We all know it’s true, but it’s good to be reminded: Words have meaning. Just one word can make a big difference. And the change of just one word can send a powerful message.

That’s President Trump’s goal. He wants to send a message by changing the name of the Pentagon from the Department of Defense to the Department of War. In this, he has succeeded. By signing an executive order changing the name, he is sending a powerful message, all right. The problem is that the message he’s sending is wrong and dangerous.

Shortly after the Revolution, George Washington urged Congress to create a standing army to defend the U.S. with its own federal agency, which was called the “Department of War.” That name stuck from 1789 — through the War of 1812, the Spanish-American War, World War I, and World War II — until 1949, when President Harry Truman changed it to the “Department of Defense.”

It was only a change of one word, but Truman knew it made all the difference in the world. It did then, and it still does today.

The Department of Defense means what it says: that we are a peace-loving people. That we have a standing military — by far the largest and best-armed on........

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