By LEAH WILLINGHAM, JENNIFER SINCO KELLEHER and TARA COPP, Associated Press
The Pentagon said Monday that internet pages honoring a Black Medal of Honor winner and Japanese American service members were mistakenly taken down — but staunchly defended its overall campaign to strip out content singling out the contributions by women and minority groups, which the Trump administration considers “DEI.”
A Defense Department webpage honoring Black Medal of Honor recipient Army Maj. Gen. Charles Calvin Rogers was taken down last week. The department actually temporarily changed the web address to insert “deimedal-of-honor”, which then led to a “404 – Page not found” message, according to a screenshot captured by the Internet Archive on March 15.
A U.S. official said the website was mistakenly taken down during an automated removal process.
But it’s not the only one. Thousands of pages honoring contributions by women and minority groups have been taken down in efforts to delete material promoting diversity, equity and inclusion — a step that Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell defended at a briefing Monday.
“I think the president and the secretary have been very clear on this — that anybody that says in the Department of Defense that diversity is our strength is, is frankly, incorrect,” Parnell said. “Our shared purpose and unity are our strength. And I say this as somebody who led a combat platoon in Afghanistan that was probably the most diverse platoon that you could possibly imagine.”
But it isn’t resonating that way with veterans or communities who honor those groups — and raises questions as to whether the administration’s fixation on getting rid of images that highlight the contributions of women, minorities and members of the LGBTQ community will ultimately backfire and hurt recruiting. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and President Donald Trump have already removed the only female four-star officer on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Navy Adm. Lisa Franchetti, and removed its Black Chairman, Gen. CQ Brown Jr.
“The full throttled attack on Black leadership, dismantling of civil rights protections, imposition of unjust anti-DEI regulations, and unprecedented historical erasure across the Department of Defense is a clear sign of a new Jim Crow being propagated by our Commander in Chief,” said Richard Brookshire, co-CEO of the Black Veterans Project, a nonprofit advocating for the elimination of racial inequities among uniformed service members.
Rogers, a native of Fire Creek, West Virginia, was awarded the Medal of Honor in 1970 by then-President Richard Nixon, becoming the highest-ranking Black service member to receive the country’s greatest military honor. He was wounded three times while serving in Vietnam. Rogers joined the U.S. Army in 1951, six months before the racial desegregation of the U.S. military.
He remained outspoken throughout his life about the discrimination Black service members faced. In a 1975 interview with the Daily Press in Newport News, Virginia, Rogers described how difficult it was for them to rise into leadership positions and said the struggle for equal treatment in the military wasn’t over. “We still have and will have what the Department of Defense describes as institutional racism,” he said.
The story of Rogers’ web page removal was first reported by The Guardian. It was back online Monday night.
Another page that was removed featured the World War II Japanese-American 442nd Regimental Combat Team, U.S. Army spokesperson Christopher Surridge said Monday.
According to the Army, the 4,000 men who made up the unit were mostly American-born children of Japanese immigrants, known as Nisei soldiers. Their losses were so great the whole unit had to be replaced nearly 3.5 times, according to the Army. In total, about 14,000 men served, ultimately earning 9,486 Purple Hearts, 21 Medals of Honor and an unprecedented eight Presidential Unit Citations.
But their story was removed “in accordance with a Presidential Executive Order and guidance from the Secretary of Defense” when the service took down a website celebrating Asian American and Pacific Islander heritage.
“The Army is tirelessly working through content on that site and articles related to the 442nd Infantry Regiment and Nisei Soldiers will be republished to better align with current guidance,” Surridge said in a statement. “The Army remains committed to sharing the stories of our Soldiers, their units, and their sacrifice.”
The mostly Japanese American segregated unit was highly decorated despite facing prejudice after Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor. After the removal of the 442nd page was reported by the Honolulu Advertiser and other media outlets, the U.S. Army’s website prominently displayed a page with a “spotlight” label Monday featuring the unit’s history.
After Japan’s Dec. 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor, Japanese Americans were viewed with suspicion and initially prevented from enlisting for military service. Nearly 110,000 were sent to internment camps. Congress presented 442nd members and other Japanese American veterans of World War II its highest civilian honor — the Congressional Gold Medal — in 2011.
The erasure of the 442nd content also drew congressional ire. Democrat Hawaii Rep. Ed Case wrote Friday in a letter asking for the pages to be restored that “it is clear that the Army is intentionally removing these websites based solely on race without any consideration of or respect for historical context.”
The Japanese American Citizens League also denounced the decision, calling it “an attempt to erase the legacy of thousands of soldiers who gave everything for a country that doubted them.”
Bill Wright, whose father was an officer in the 442nd, said the page’s removal is just one example of what’s happening across Department of Defense websites reflective of current politics. “We don’t have any control over that except at the ballot box,” he said, adding that it won’t deter him and others from continuing to educate people about the unit.
Mark Matsunaga, a former Honolulu journalist whose Japanese American father and uncles served in World War II, said he was grateful to see the 442nd’s webpage restored, but that “one act doesn’t solve the larger problem.”
“They’re still eliminating all kinds of content — photos, articles, social media posts — that all help Americans to understand how diverse their military is,” he said. “Clearly this is part of an attempt to whitewash history.”
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