# Who decides on the names of battles? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 19, 2022, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789 "2022-12-19T14:17:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/21 "2022-12-20T18:53:58Z")
> [@Schnitte](#): > > …Blenheim, in turn, was then used to name a lot of other entities throughout British history. Including the palace in which Winston Churchill was born. ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/22 "2022-12-20T19:48:06Z")
Indeed. And by coincidence, later in my life I got to live within a few miles of Blenheim Palace for a couple of years, so I’ve had double exposure. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/23 "2022-12-20T20:53:48Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > > [@Schnitte](#): > > > > …Blenheim, in turn, was then used to name a lot of other entities throughout British history. > > Including the palace in which Winston Churchill was born. There are two towns named Blenheim in the US. The one in NJ was named after the battle; the one in South Carolina was named for the palace. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/24 "2022-12-20T21:42:35Z")
Hah! The only Encyclopedia Brown mystery I remember some thirty plus years nigh. Don’t remember the Manassas part, but definitely the sword and the “First Battle” part. ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/25 "2022-12-20T22:03:13Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#): > > > [@Dissonance](#): > > > > Then again, there were two Ardennes Offensives in WWII, the one in 1940 and the one in 1944. > > Isn’t the one in 1944 technically a counteroffensive? There’s that too; the answer is that it is if that’s what you want to call it. There’s no real solid line dividing between when something is an offensive and when it’s a counteroffensive. Not that google is the arbiter of anything, but googling “Ardennes Counteroffensive” and “Ardennes Offensive” both return plenty of results both referring to the 1944 one. “Ardennes Offensive” produces numerically many more, but that doesn’t really mean anything other than it is probably the more commonly used one of the two. Results for “Ardennes Counteroffensive” are hardly lacking in authority leading to such places as the Eisenhower Presidential Library, the Imperial War Museum and the US Army’s Center of Military History. ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2022, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/26 "2022-12-25T19:01:10Z")
At the end of the Great War the British set up a Battle Nomenclature Committee to assign names to the various battles on the Western Front; It eventually published its conclusions as _The official names of the battles and other engagements fought by the military forces of the British Empire during the Great War 1914-1919 and the Third Afghan War 1919: report of the Battles Nomenclature Committee as approved by the Army_. Some, like the Third Battle of Ypres, commanded more-or-less universal acceptance in British historiography, others, like the Battle of Albert, are now used by nobody at all. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2022, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/27 "2022-12-25T19:17:00Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > Hah! The only Encyclopedia Brown mystery I remember some thirty plus years nigh. Don’t remember the Manassas part, but definitely the sword and the “First Battle” part. Also the only E.B. story I still remember, except I remembered “Manassas,” and forgot “First Battle.” ---
**Author:** ![smithsb](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smithsb/32/12107_2.png) [@smithsb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smithsb)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2022, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/28 "2022-12-25T20:03:43Z")
The US Revolutionary war battle was not in Saratoga as referenced; it was in Stillwater, NY as any Stillwaterian will tell you. ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2022, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/29 "2022-12-27T12:16:55Z")
> [@Dissonance](#): > > Results for “Ardennes Counteroffensive” are hardly lacking in authority leading to such places as the Eisenhower Presidential Library, the Imperial War Museum and the US Army’s Center of Military History. Interestingly, in various [military history](https://history.army.mil/books/70-7_20.htm) sources such as > [@](#): > > Chapter 20 > The German Counteroffensive in the Ardennes > By Charles V. P. von Luttichau they sprinkle the chapter with both “offensive” and “counteroffensive,” even on the same page. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2022, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/30 "2022-12-27T17:51:17Z")
I find that kind of sloppiness offensive. ---
**Author:** ![garygnu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/garygnu/32/2924_2.png) [@garygnu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garygnu)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2022, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/31 "2022-12-27T21:36:03Z")
Weren’t the ground conditions pretty sloppy? ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2022, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/32 "2022-12-28T02:25:58Z")
Whereas I find it Counter-Offensive. ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2022, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/33 "2022-12-28T15:37:44Z")
the ‘von Rundstedt offensive’ was also used for it at the time, although von Rundstedt actually had very little to do with it other than the operations orders going out under his nominal signature. ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2022, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/34 "2022-12-28T15:40:32Z")
> [@Mk\_VII](#): > > At the end of the Great War the British set up a Battle Nomenclature Committee to assign names to the various battles on the Western Front; This is the kind of thing I was wondering. Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Finn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/34f0e0/32.png) [@Mark\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Finn)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2022, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/35 "2022-12-29T17:04:30Z")
In a similar vein - who decided that the “Great War” should be called “World War 1”? Obviously - sometime after early September, 1939. ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2022, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/36 "2022-12-29T17:20:46Z")
Yeah, you know a war memorial is prior to 1939 when it just says “The World War.” ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2022, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/37 "2022-12-29T18:09:27Z")
All this and World War too! ---
**Author:** ![SunUp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ea5d25/32.png) [@SunUp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SunUp)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2022, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/38 "2022-12-29T18:53:12Z")
Also someone who completely ignored the Seven Years’ War. ---
**Author:** ![APB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8e8cbc/32.png) [@APB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/APB)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2022, 10:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/39 "2022-12-30T10:43:59Z")
> [@Mark\_Finn](#): > > In a similar vein - who decided that the “Great War” should be called “World War 1”? Obviously - sometime after early September, 1939. Actually, not so ‘obviously’. _The First World War 1914-1918_ had been used as a book title as early as 1920. [The First World War 1914 1918 by Repington C - AbeBooks](https://www.abebooks.co.uk/book-search/title/the-first-world-war-1914-1918/author/repington-c/) It was a term occasionally used by those who wanted to stress that there might be another world war. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2023, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789/40 "2023-01-04T13:23:12Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > > [@Schnitte](#): > > > > …Blenheim, in turn, was then used to name a lot of other entities throughout British history. > > Including the palace in which Winston Churchill was born. There’s only one Blenheim. [![](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/6b/3c/2c/6b3c2cf39985033e7d7376d485c6e9e8.jpg) ](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/6b/3c/2c/6b3c2cf39985033e7d7376d485c6e9e8.jpg) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-decides-on-the-names-of-battles/976789.md?page=3)