Lecture 3: General Issues II

17.584, Civil-Military Relations, Spring 2003 Lecture 3: General Issues II Week III Summaries Feaver, Peter. “The Civil-Military Problematique: Huntington, Janowitz, and the Question of Civilian Control.” Armed Forces and Society 23 (Winter 1996): 149-178. Civil-Military Problematique: how do you ensure a strong military while keeping control of it? It’s an issue of protection versus control. Review of Huntington’s argument of Janowitz. Critique: Tautology professionalism=civilian control. Professional militaries conduct Coups (Latina America). Finally, doubts professionalism’s usefulness an explainable variable for this problem except as historically interesting. Cohen, Eliot, Supreme Command: Soldiers, Statesmen, and Leadership in Wartime. New York, NY: The Free Press, 2002. Selected chapters 1, 6, 7. ISBN: 0743230493. Chapter 1 – “Normal” theory is about military professionalism as its own sphere. Reality politics mingles with military decisions and good civilian commanders interfere. Rosen: Military is a political organization that decides who will die and how, who will be honored and who will not. Uses Lincoln, Clemenceau, Churchill, and David Ben Gurion to expound on the problem of civil-military relations during wartime. Chapter 6 – LBJ viewed selection in North Vietnam as trivial given the fear of Chinese intervention and dodges circuits. Too little intervention and no strategic vision and didn’t make the Army of the Republic of Vietnam into the Republic of Korea. Yet officers left with Vietnam syndrome and Gulf War was fought with too much decision in the hands of the militaryÆpremature end of the war (Powell) and armistice terms allowed rebellions in Iraq to be crushed (General H. Norman Schwarzkopf). Normal theory allowed mediocre leaders to defer authority to professionals. Chapter 7 – Leaders that were studied weren’t always right, but they challenged advisors knowing that experts can be wrong. The leaders paid attention to the right details—unlike LBJ and Bush I. B. Huntington, Samuel, “Reforming Civil-Military Relations,” in Civil-Military Relations and Democracy, Larry Diamond and Marc Plattner, eds. (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 1996), pp. 3-11. ISBN: 0801855365. Third wave post Cold War new democracies were weak with economic reform and in most cases have successfully moved to smooth civil-military relations. South Africa had some problems with integration and Russia had problems with its military’s disintegration, and it stems from the propagation of the idea of military non-intervention (possible US influence?). Where they gave up voluntarily (Turkey, Chile) military will still play an important role. C. Finer, S. E. The Man on Horseback: The Role of the Military in Politics (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1988), Chapter 13, pp. 223-297.ISBN: 0813305764. 2nd, enlarged ed., rev. and updated The last chapter was added in the updated version. Due to its organization and capabilities, the military is prone to intervention in politics. You can assume that “military” includes officer corps even though some coups are lead by Non-Commissioned Officers (NCOs), lower ranking. The more divided a military is politically, the more coups that will result. Motivations for a coup can include personal, regional ethnicity, class, corporate interest, and national interest. Finer refutes Huntington’s point in Political Order in Changing Societies: which argues that the military representing the middle class will revolt against oligarchs, but then become reactionary towards the labor class and prevent mass participation. Chart on p. 247 – Classification of military regimes. Lecture Major Figures in Civil-Military Relations Theory: Huntington’s seminal book from 1957 (The Soldier and the State) came after the garrison state hypothesis. Huntington feared that US military wouldn’t be strong enough. “Normal” theory which dominated US foreign policy in the 60s. Functional Imperative Threats 1. 2. 3. 4. Societal imperative (Legal and institutional structure) Ideology Liberalism Conservatism Fascism Marxism Shape civil-military relations. 2 kinds of control: (1) subjective, (2) objective (affects ability of country to defend itself. Chapter 1: The military is a profession and has expertise, corporate identity, and responsibility. Chapter 2: Rise of the military profession in history before officers rose from state structure (aristocracy): Prussia 1808 Once you add professionalism, military will have conservative fist ideology. 1. Subjective: a civilian group uses military (civilianize military) for its own interest. 2. Objective: maximizes professionalism-militarize military. Subjective denies that there is independent military sphere (Cohen). Chapter 17: Huntington feared that liberalism would erode military capability. Society should change its ideology towards conservatism. [Considered by leftists as right wing pigs]. Austin: Gordon Craig’s, The Politics of the Prussian Army (1955), which Huntington cites, comes to the opposite conclusion. Victor: General principle-agent problem. Do you allow all special departments and services to run their own affairs? Janowitz: Pre-modern military was warriors, now they’re managers. In “The Professional Soldier”, a military sociologist expresses his attitudes of officers and leading article on Wehrmacht Cohesion and why they fought. His later book, The Reconstruction of Patriotism, argues for universal service. Janowitz: Need constabulary military to police the world because you can’t fight total wars with nuclear weapons but limited wars can use police actions, which requires management. Budget, mission, designation, clear channels to President—want military to look like society. Huntington-Janowitz debate classic. Feaver: Janowitz also falls back on ethics approach. The military develops an ethic there too. Civil-Military relations fluctuate a lot in the US, but its variables don’t (ideology and threat). Samuel Finer: Focus on the dev. World. Man on Horseback is the most cited, Latin American caudillo. Military: The more professional and corporate it is, the higher the sense of responsibility and increased likelihood of intervention in politics. Moskos is a leading military sociologist. Cohen Reading Huntington dominated debates and was very influential. The book, Political Order in Changing Societies, refers to coup theory. The Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986 reorganized the Department of Defense. Secretary of Defense and the Deputy Secy. of Defense «--Dept. of Defense (civilian) Chairman, Vice Chair and chiefs of service «--Joint Chiefs of Staff (military) DoS (civilian, but at the time this class was taught, it was a former general.) National Security Council (civilian council of advisors). Goldwater-Nichols followed Huntington’s theory and Cohen was unfavorable of the act. Powell Doctrine: full public support, apply overwhelming force at outset, give the military free hand, and have an exit strategy. (view of what went wrong in Vietnam). Cohen lesson from Churchill, Clemenceau: sometimes you have to tell allies to go to hell. That’s his current view of Iraq coalition. John: but in ’91, there was also fear of Soviet reaction. Critique: It was Bush’s decision, not abdication. We can debate if it was a good decision or not (Saddam contained deeply for years). There wasn’t a loss of civilian control of the military; it was a question of strategy. The book worships leaders he writes about examples where Churchill had long dinners to relax (if he had short, he’d be focused). Everything they do is right (but he picked astute leaders what about the cases where the leaders were incompetent leaders meddled?) Not a social science book. Cohen was a member of the Defense Policy Board. Many people thought he was influential. Members come mostly from right wing organizations now including Kissinger and New Gingrich. George W. bush reported to have read Supreme Command. Wolfowitz (Deputy Secretary of Defense) was at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) of The Johns Hopkins University and was friendly with Cohen. Discussion: Is there objective control? Unless it’s a military dictatorship, civilians meddle. Student: Objective control doesn’t exist unless the military is out of control