US Army: We Won’t Be Changing
Military Bases Named for Confederate Soldiers
The latest Confederate
flag controversy may be too difficult for flag supporters to resist, like a
wave crashing on the beach, the tsunami of attacks against the old battle flag
may be too much for many Southerners to bear.
This isn't the first time that
the flag has faced attack, but this time just feels different. This time feels like
it really may be the last time. Sure, they may not be able to ban the flag, but
they can turn it into a pariah, forcing anyone who flies the flag into
second-class citizenship. I think that the battle for the Southern Cross may be
a losing one, but a greater battle still rages, the battle
for an untainted history.
Along
with the attacks on the Confederate battle flag, the media and liberals have
joined forces to attack any
and all things bearing any connection to the Confederacy. War memorials, historical
sites, cemeteries,
highways, buildings, and on
and on it goes. If something is named after a Confederate soldier or is in
honor of a Confederate soldier, then it is in danger
of attack.
The
latest case in point comes from the US Military who have been inundated with demands
that they change the names of military bases which were named after
Confederate Generals! Fort Benning in Georgia, Fort Bragg in North Carolina and
Fort Hood in Texas, for example, are all named after Confederate leaders who
were both respected and beloved throughout the South and in the military.
Thankfully
it seems that the Pentagon and the US Army are ready to defend those bases and
the honor of the men they were named after. The Army does not look at the men
that these bases were named after as simply "Confederate" Generals,
but as American military icons.
Army
spokesman Brig. Gen. Malcolm Frost said "Every Army installation is named
for a soldier who holds a place in our military history. Accordingly, these
historic names represent individuals, not causes or ideologies. It should be
noted that the naming occurred in the spirit of reconciliation, not
division."
There
has to be a line drawn, hasn't there? I understand the reticence with flying
the Confederate flag in public places, but these people are part of our shared
history. They are part of the very fabric of our nation and they deserve a
place in our story, because they did play an important, even vital, role in
that narrative. Men like Nathan
Bedford Forrest should be remembered, John
Bell Hood, James
Longstreet, Thomas
"Stonewall" Jackson, Braxton
Bragg, and especially the great Robert
E. Lee (who thought slavery an evil sin and a burden on our nation).
… In this enlightened age, there are
few I believe, but what will acknowledge, that slavery as an institution, is a
moral & political evil in any Country. It is useless to expatiate on its
disadvantages. I think it however a greater evil to the white man than to the
black race, & while my feelings are strongly enlisted in behalf of the
latter, my sympathies are more strong for the former.
--- In a letter to
Mary Anna Lee from December 1856
So,
is it okay to honor Lee? Or is every Confederate soldier, even the anti-slavery
ones, tainted with the sins of racism and slavery?
This
is our history, and yes, some of it is very ugly – but there is no nation that
does not own some ugliness in its past. Erasing it from memory serves no one;
in fact it's only by remembering well our past that we can hope to avoid
repeating those very same mistakes. In this case, the mistake we should fear
repeating isn't necessarily racism or slavery (though we should avoid those),
but the mistakes of considering some in our society lower than others. Many
liberals look at those who might defend Southern culture as backwards and
uneducated. They make a dangerous miscalculation.
The
men and women who lived through the Civil War deserve more than to be erased
from our history. They deserve to be remembered for their accomplishments and
their contributions to the path we've all trod. Tear down the flag in public
places if you must, but leave our history alone.
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