The Department of Defense began last week the work of changing the names of military infrastructure tied to the Confederate States of America, Task & Purpose reported Sunday.
The work began with the disassembly of a Confederate memorial showing Southern troops marching to war, with slaves following along. The monument had stood there for more than a century.
"Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment William LaPlante today directed all DOD organizations to begin full implementation of the Commission on the Naming of Items of the Department of Defense, aka The Naming Commission, and those recommendations," Pentagon spokesman Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder said Thursday.
According to the commission's final report, the project will cost approximately $62.5 million. Still, Ryder did not give an exact figure.
The most significant changes in the project are nine Army bases, all named after figures from the Confederacy and all located in the Southern states once considered a part of it. They include forts Benning, Bragg, Gordon Hood, A.P. Hill, Lee, Pickett, Polk and Rucker. Among the commission's name suggestions will be changing Fort Bragg to Fort Liberty.
The DOD has also requested that a pair of U.S. Navy ships be addressed, but the Naming Commission has yet to make suggestions. They include the USS Chancellorsville, named after a battle the Confederacy won, and the USNS Maury, named after Matthew Fontaine Maury, a U.S. naval officer who later joined the Confederacy.
But the vast majority of the undertaking will be renaming roads, buildings, memorials, signs and other smaller items heralding the Confederacy. It is estimated that therein will lie two-thirds of the project's cost.
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