diff --git a/includes/menu.inc b/includes/menu.inc
index 18e91037e0..d4e55398ea 100644
--- a/includes/menu.inc
+++ b/includes/menu.inc
@@ -2752,11 +2752,14 @@ function _menu_check_rebuild() {
  * menu_execute_active_handler(), because the maintenance page environment
  * is different and leaves stale data in the menu tables.
  *
+ * @param $force
+ *   Force a full rebuild even if {menu_router} didn't change.
+ *
  * @return
  *   TRUE if the menu was rebuilt, FALSE if another thread was rebuilding
  *   in parallel and the current thread just waited for completion.
  */
-function menu_rebuild() {
+function menu_rebuild($force = FALSE) {
   if (!lock_acquire('menu_rebuild')) {
     // Wait for another request that is already doing this work.
     // We choose to block here since otherwise the router item may not
@@ -2777,7 +2780,7 @@ function menu_rebuild() {
 
   try {
     list($menu, $masks) = menu_router_build();
-    if (_menu_router_save($menu, $masks)) {
+    if (_menu_router_save($menu, $masks) || $force) {
       _menu_navigation_links_rebuild($menu);
       // Clear the menu, page and block caches.
       menu_cache_clear_all();
diff --git a/modules/simpletest/tests/menu.test b/modules/simpletest/tests/menu.test
index f5d7d290fc..0d44d5999d 100644
--- a/modules/simpletest/tests/menu.test
+++ b/modules/simpletest/tests/menu.test
@@ -402,7 +402,7 @@ class MenuRouterTestCase extends DrupalWebTestCase {
     // Change the menu_name parameter in menu_test.module, then force a menu
     // rebuild.
     menu_test_menu_name('changed');
-    menu_rebuild();
+    menu_rebuild(TRUE);
 
     $sql = "SELECT menu_name FROM {menu_links} WHERE router_path = 'menu_name_test'";
     $name = db_query($sql)->fetchField();