides cover for discriminatory practices.

Finally, however the U.S. Army proceeds, it should do so with understanding and compassion in mind. However, understanding and compassion do not entail compromise, especially in this context. Nor does the burden for either fall only to one side. Rather, keeping compassion and understanding in mind entails both giving it and demanding it. The U.S. Army should listen to those who see Confederate symbols as an important part of American history. But the U.S. Army should also demand that they see how divisive and marginalizing those symbols have become and if not understand the necessity of their removal, accept it for the sake of the larger community.

There are, of course, a number of ways the Army could proceed in determining new names. One would be to follow the example of the Navy and Air Force whose bases are often named for their locations. Another would be to consult the local community again, but seek names of individuals who fought in other wars, perhaps prioritizing minorities who served. The U.S. Army could also review all base names and ensure they represent the demographics of the Army today. More to the point, the U.S. Army should take this opportunity to go beyond such important, but cosmetic, changes and address remaining systemic barriers or conditions that marginalize its minority members.

C. Anthony Pfaff is a retired Army officer and currently serves as the Research Professor for Strategy, the Military Profession and Ethic at the Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College. The views expressed in this article are the author’s and do not represent the official position of the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

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Header Image: “The Storming of Fort Wagner” by Kurz and Allison (Wikimedia)

Notes:

[1] Kyle Rempfer, “SECDEF and Army Secretary Open to Renaming Posts Named for Confederate Generals,” Army Times, June 9, 2020, https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2020/06/08/army-secretary-is-now-open-renaming-posts-named-for-confederate-generals/, accessed June 10, 2020.

[2] Lisa Desjardins, “Robert E. Lee Opposed Confederate Monuments,” PBS News Hour, August 15, 2017, https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/robert-e-lee-opposed-confederate-monuments, accessed June 10, 2020.

[3] Desjardins.

[4] Jonathan Horn, The Man Who Would Not Be Washington (New York: Scribner, 2015), 74-75.

[5] Michael Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars: A Moral Argument with Historical Illustrations (New York: Basic Books, 1977), 34-47.

[6] Walzer, 35.

[7] Tim O’Brien, The Things They Carried (New York, Houghton Mifflin, 1990), 45.

[8] O’Brien, 57.

[9] Mark Hebert, “How Did the US Military Get All Those Confederate-Named Bases, Anyway,” Task and Purpose, August 18, 2017, https://taskandpurpose.com/history/u-s-military-get-confederate-named-bases-anyway, accessed June 14, 2020.

[10] Logan Strother, Thomas Ogorzalek, and Spencer Piston, “The Confederate Flag Largely Disappeared After the Civil War. The Fight Against Civil Rights Brought it Back.,” The Washington Post, June 12, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/06/12/confederate-symbols-largely-disappeared-after-the-civil-war-the-fight-against-civil-rights-brought-them-back/, accessed June 10, 2020.

[11] Michael C. Desch, Civilian Control of the Military: The Changing Security Environment (Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999), 26-27.

[12] Peter Olsthoorn, Military Ethics and Virtues: An Interdisciplinary Approach for the 21st Century (New York: Routledge, 2011), 52.