US Defense Department removes war hero images as part of DEI purge

The US Defence Department is erasing from its archives thousands of images of diversity, equity and inclusion to comply with White House orders to end those programmes across federal government.

References to a World War II Medal of Honour recipient, the Enola Gay aircraft that dropped an atomic bomb on Japan and the first women to pass Marine infantry training are among thousands of photos and online posts marked for deletion, according to a database obtained by The Associated Press.

Around 10,000 images and stories have been examined and identified for removal but it's thought thousands more in the database could eventually be removed from every military branch.

The vast majority of the Pentagon purge targets women and minorities, including notable milestones made in the military. It also removes a large number of posts that mention various commemorative months — such as those for Black and Hispanic people and women.

US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth had given the military until Wednesday to remove content that highlights diversity efforts in its ranks following President Donald Trump’s executive order.

But a review of the database also underscores the confusion that has swirled among agencies about what to remove following Trump's order.

Aircraft and fish projects are flagged

In some cases, photos seemed to be flagged for removal simply because their file included the word ”gay,” including service members with that last name and an image of the B-29 aircraft Enola Gay, which dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, during World War II.

Several photos of an Army Corps of Engineers dredging project in California were marked for deletion, apparently because a local engineer in the photo had the last name Gay. And a photo of Army Corps biologists was on the list, seemingly because it mentioned they were recording data about fish — including their weight, size, hatchery and gender.

In addition, some photos of the Tuskegee Airmen, the nation’s first Black military pilots who served in a segregated WWII unit, were listed on the database, but those may likely be protected due to historical content.

The Air Force briefly removed new recruit training courses that included videos of the Tuskegee Airmen soon after Trump’s order. That drew the White House’s ire over “malicious compliance,” and the Air Force quickly reversed the removal.

Asked about the database, Pentagon spokesman John Ullyot said in a statement, “We are pleased by the rapid compliance across the Department with the directive removing DEI content from all platforms. In the rare cases that content is removed that is out of the clearly outlined scope of the directive, we instruct components accordingly.”

He noted that Hegseth has declared that “DEI is dead” and that efforts to put one group ahead of another through DEI programs erodes camaraderie and threatens mission execution.

Some images aren't gone

In some cases, the removal was partial. The main page in a post titled “Women’s History Month: All-female crew supports warfighters” was removed. But at least one of the photos in that collection about an all-female C-17 crew could still be accessed. A shot from the Army Corps of Engineers titled “Engineering pioneer remembered during Black History Month” was deleted.

Other photos flagged in the database but still visible Thursday included images of the World War II Women Air Service Pilots and one of U.S. Air Force Col. Jeannie Leavitt, the country’s first female fighter pilot.

Also still visible was an image of then-Pfc. Christina Fuentes Montenegro becoming one of the first three women to graduate from the Marine Corps’ Infantry Training Battalion and an image of Marine Corps World War II Medal of Honour recipient Pfc. Harold Gonsalves.

It was unclear why some other images were removed, such as a Marine Corps photo titled “Deadlift contenders raise the bar pound by pound” or a National Guard website image called “Minnesota brothers reunite in Kuwait.”

Why the database?

The database of the 26,000 images was created to conform with federal archival laws, so if the services are queried in the future, they can show how they are complying with the law, the U.S. official said. But it may be difficult to ensure the content was archived because the responsibility to ensure each image was preserved was the responsibility of each individual unit.

In many cases, workers are taking screenshots of the pages marked for removal, but it would be difficult to restore them if that decision was made, according to another official, who like the others spoke on the condition of anonymity to provide additional details that were not public.

A Marine Corps official said every one of its images in the database “either has been taken down or will be taken down.” The Marines are moving on the directive as fast as possible, but as with the rest of the military, very few civilian or contractor employees at the Pentagon can perform content removal, the official said.

On 26 Feb, the Pentagon ordered all the military services to spend countless hours poring over years of website postings, photos, news articles and videos to remove any mentions that “promote diversity, equity and inclusion."

If they couldn't do that by Wednesday, they were told to “temporarily remove from public display” all content published during the Biden administration’s four years in office.