The United States Department of War, also called the War Department (and occasionally War Office in the early years), was the United States Cabinet department originally responsible for the operation and maintenance of the United States Army, also bearing responsibility for naval affairs until the establishment of the Navy Department in 1798, and for most land-based air forces until the creation of the Department of the Air Force on September 18, 1947.

The secretary of war, a civilian with such responsibilities as finance and purchases and a minor role in directing military affairs, headed the War Department throughout its existence.

The War Department existed for 158 years, from August 7, 1789, to September 18, 1947,[1] when it split into the Department of the Army and the Department of the Air Force under the National Security Act of 1947, joining the Department of the Navy to form the National Military Establishment (NME). In 1949, the NME was renamed the Department of Defense (DOD).

It would be far more accurate to say that Trump likes to pretend he’s good at branding, and that leads him in some unfortunate directions. NBC News reported on Trump’s upcoming executive order to add “Department of War” as the secondary title of the Defense Department:

The order, which Trump is expected to sign in the Oval Office, won’t rename the Defense Department, but it will authorize Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to use secondary titles like ‘secretary of war’ and ‘Department of War’ in official correspondence and public communications and during formal ceremonies, according to a White House preview of the order. Trump will require all executive departments and agencies to ‘recognize and accommodate these secondary titles in internal and external communications.’

......At a White House event last week, a reporter reminded the president that it would require an act of Congress to rename a Cabinet agency. He replied, “We’re just gonna do it.”

The comment now makes more sense: Trump isn’t renaming the department; he’s wrapping a new skin around it like a cheap sedan.

We’ve been headed down this path for much of the year. The first hint came in March, when the president published an item to his social media platform that referred in passing to the Pentagon as “the Department of War.” A few months later, he reiterated his interest in the change and even referred to Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth as the “secretary of war.”.....

On the other hand, Trump has also destabilized international alliances and institutions, announced plans to acquire countries that don’t appear to have any interest in joining the United States, launched a preemptive strike against Iran, militarized his own country’s capital, mused about launching military strikes against targets in Mexico and Central America, boasted about a military strike against a civilian boat in international waters and is now rebranding the Pentagon — because “we want offense, too.”

If he’s still angling to get that Nobel, he might want to lower his expectations.