In the past I’ve been very critical of US President Donald Trump, tending to agree with the assessment of anthropologist Carole McGranahan. She wrote: “It has long been a truism that politicians lie.” It’s a strange feeling, therefore, to be writing this article acknowledging, for once, Trump’s refreshing honesty. I’m referring of course to his rebranding of the US Department of Defense as the US Department of War.

On Sept 5, he signed an executive order to this effect, stating: “The name ‘Department of War’ conveys a stronger message of readiness and resolve compared to ‘Department of Defense’, which emphasizes only defensive capabilities.” Trump went on to assert that the new name “sends a message of victory”. His redesignated secretary of war, Pete Hegseth, was even more enthusiastic: “We’re going to go on offense, not just on defense. Maximum lethality, not tepid legality. Violent effect, not politically correct. We’re going to raise up warriors, not just defenders.”

The change of name from “Defense” to “War” is not mere semantics. By refocusing the department on “war-fighting” and a “warrior ethos”, the Trump administration is acknowledging the reality of US policy over the past 250 years. Indeed, it’s been calculated that since its independence in 1776, the United States has been engaged in direct wars, proxy wars or covert conflict for all but 17 years of its existence. Since World War II, the US has been almost constantly involved in military operations, most notably the Korean War (1950-53), the Vietnam War (1955-75), the Contra War in Nicaragua (1979-90), the Gulf War (1990-91), the Afghanistan War (2001-21), the Iraq War (2003-11), and the Syria War (2014-25). Significantly, this is in sharp contrast to China, which has not fought in any war or instigated regime change anywhere in the world over the past 45 years.

At a time when euphemisms are frequently deployed to obfuscate reality, Trump’s brutal honesty about US foreign policy could be the start of a new trend. There are 15 federal executive departments in the US government, each led by a Cabinet-level official. Now that the Department of Defense has changed into the Department of War, can we expect the other 14 departments to follow suit in renaming themselves to reflect their roles more accurately? Here are a few suggested name changes:

Department of Agriculture to become Department of Fast Food Supplies and National Obesity. (Nearly three in four adults in the US are now considered overweight or obese, according to a 2024 study published in the medical journal, The Lancet.)

Department of Commerce to become Department of Tariffs. (The US president’s “most beautiful word in the dictionary”.)

Department of Education to become Department of Ignorance. (Standards of literacy and numeracy have both been in steady decline over the past decade.)

Department of Energy to become Department of Global Warming. (“We will drill, baby, drill,” Trump said in his inauguration speech, adding that the US has the “largest amount of oil and gas of any country on Earth — and we are going to use it”.)

The rebranded “Department of War” now represents a further ratcheting up of global tension. It reflects a shift away from multilateralism, international cooperation and peaceful coexistence, and risks the US going further down the road toward the status of a pariah state

Department of Health and Human Services to become Department of Dysfunctional Healthcare. (Exorbitant medical costs, big pharma profits and anti-vaccination misinformation have all contributed to what the American College of Surgeons has called a “dysfunctional” system.)

Department of Homeland Security to become Department of Paranoia, Xenophobia and Migrant Deportation. (During a 2024 presidential debate, Trump falsely claimed: “In Springfield, they are eating the dogs. The people that came in, they are eating the cats. They’re eating — they are eating the pets of the people that live there.” This sort of scaremongering has since been translated into a campaign of mass deportations.)

Department of Justice to become Department of the Right to Bear Assault Rifles. (There are estimated to be between 400 million and 500 million guns in civilian circulation in the US. This number represents more guns than people, approximately 1.5 guns for every American citizen. In 2024, the Gun Violence Archive recorded over 488 mass shootings.)

Department of State to become Department of America First (and let’s blame China for everything).

Whether these or other new names will be adopted is a matter for conjecture, but what is certain is that the outbreak of honesty in the new Department of War will have serious ramifications across the world. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has always claimed to be a defensive alliance. Is this about to change to keep in step with its most powerful member? NATO is already perceived as a threat by countries such as Russia. With the US now adopting a warrior mentality, the prospect of a more aggressive NATO will undoubtedly intensify these concerns. Similarly, China will be more wary of how the Department of War will impact on the US’ persistent “China threat” narrative.

The US has already destabilized the world through its America First tariff wars, threats to its neighbors in Canada, Greenland, Mexico and Panama, and its withdrawal from overseas aid, environmental commitments and nuclear missile agreements. It is also the world’s most militarized power, reflecting the dominance of the military-industrial complex, which has been at the heart of the US economy ever since the 1950s.

The rebranded “Department of War” now represents a further ratcheting up of global tension. It reflects a shift away from multilateralism, international cooperation and peaceful coexistence, and risks the US going further down the road toward the status of a pariah state. In the world’s dominant military power, a simple but honest name change sends out a chilling message.

The author is a British historian and former principal of Sha Tin College, an international secondary school in Hong Kong. 

The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.