The post below the line was published in February 2024. It was generally well received but nothing happened.

We have a new administration that is talking about reorganization, so maybe it is a good time to bring it up again.

The only reservations seemed to be about using the word “Forces” instead of “District.” My final comment on the post was, we could also continue to call them districts but give them geographic names, e.g. Coast Guard District New England or Coast Guard District Alaska and Arctic.

I found that the author,

CDR Cole currently serves as the United States Coast Guard’s National Security Fellow at Harvard University where she examines defense, emerging technologies, and strategy at the Belfer Center of Science and International Affairs and advancing public policy for national security at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government.

The February edition of US Naval Institute Proceedings has a one page, “No Body Asked Me, But,” article on page 18, by Cdr. Leah Cole, USCG, suggesting that the Coast Guard Districts be given geographic names rather than numbers.

I’ll just list the proposed names without linking them to the existing numbers because, you will find them obvious and intuitive.

• Forces New England
• Forces Mid-Atlantic
• Forces South and Caribbean
• Forces Heartland and Gulf Coast 
• Forces California and Southwest Border
• Forces Pacific Northwest
• Forces Pacific Islands
• Forces Alaska and Arctic

I think she pretty much nailed it, though I think Forces Southeast and Caribbean might be more descriptive for D7, and for D11, Forces Pacific Southwest.

Along with these, she would rebrand the Areas Forces Atlantic and Forces Indo-Pacific.  There is a potential glitch here, in that PATFORSWA, which frequently operates in the Indian Ocean, is currently under Atlantic Area. (Both the Combatant Commanders and the Navy’s Fleet structure have the Indian Ocean split up three ways.) Just Forces Pacific should suffice.

She goes on to suggest,

“As an additional step, the Coast Guard could time the renaming to align with a new recruiting initiative for both the active-duty and reserve force that offers candidates the opportunity to serve in their home regions or a region in which they would like to live and serve long-term. This could create a sense of purpose, build belonging, and also reduce barriers to accessions.”

She also suggests how district Reserve programs could be tuned for predicable surge operations–it’s a short read.

As I am sometimes told, this makes too much sense to actually happen, but it is definitely worthy of serious consideration.

The US Naval Institute has a short article by Cdr. Jim Hotchkiss (USCG Reserve). Unfortunately it is behind the paywall for those of you who are not members, but in short he points out that the current district number designations can be traced back to WWII and a desire to correspond to Naval District designations. Now that that is no longer a consideration, why not use more descriptive geographic designations?

His proposal is captured in the diagram above.

Certainly Cdr. Hotchkiss has a point. I only have a couple of comments. It would ease the transition if we continue to use the term “District” rather than the less specific term, “Command,” which he uses above, e.g., “Coast Guard District Northeast” rather than “Coast Guard Northeast Command.”

The actually choice of names would justify some additional thought, but I will suggest alternatives for three of the Districts.

• For the current 7th District–CG District Southeast
• For the current 8th District–CG District Gulf and Inland
• For the current 11th District–CG District Southwest