In July, ROA wrote Congress and President Trump supporting renaming military bases named for Civil War confederate officers and a renaming commission.
WASHINGTON, DC, USA, January 1, 2021 /EINPresswire.com/ — The Reserve Officers Association of the United States, now doing business as the Reserve Organization of America, today thanked the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate for overriding the president’s veto of the National Defense Authorization Act and funding national security, the federal government’s most important job.
ROA, which noted with approval the bill’s recognition of the “significant threat to the security of the United States” posed by China and Russia, wrote the president in July, urging him to sign the defense bill.
The William M. “Mac” Thornberry National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021 supports a strong operational Reserve and National Guard with good manpower funding within a robust overall defense budget. While the NDAA does not direct reserve component participation in the newly formed U.S. Space Force, it does directs DoD to recommend how the reserve components would be included in the Space Force; ROA regards that as a good step forward.
U.S. military bases named for confederate officers will be renamed with the bill’s passage. ROA, virtually alone among military groups, voiced support of base renaming in letters to both President Trump and Congress.
“I am proud of ROA for taking a principled stand,” said ROA’s executive director, retired U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Jeffrey E. Phillips, referring to base renaming. “We ask young Americans and immigrants aspiring to citizenship to defend our nation. They deserve the substance and the symbols of our republic to reflect the dignity and the diversity of their origins.”
ROA, whose membership is open to all ranks, received its congressional charter in 1950 and is the only national organization with an exclusive focus on support of the nation’s uniformed reserve components: the Army Reserve, Navy Reserve, Marine Corps Reserve, Air Force Reserve, Coast Guard Reserve, the National Guard, and the reserve components of the U.S. Public Health Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.