Erasing history

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Mar 24, 2025

Have you heard about the new mission of the Department of Defense? Apparently, since FauxNews personality Pete Hegseth took over the department, his current mission has been to erase history.

Trump's fierce attacks on DEI reflect a ...

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has ordered a massive review of DOD computer archives in an attempt to “align” the department with President Donald Trump’s directive to eliminate anything on government systems that could be related to DEI. … So far some 26,000 images have been flagged for deletion, including a photo of the Enola Gay, because … well, gay… the whole business raises the question of the purpose behind deleting tens of thousands of images. There is something fundamentally weird about interpreting an order to get rid of DEI programs as a charge to erase pages of American history. What are the lethal warfighters of the Pentagon so afraid of? … the MAGA movement—including its supporters in the military and the Defense Department—is based on fear and insecurity, a sense that American culture is hostile to them and that Trump is the protector of a minority under siege. Many members of this movement believe that the “left,” or whatever remains of it now, is engaged in a war on the traditional family, on masculinity, on American capitalism, on Christmas and Christians. They see DEI as one of the many spiritual and moral pathogens that threaten to infect fine young men and women (especially white ones) and turn them into sexually decadent Marxists.
Source: The Pentagon’s DEI Panic

For me these actions are personal.

Just as the Enola Gay seems to be missing, so is information about women who served in the military, including the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) of World War II. My dad’s sister, Caryl Woodbury Jones Storz, was a WASP during the war. During 1943 and 1944, she served as a WASP at Camp Davis in North Carolina, Camp Stewart in Georgia, and Biggs Field in El Paso, Texas.

Today, when I ask people, “Do you know what a WASP is?” I usually get an answer that either relates to the descendants of the Mayflower or references yellow jackets or hornets. This is not surprising. From the moment of their disbandment in 1944, the WASP records were sealed and marked classified and secret and they were stored in the archives for over 30 years. Historians had no access to the records or accomplishments of the WASP, so their story was systemically omitted from most official histories of WWII.

By 1942, the U.S. Army Air Force was in critical need of pilots for the two-front war that was underway. Not only pilots for combat, but they also needed pilots to fly the planes from the factories to the points of embarkation on each coast. Despite the reluctance of the military establishment, the Army Air Force was so desperate they decided to bring women on as civilian pilots. They would figure out a way to bring them into the military later as the bureaucratic details could be worked out.

These pilots were the first women in America's history to fly American military aircraft. They flew non-combat missions in order to free men for combat. The Women’s Airforce Service Pilots had an enormous impact on World War II aviation. They flew over 60 million miles in as many as 75 different types of aircraft during the two years they were active. They flew the heaviest bombers, fastest pursuit planes, and lightest trainers. They were stationed at 120 army air bases across the country. The WASP ferried planes across the U.S. They took meteorologists up for weather observations, transported equipment, broke in engines, and flew as couriers. They also helped to train gunners on the ground and in B-17s, by towing targets behind their own planes.

They test-flew planes that had been repaired to make certain they were safe for the male cadets. One WASP even test flew America's first jet aircraft, the Bell YP-59A.

One of the more remarkable stories about the WASP relates to the Boeing’s B29 Superfortress planes. This was the plane used by Lt. Col. Paul Tibbets, when he flew the Enola Gay to drop the atomic bomb. The plane was rushed through production and not put through years of testing. One of the early flaws made the plane prone to engine fires. In February 1943, Boeing’s renowned test pilot Eddie Allen perished during a test flight. Tragically Allen, eight crewmembers and 19 civilians on the ground died when the plane crashed into a factory. This incident left many pilots spooked and reluctant to fly the B29 Superfortress.

Tibbets was tasked with training pilots in this advanced bomber that obviously had reliability problems. To show the men that the B-29 could be flown safely he recruited two WASP, Didi Moorman and Dora Dougherty to train. Both women had never been in a four-engine plane before. Under Tibbets’ guidance the two women trained for only three days before he decided they were ready. Keep in the mind, the regular B-29 training program was considerably more rigorous and usually ran for six months.

Tibbets’ advantage was that these two women were both motivated and unlike the men, followed Tibbets instructions to the letter. He didn’t inform them about the engine problems – only instructed them to go through certain workarounds to avoid engine fires. While training, one of the engines caught fire. Without missing a beat, Dora instructed her flight engineer to pull out the fire extinguisher and then she safely landed the plane.

Tibbets plan was to show the male pilots that if two “girls” could fly the plane, so could they. He set up B-29 demonstration flights, allowing Dora and Didi to ferry pilots, crew chiefs and navigators to other bases across the United States. These demonstration flights lasted only a few days, but were a resounding success. As Didi and Dora stepped out the planes, the male pilots on the ground were stunned and frankly a little embarrassed. They stopped complaining and got over their fears and began learning to fly the B-29.

When the women signed up to serve as WASP, they were promised they would be given military status. Although classified as Civil Servants, they had to conform to military regulations when on duty, were entitled to the privileges of officers when on an Army base, and even had their own uniforms. They went through the same training and work as the male Army Air Force pilots serving stateside and the women did the work with safer flying records and faster aircraft delivery times than the men.

This semi-civilian, semi-military status was problematic. They were treated differently than the men. For example, they had to buy their own insurance. If they were injured, they were sent home to care for themselves. There were no death benefits. And not surprisingly, they were paid less money for doing virtually the same work.

Of the 1,102 women who earned their Silver Wings, 38 of them were killed in service. When one of the women pilots was killed, the response of the Army Air Force depended on the commander at a particular base. Some pilots were honored with a service and escorted home by a fellow WASP at the government’s expense. But sadly, many of the families received telegrams with the words: “Your daughter was killed this morning. Where do you want the body?” Often the families did not have the resources to bring the bodies home, so fellow WASP would take up collections to help with the expenses. Making it even more painful, the families of the 38 women killed were not allowed to put the same gold star in their windows as other families of fallen service members.

The WASP story did not end well. When Hap Arnold, the general in charge of the Army Air Force went to Congress to get the WASP their military status, Congress voted the measure down. The WASP were disbanded in favor of male pilots who had managed to get deferments during the war, but were now being called up to serve in combat.

“Deactivation of the WASP was costly for both the war effort and taxpayers. It deprived the air transport command of … expert ferrying pilots, tow target pilots, test pilots and administrative pilots. It cost a million dollars to train men to do the women's jobs and it hampered the delivery of planes during the 4 to 6 months that these men were being trained. It also prevented the men, who were being transferred to ferry duty, from completing training for specialized combat tasks. Women pilots had 18-months experience, which could not be replaced. Fifty-five percent of the pursuit plane ferrying in the US had been done by the WASP during that period.” Source: Out of the Blue and into History by Betty Stagg Turner

As the war ended, the women moved on with their lives. Some continued to fly or stay involved with aviation in some capacity. While several worked in civil-service jobs, they did so without any veterans’ preference for promotions or any of the benefits of the GI Bill. It’s wasn’t until 1977 that their years working as a WASP were considered as part of their government service and they were given veteran’s benefits.

They were extraordinary women who contributed exceptional service to the war effort.

Sadly, not only have the WASP been scrubbed as DEI, so were the Navajo Code Talkers. When I worked on the reservation, I learned about these amazing soldiers who created an unbreakable code by using their native language. Peter MacDonald was head of the Navajo nation, when I lived there — he was one of the code talkers.

From 1942 to 1945, the Code Talkers were key to every major operation of the Marine Corps in the Pacific Theater. The Army expanded the use of Code Talkers in World War II, using members of 34 different tribes in the program. Indigenous Americans always enlisted in the military in higher proportions than any other demographic group—in World War II, more than a third of able-bodied Indigenous men between 19 and 50 joined the service—and the participation of the Code Talkers was key to the invasion of Iwo Jima, for example, when they sent more than 800 messages without error.
“Were it not for the Navajos,” Major Howard Connor said, “the Marines would never have taken Iwo Jima.”
… at least ten articles about the Code Talkers have disappeared from U.S. military websites. Broken URLs are now labeled “DEI,” an abbreviation for “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.”
Source: Letters from an American

Note: Pentagon restores histories of Navajo Code Talkers, other Native veterans after public outcry; Lawmakers Demand Trump Administration Restore Removed Webpages Celebrating Troops; Historical figures cut from military websites while others are restored following ‘DEI’ ban

Like I said, removing these pages were personal for me. Seeing both the Navajos Code Talkers and the WASP removed from our military history is a disgrace and also a signal of the sort of mindset that this administration wants to promote: If you’re not a white man, your service doesn’t matter.

I have a presentation about the WASP that I have been giving for many years. If you want to see it, check it out: Fly Girls

Thought for the day…

"We will not again look upon a woman flying as an experiment."

-Henry H. Arnold, General of the Air Force (said in 1944)

Must Read Article:

Navajo Code Talkers disappear from military websites after Trump DEI order

Articles about the renowned Native American Code Talkers have disappeared from some military websites, with several broken URLs now labeled "DEI."

From 1942 to 1945, the Navajo Code Talkers were instrumental in every major Marine Corps operation in the Pacific Theater of World War II. They were critical to securing America's victory at Iwo Jima. …at least 10 articles mentioning the Code Talkers that had disappeared from the U.S. Army and Department of Defense websites…The Defense department's URLs were amended with the letters DEI, suggesting they were removed following President Trump's executive order ending federal diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. The Internet Archive shows the deleted Army pages were live as recently as November, with many visible until February or March. None are shown with error messages until Trump took office.

The U.S. Needs Soldiers, Not Warriors

In his contentious confirmation hearing, Donald Trump’s nominee for secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth, affirmed that his mission is “to bring the warrior culture back to the Department of Defense.” It is a terrible idea…

Warriors are people who exult in killing, who prize individual courage and daring, who obsess about honor (often in self-destructive ways), who frequently take trophies from the bodies of their enemies, and whose behavior on and off the battlefield often veers into atrocity.

Soldiers are different. They are servants of the state. In well-governed countries, they are bound by discipline, the rule of law, and commitment to comrades and organizations—not to self-glorification. Their virtues are obedience, stoicism, perseverance, and competence. They serve a common good, and duty, not glory, is their prime motivation.

Quote of the day…

“NATO has been an emblem and symbol of American global commitment. But it’s also an emblem and symbol of American greatness. The success of NATO as a defensive and peace-keeping alliance is a great and historic achievement. A political movement that truly believed in American greatness would appreciate that. Instead, we have a cramped, mean-spirited and inward-looking political movement, masquerading as a movement for greatness and eager to turn its back on U.S. global leadership.

Compared to the attempted destruction of the rule of law at home or the betrayal of Ukraine abroad, walking away from this aspect of Eisenhower’s legacy wouldn’t perhaps be the most damaging thing the Trump administration has done. But it will be damaging. It would be yet another marker, another step in American decline….

One might call the Trump administration’s planned action an unforced error. But it’s not really even an error. It’s a choice. It’s a choice for smallness and pettiness. It’s a choice against seriousness, against responsibility, against a role of which we should be proud. It’s a choice against American greatness.”

~ Bill Kristol

What I’m reading today…

Hegseth Closes Pentagon Office Focused on Future Wars

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the shuttering of the Office of Net Assessment, a small, often secretive and sometimes opaque office that for more than 50 years has helped the Pentagon’s most senior leaders think about the future of war. The office costs about $10 million to $20 million a year — a fraction of the Pentagon’s $850 billion annual budget — but its work and staff of about a dozen civilians and military officers has often had an outsize impact on how the Pentagon prepares for possible conflicts….Thomas G. Mahnken, a former top Pentagon strategist, questioned the decision to dismantle an office focused on preparing the U.S. military for long-term competition with major powers at a time when China seems to be growing stronger and more aggressive.

The Age of Anti-Woke Overreach

“…some of the extreme positions—and appointments—of the Trump administration are self-evidently at odds with Americans’ views in the main. Recently, Trump appointed Darren Beattie to a senior diplomatic position at the State Department. Beattie is notorious for making arguments such as “Competent white men must be in charge if you want things to work. Unfortunately, our entire national ideology is predicated on coddling the feelings of women and minorities, and demoralizing competent white men.”

Arlington Cemetery Erases Civil War in Hegseth DEI Purge

The Arlington National Cemetery has removed key information from its website about prominent Black, Hispanic, and female service members as well as historical topics like the Civil War.

How Pete Hegseth is pushing his beliefs on US agency: ‘nothing to prepare forces’

“…mass firings and transgender bans have distracted from learning lessons from the war in Ukraine and the coming global conflict many inside the Pentagon have been predicting for years. Most of all, Hegseth’s focus on culture war is actively neglecting the “warfighters” he constantly invokes.

“What we’re seeing is nibbling around the edges of a culture with a dominant theme that does nothing to prepare the armed forces of the United States to meet its next peer or near peer opponent.”

Pentagon website removes, then restores, page honoring Black Medal of Honor recipient

Army Maj. Gen. Charles C. Rogers is the highest-ranking Black servicemember to receive the Medal of Honor. His actions during the Vietnam War, when he was wounded and came under repeated attack by the North Vietnamese Army, were later hailed by then-President Richard Nixon.

But a Department of Defense profile of Rogers, who died in 1990, was taken down on Friday. It comes as the Trump administration has pushed to remove references to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) across the federal government. The removal prompted outrage over what many saw as a disrespectful erasing of history.

Civil War Nurses, USS Constitution Commander Among Female Veterans Removed in Pentagon DEI Sweep

The U.S. military has long been a cultural and political leader in recognizing civil rights, irrespective of race, gender or orientation, lauded for removing restrictions on each years before the rest of the United States. It has also been a leader in celebrating its multicultural heritage and recognizing important firsts. The Trump administration's anti-DEI efforts appear to have forced the DoD to systematically remove those recognitions despite any heroism inherent in these military stories. Women's history is just the latest casualty.

Books I highly recommend…

Code Talker: The First and Only Memoir By One of the Original Navajo Code Talkers of WWII by Chester Nez, Judith Schiess Avila

During World War II, the Japanese had managed to crack every code the United States used. But when the Marines turned to its Navajo recruits to develop and implement a secret military language, they created the only unbroken code in modern warfare—and helped assure victory for the United States over Japan in the South Pacific.

The Women with Silver Wings: The Inspiring True Story of the Women Airforce Service Pilots of World War II by Katherine Sharp Landdeck

When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor in December 1941, Cornelia Fort was already in the air. At twenty-two, Fort had escaped Nashville’s debutante scene for a fresh start as a flight instructor in Hawaii. She and her student were in the middle of their lesson when the bombs began to fall, and they barely made it back to ground that morning. Still, when the U.S. Army Air Forces put out a call for women pilots to aid the war effort, Fort was one of the first to respond. She became one of just over 1,100 women from across the nation to make it through the Army’s rigorous selection process and earn her silver wings.

Character Matters

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