Definitions of military base vary widely across services

Evidence

But what exactly is a “base”? Definitions and terminology vary widely, and each of the military’s services has its own preferred vocabulary, including “post,” “station,” “camp,” and “fort.” The Pentagon defines its generic term base site as a “physical (geographic) location”—meaning land, a facility or facilities, or land and facilities—“owned by, leased to, or otherwise possessed” by an armed service or another component of the Department of Defense. To avoid linguistic debates and because it’s the simplest and most widely recognized term, I generally use “base” to mean any place, facility, or installation used regularly for military purposes of any kind. — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 18

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies the book’s working definition of ‘base’ and why counts differ so dramatically.