The Stars and Stripes
Feb 11, 2021
On February 8, 1918, the first issue of The Stars and Stripes is published. It was the first U.S. Army newspaper, and was originally published for the troops during World War I.
During World War I, the staff, roving reporters, and illustrators of the Stars and Stripes were veteran reporters or young soldiers who would later become such in the post-war years. It was published by the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) from February 8, 1918, to June 13, 1919.
The Stars and Stripes was then an eight-page weekly which reached a peak of 526,000 readers, relying on the improvisational efforts of its staff to get it printed in France and distributed to U.S. troops.
And yet, the history of the newspaper goes back even further. On November 9, 1861, during the Civil War, soldiers of the 11th, 18th, and 29th Illinois Regiments set up camp in the Missouri city of Bloomfield. Finding the local newspaper's office empty, they decided to print a newspaper about their activities. They called it the Stars and Stripes. Tradition holds this as the origin story for the newspaper, and the Stars and Stripes Museum/Library Association is located in Bloomfield.
In February 2020, the Department of Defense announced that a draft budget would reduce the newspaper's federal support in 2021 under a $5 billion shift to higher priorities in the defense budget. Deputy Under Secretary of Defense Elaine McCusker indicated its funding would be cut and said: “We have essentially decided that, you know, kind of coming into the modern age that newspaper is probably not the best way that we communicate any longer.” The subsidy is more than $15 million a year, which represents approximately half the publication's budget and roughly 0.002 percent of the Department of Defense budget, which was $721,500 million in 2020. It was described by the Stars and Stripes ombudsman as "a fatal cut”. In September, Defense Secretary Mark Esper justified the decision to discontinue publication of the paper as a result of his department-wide budget review. An order for the newspaper to shutter was issued, specifically by presenting a plan for it to dissolve by September 15, including "specific timeline for vacating government owned/leased space worldwide" and to end publication by September 30, 2020.
A bipartisan group opposed to the move was formed in Congress, and on September 4, 2020, President Donald Trump reversed this position by tweeting that funding would not be cut. On September 30th, the order to close was rescinded.
