What’s wrong with a good, old-fashioned book burning? (Part I)

The book purge at the United States Naval Academy

Just over two weeks ago, the Navy announced that, at the direction of Secretary of Defense Hegseth, it had removed from the shelves of the Nimitz Library 381 books deemed to violate President Trump’s executive orders to eliminate materials related to diversity, equity, and inclusion from federal institutions. Since then, I’ve encountered two reactions to this story from acquaintances curious about the thoughts of a former Naval Academy professor (I taught ethics).

The first reaction has been one of surprise. For many, learning that Nimitz Library holds texts (or at least once held texts) that aren’t directly and obviously related to military matters contradicted – in a positive way – their preconceptions of what a military academy is and does. “Yes, Maya Angelou is a remarkable poet and memoirist, but what can I Know Why the Caged Birds Sing teach Midshipmen about fighting wars?”

This reaction reflects a lack of familiarity with the mission of our service academies and, more broadly, the nature of officership in Western militaries. Contrary to stereotypes, there is no field of endeavor in which a well-rounded education, in both the STEM fields and the liberal arts, is more urgently required. Naval Academy graduates manage nuclear reactions hundreds of feet beneath the ocean’s surface, apply the concepts of aeronautical engineering at many times the speed of sound, and routinely order other human beings to run toward the sound of the guns when prudence would suggest running away. In preparation for service in “the Fleet,” Midshipmen must not only master the laws of thermodynamics and the equations that describe lift and thrust, but they must also acquire a fundamental understanding of what constitutes a lawful (and unlawful) order, why it’s imperative for their troops to observe principles of just conduct in war, and how humans respond to danger, fear, chaos, uncertainty, pain, and exhaustion.

In short, there is no branch of human knowledge that is not relevant to the art and science of leading troops in combat. Officers who are unfamiliar with Homer, Thucydides, Plato, Marcus Aurelius, Machiavelli, Shakespeare, Hobbes, Newton, Melville, Tolstoy, Crane, Planck, Einstein, Bohr, Hemmingway, Tim O’Brien – and, yes, Maya Angelou – are not as prepared as they could and should be. And because the moral, intellectual, and physical preparation of America’s officer corps is so consequential to America’s security, the Naval Academy should be (and is!) among finest institutes of higher education in the nation. The Naval Academy is ranked #4 among national liberal arts colleges in the latest rankings from US News and World Report (West Point and the Air Force Academy are tied at #8). It also ranks #10 in the number of students awarded Rhodes Scholarships between 1904 and 2023 (West Point is #5 and Air Force Academy is #13).

Sustaining all of this requires world-class libraries at the Naval Academy, West Point, and the Air Force Academy. Unfortunately, Nimitz Library is now 381 books dumber than it was before Secretary Hegseth’s misguided intervention. Two copies of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf still sit on Nimitz Library’s shelves, while Janet Jacob’s Memorializing the Holocaust has been removed. Trump administration auditors were okay with The Bell Curve, a book that argues that Black men and women are intellectually inferior to white people, but Gresson, Kincheloe, and Steinberg’s decisive takedown of The Bell Curve is gone.

Two US institutions stand out as uniquely worthy of American pride: higher education and the military. I say this because there really are no close seconds or near peers to America’s colleges and universities or to America’s military might. Over 1.1 million students from around the world came to America last year to study at our colleges and universities. As for US military power, it is unprecedented in the history of our species. The US spent more on its military last year than the next 10 countries combined and has done so for decades.

With one order, Secretary Hegseth has managed to degrade both of these institutions. The book-purge order makes sense only if its intent is to undermine the Naval Academy’s academic credibility, diminish its prestige as a premier institute of higher learning, and promote mediocrity in the Ensigns and Second Lieutenants it commissions into the Navy and Marine Corps. Otherwise, Secretary Hegseth’s order is breathtakingly stupid. Even if we disregard the obvious harms that result from any narrowing of the intellectual landscape of Nimitz library, the titles selected for removal send an unambiguous signal to ethnic and racial minorities (especially Black alumni, students, and prospective students), women, non-Christians, and LGBTQ people that USNA does not value scholarship by them or about them. Among the predictable results of Secretary Hegseth’s very public assault on academic freedom at the Naval Academy are the loss of talented faculty who rightfully view academic freedom as a non-negotiable term of continued employment, the degraded ability to attract the best young scholars to backfill the imminent brain drain at the service academies, and the associated erosion of student quality as prospective students and their parents watch USNA’s academic status fall vis-à-vis colleges and universities that have not been academically compromised by culture wars.

The second reaction I’ve encountered since the Navy announced Nimitz Library’s book purge is disappointment. “Why did the Naval Academy cave? If broad exposure to the arts and sciences is so valuable for the education of a naval officer, then why not push back? Since when have the Navy and Marine Corps backed down from a fight?”

I’ve been struggling and continue to struggle with these questions. I’ve decided, therefore, to make this a two-part Substack post. I need more time to think about this. I’ll fire off Part II of this essay next week.