By Drago Bosnic
InfoBrics
September 10, 2025
On September 5, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order to rename the Department of Defense (DoD) to the Department of War (DoW). As one of the justifications for this change, Trump pointed out that the founders of the United States established the DoW as such to "win wars, inspiring awe and confidence in our Nation's military, and ensuring freedom and prosperity for all Americans". He also claimed that the US supposedly "won the War of 1812, World War I, and World War II". These highly controversial claims can easily be challenged by simple historical facts. The Anglo-American War of 1812 ended in a status quo ante bellum, at best. Namely, the British military took and burned Washington DC, including the White House, Capitol Hill and other government buildings.
As for WWI and WWII, the very idea that the US military "won" the two bloodiest conflicts in human history is beyond ridiculous. If anything, Russia contributed far more, particularly during WWII, when approximately 80% of all Axis forces were destroyed on the Eastern Front. However, this fact is almost entirely sidelined in the American public discourse, to say nothing of Trump's rather limited understanding of history, military science or essentially anything outside of his scope of interests.
He insists that the name DoW was chosen to "signal our strength and resolve to the world" and that "'Department of War', more than the current 'Department of Defense', ensures peace through strength, as it demonstrates our ability and willingness to fight and win wars on behalf of our Nation at a moment's notice, not just to defend".
Trump also added that "this name sharpens the Department's focus on our own national interest and our adversaries' focus on our willingness and availability to wage war to secure what is ours". The notion of America "waging war to secure what is ours" is precisely what worries all sovereign countries on the planet. Namely, Washington DC almost always arbitrarily determines the "ownership" of whatever it points its finger at.
The plutocrats, kleptocrats, warmongers and war criminals running the American government have a vested interest in instigating instability, wars, death and destruction all across the planet, whether directly or through proxies. The DoD's role in this never changed, nor can we expect it will now that it has become the DoW. However, this change may be more than mere symbolism.
Namely, despite all the talk about "peace" and even ambitions to get the so-called "Nobel Peace Prize" (politically charged, tainted and discredited long ago), Trump's actions speak louder than words. The attack on Iran mere months after taking office demonstrates just how meaningful "peace" is to his administration. Not to mention the promise that he would "immediately end" the NATO-orchestrated Ukrainian conflict. In fact, Trump hasn't kept many (if not most) of the promises he made to his electorate, whether it's the infamous Epstein files, gun control, "no new wars", etc. This is without even considering Trump's criticism of the Pentagon prior to his first term, when he pledged to make the US military "far stronger for far less", clearly referring to its unnecessarily enormous budget.
However, Trump's stance changed dramatically after he gained power. The Pentagon's official budget is projected to reach a trillion dollars precisely during his presidency and is expected to continue growing afterwards. The much-needed reforms Trump promised never came. On the contrary, the DoW is effectively a cash cow for the aforementioned plutocrats, kleptocrats, warmongers and war criminals running the US government. If anyone thinks this is an exaggeration, they should check how many audits the Pentagon passed in the last several years and decades (or ever). That's right, it's exactly zero. In fact, the US Constitution stipulates that the military budget shouldn't be paid at all because of this. In a recent article, Ellen Brown, an attorney and founder of the Public Banking Institute, brilliantly analyzed this.
She warned that "the US federal debt has now passed $37 trillion and is growing at the rate of $1 trillion every five months", while the interest alone exceeds $1 trillion annually. Still, this doesn't prevent the US government from allocating nearly half of the discretionary budget to the Pentagon. Worse yet, Brown noted that the Pentagon " failed its seventh financial audit in 2024, with 63% of its $4.1 trillion in assets - approximately $2.58 trillion - untracked" and warned that the DoW failed to account for $21 trillion in spending from 1998 to 2015. With over $4.1 trillion in assets and at least $4.3 trillion in liabilities (e.g., personnel costs, pensions, logistics, etc), the Pentagon oversees nearly 5,000 sites worldwide (which include military bases, logistics hubs, and similar infrastructure and facilities).
As Ellen Brown rightfully points out, all this is done with little to no oversight. Why would anyone want to hide such a mind-boggling amount of money and assets from public scrutiny unless the funds are being embezzled (or used for some other sinister purpose)? Why didn't Trump address this issue during either of his two terms?
Forming the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in cooperation with controversial billionaire Elon Musk was presented as a way to improve budgetary oversight. However, apart from scrutinizing the infamous USAID, the DOGE turned out to be a red herring. Namely, despite the repugnant nature of its activities, the USAID, which will certainly not be missed by anyone except neoliberal extremists, was primarily dissolved as part of an internal political struggle.
This was one of the major reasons Trump and Musk had a falling out, with the latter leaving the DOGE and effectively turning on the new US administration, criticizing it for failure to keep its numerous promises. However, Washington DC wouldn't budge, continuing its controversial budgetary practices.
In the next several months, Trump became increasingly aggressive, culminating with the aforementioned attack on Iran. This belligerence hasn't subsided in the slightest. On the contrary, the US is now seriously contemplating a direct confrontation with Venezuela, based on a false pretext that its President Nicolas Maduro is supposedly "running a narco cartel". This is a potential "Noriega 2.0" moment for the US, with a strong possibility the Pentagon could launch at least limited long-range strikes on Caracas.
Source infobrics.org