A Resist Hate exclusive look at a leaked transcript from a meeting at the Office of Operational Nomenclature—The most important department in American foreign policy.
The Pentagon’s Office of Operational Nomenclature is, by all accounts, the most stressful workplace in the Department of Defense.
A small cadre of senior officials — most of them former advertising executives, two of them screenwriters with unproduced action scripts, one of them a man who simply wandered in during a tour and was never asked to leave — gather in a windowless conference room on the fourth floor of the Pentagon and decide what America’s wars will be called.
Resist Hate has obtained transcripts of a session that took place in early 2026. They are reproduced here, lightly edited for length, because the full document contains seventeen pages of one participant simply repeating the word “thunder” in different cadences.
Office of Operational Nomenclature Meeting:Leaked Transcript
MEETING CALLED TO ORDER, 0800 HOURS
CHAIRMAN: Alright, people. The Iran thing kicks off any day now. We need a name. I want bold. I want cinematic. I want something a twelve-year-old would Sharpie onto a Trapper Keeper.
ANALYST 1: Operation Desert Storm 2.
CHAIRMAN: No sequels.
ANALYST 1: Operation Desert Storm: Reloaded.
CHAIRMAN: Sit down.
ANALYST 2: What about Operation Freedom’s Promise?
CHAIRMAN: Did Bush use that one already?
ANALYST 2: Bush used everything. Bush used words that haven’t been invented yet.
ANALYST 3: Operation Iron Resolve.
CHAIRMAN: Marketing flagged “Iron.” Apparently we used it on a deodorant tie-in last quarter and there was confusion.
ANALYST 3: Operation Steel Resolve.
CHAIRMAN: Steel is fine. Resolve is dead. Resolve is what we call it when we can’t think of anything.
ANALYST 4: (quietly) Operation Epic Fury.
[A long silence.]
CHAIRMAN: Say that again.
ANALYST 4: Operation Epic Fury.
CHAIRMAN: Jesus Christ. That’s it. That’s the one. That sounds like a video game my nephew wouldn’t shut up about. That sounds like a Monster Energy flavor. Get me legal, get me PR, get me a guy who can do a voiceover.
ANALYST 2: Sir, with respect, “Epic” feels a little —
CHAIRMAN: A little what?
ANALYST 2: A little like we’re naming a Marvel movie.
CHAIRMAN: And?
RECESS, 0930 HOURS. MEETING RESUMES, 1000 HOURS.
CHAIRMAN: Okay, we’ve got Epic Fury locked. Now let’s bank some names for the next six. Hit me.
ANALYST 1: Operation Liberty Hammer.
CHAIRMAN: Approved. Next.
ANALYST 3: Operation Final Justice.
CHAIRMAN: What happens if we need a justice operation after the final one?
ANALYST 3: Operation Even More Final Justice.
CHAIRMAN: I love it. Bank it.
ANALYST 4: Operation Patriot Thunder.
CHAIRMAN: Bank it.
ANALYST 4: Operation Thunder Patriot.
CHAIRMAN: Different operation. Bank it.
ANALYST 2: Sir, are we naming operations or are we just listing nouns?
CHAIRMAN: Are those different things?
INTERN, ENTERING: Sir, the focus group came back on “Operation Epic Fury.”
CHAIRMAN: And?
INTERN: Eighty-two percent of respondents said it sounded “cool.” Six percent asked if it was a new energy drink. Twelve percent asked what country we were attacking.
CHAIRMAN: And?
INTERN: None of them asked why.
CHAIRMAN: (visibly moved) That’s the dream. That’s what we’re here for. Put it in the brief.
ANALYST 2: Sir, I have to say something. We’ve spent four hours in here. We have not once discussed the operation itself. We don’t know the objectives. We don’t know the casualty estimates. We haven’t asked whether this thing should happen at all. We’re just —
CHAIRMAN: Naming it.
ANALYST 2: Yes.
CHAIRMAN: That’s the job, Phil. That’s literally the name of the office.
ANALYST 2: I know, but —
CHAIRMAN: Phil. Phil. Look at me. Do you think the people watching cable news at home are going to ask about casualty estimates?
ANALYST 2: No.
CHAIRMAN: Do you think they’re going to ask about objectives?
ANALYST 2: No.
CHAIRMAN: They’re going to see a chyron that says OPERATION EPIC FURY in red, white, and blue, with a little flag waving next to it, and they are going to feel something. Do you understand what we do here? We don’t fight wars, Phil. We name them. The fighting is somebody else’s department. We are the poets.
ANALYST 2: (after a long pause) Operation Sacred Vengeance.
CHAIRMAN: (tearing up) Welcome back, Phil. Bank it.
MEETING ADJOURNED, 1147 HOURS.
The next session is scheduled for Thursday, when the board will workshop names for a possible second front in a country one analyst keeps referring to only as “the small one with the beach.”
Resist Hate will continue to monitor the situation and provide updates as they come,
