Question

Manipulating Meaning: The Military Name Game
SARAH BOXER
Summary Today, several linguists (See work by George Lakoff, for example) have looked at the way metaphor is used to frame a particular view of an event or policy. This selection by Sarah Boxer provides an excellent example of the framing process. Using information drawn from an article entitled "The Art of Naming Operations" by Lt. Col. Gregory C. Sieminski, she shows how the names for military operations have shifted in purpose from an inside code to a public symbol meant to shape public perception. She concludes that the process is more difficult than one might think.
The naming of operations began during World War II by the Germans who initiated the process as an inside secret code. The British did the same but with rules laid down by Winston Churchill, who felt operations' names should not be boastful, despondent, or frivolous.
After World War II, the U.S. Pentagon started to name military operations for public consumption, which inevitably led to controversies about what names should convey. During the Korean conflict, for example, General MacArthur used aggressive names such as "thunderbolt" and "ripper" for operations. The Vietnam War saw Lyndon Johnson veto aggressive names; for him, the suggested operations name "masher" sounded too aggressive and he replaced it with "white wing." Following Vietnam, the Pentagon bureaucracy codified the process. Each area command was given two-letter sequences that would start two-word operations names. Further, the Pentagon developed a computer program entitled "Code Word, Nickname, and Exercise Term System" (called "NICKA" for short).
More recent operations naming involves a verb-noun sequence such as "promote liberty" and "restore hope." Because almost any choice of words seems to offend someone, Boxer concludes that the new game is to find words without meaning. Readers should note that today the first word of the two-word phrase does not need to be a verb. "Iraqi Freedom," is a case in point.
In "The Military Name Game,"Boxer shows how a modern computer program entitled "Code Word, Nickname, and Exercise Term System," or NICKA for short, has solved most of the problems encountered by the Pentagon as it generates code names for military operations.

Answer

This answer is hidden. It contains 1 characters.