Navy Task Force Calls for Changing Ship Names that Honor Confederacy

The Navy needs to modernize the way it names ships, buildings and streets, and the service should rename assets that honor the Confederacy, a task force designed to identify problematic policies recommended this week.

The recommendation is one of nearly 60 presented to Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Gilday in a new 141-page report released Wednesday from Task Force One Navy. Gilday ordered the creation of the task force in July following the death last May of George Floyd, a Black man who died in the hands of law enforcement, prompting nationwide protests about racism and police brutality.

Task Force One Navy was directed to identify and dismantle barriers of inequality. The group, led by Rear Adm. Alvin Holsey, who recently commanded Carrier Strike Group 1, held hundreds of listening sessions and focus groups ahead of releasing their recommendations to the CNO.

The group found the Navy lacks a consolidated database or process for reviewing the names of ships, streets, buildings and other assets to ensure they reflect the service's core values.

"This initiative is an opportunity to honor and name Navy assets for Naval heroes from all classes, races, genders and backgrounds," their report states.

It notes that members of Congress and the media have identified ship names that have ties to the Confederacy or white-supremacist ideologies. The names of two warships -- that of the aircraft carrier John C. Stennis and the guided-missile cruiser Chancellorsville -- faced new scrutiny last summer following the push to rename 10 Army installations that honor Confederate leaders.

As retired Lt. Cmdr. Reuben Keith Green noted last year in U.S. Naval Institute's Proceedings magazine, Stennis had a long record of championing white supremacy.

"Most sailors -- and Navy leaders -- have little idea of his background, but the Navy, as an institution, has a moral obligation to know," Green argued. "And, it should act."