Pete Hegseth’s Orwellian purge leaves US military academies less free

I was shocked and upset to learn recently that Maya Angelou’s “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” was, under orders of Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, pulled from the shelves of Nimitz Library on the campus of the US Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland. As if the removal of this seminal text of American literature were not egregious enough, in this “DEI purge,” staff also jettisoned “Memorializing the Holocaust,” by Janet Jacobs’ and “Jack Johnson: Rebel Sojourner,” by Theresa Runstedtler. 

Jacob’s book explores gender as a framework in the larger context of Holocaust memory, and Runsteldler’s text highlights a Black man’s struggles against Jim Crow racism of the early 1900s. At a college founded in the early 1800s, but which did not produce a Black graduate until 1949, and a woman graduate until 1980, the reading of these text by students ought to be lauded, not discouraged.

When I was one of the few Black students at Annapolis in the late 1970s, I and a group of  classmates often discussed books we were reading outside of the classroom. The freedom to engage with books like Richard Wright’s “Native Son,” Maya Angelou’s “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings,” and Nathan McCall’s “Manchild in the Promised Land.” offered a connection to our personal stories and collective histories while augmenting our official instruction which emphasized the histories and accomplishments of white men. These activities encouraged curiosity and empathetic listening, skills as important to future Navy and Marine Corps officers as learning military tactics and armament. Current students at the Naval Academy may no longer have such freedom. 

Nearly four hundred other books were purged, prompting members of the House Armed Services Committee to demand that the Navy, “stop the removal of books from the service academy’s library.” Every American should make the same demand.  Moreover they should urge their representatives in Congress to also demand that Hegseth return the purged books to the library. 

My alarm about this library purge extends beyond pinning for earlier days of unmonitored library visits. In what appears to be another misguided effort to conform to Executive Order 14151: Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing, staff at the Academy cancelled the talk of an invited lecturer, Ryan Holiday, after he refused their request to not mention the book purge in his remarks. Staff at libraries in other military academies and on hundreds of military installations, may be compelled to take similar actions to curtail free speech. Moreover, Secretary Hegseth’s egregious actions may embolden other Trump appointees to further restrict what civilian employees may post on websites, include in internal documents, and discuss with coworkers. The NAACP correctly criticizes book bans as increasingly becoming the tool of “anti-black policy leaders who systematically perpetuate intolerance and ignorance.” More extensive book bans have already disrupted the education of our youth. The free speech advocacy group PEN America reports nearly 16,000 book bans in our nation’s public schools since 2021, numbers “not seen since the Red Scare McCarthy era of the 1950s.”  

Libraries at service academies exist to help educate the next generation of military leaders. However, these libraries are operated at what the defense department markets as liberal arts colleges. While the academies’ peer institutions have been criticized by Trump administration officials for giving lip service to the free flow of ideas and information, none have been subjected to such blatant censorship—not yet. 

One Department of Defense website reports that on his visit to the Naval Academy, Pete Hegseth said: “Our noncommissioned officer corps…gives us an advantage over autocratic, top-down militaries every day… Push information, decision-making and capabilities downward."  Yet, if the secretary genuinely believes in the power of non-autocratic leadership, he should give his subordinates more latitude to decide for themselves what they should read. 

Many websites offer lists of books banned by public officials in numerous states across the US. In addition to asking our representatives to oppose the book purge at the Naval Academy, the public can act further. Buy the books banned, share them with friends and colleagues, review them in the media. These are important actions in what is looking to be an ongoing fight against growing draconian efforts to suppress free speech and individual choice.