Browsing by Subject "Civil-military relations"

In this dissertation I analyze aspects of American civil-military relations and the political economy of national security policymaking. Specifically, I examine efforts to balance the military power necessary to secure American interests while considering the economic implications towards the national debt, veteran behavior in congressional resource allocation, and how civil-military relations relate to military effectiveness. I employ qualitative, quantitative, as well as mixed-methods research in examining policymaker rhetoric, voting records and bill sponsorship data, as well as a list of military use-of-force decisions. I find that policymakers deliberately consider the tradeoffs between debt and defense spending, that veterans demonstrate a small yet distinct behavior on military issues considered by Congress, and that operational outcomes were not more likely to be better when military authorities applied their preferences than when civilians asserted theirs. This dissertation helps fill important underexplored gaps in American civil-military relations and political economy of security studies.

In the relationship between military leaders and their civilian masters, the Secretary of Defense (SecDef) plays a unique role. He or she represents both the military enterprise and the non-military policymakers that control it. As a result, in civil-military relations literature the SecDef role is inconsistently categorized as sometimes military, sometimes civilian. Although this is an understandable conflation, it warrants attention. By law, the SecDef is a civilian, but he or she is required to demonstrate expertise in military matters. In some ways, the position sits in both spheres. Yet, the SecDef plays a key role in civilian control of the military, and so it is important to both draw distinctions and understand overlap. This paper examines the nuances and functions of the SecDef role, and argues that Secretaries must be successful in both the civilian and the military aspects of the job in order to provide effective civilian control of the military. Intriguingly, a variety of leaders have filled the SecDef position—from decidedly civilian ones like Ash Carter, who started his career in theoretical physics, to martial legends like George Marshall. The range includes Secretaries with combat experience, ones with long careers in the Reserves, and ones with prior appointments in the Department of Defense. Every Secretary has brought a unique level of military knowledge, connection and cultural familiarity to the office. These varied personal experiences each affected civilian control of the military in their own right. This paper provides a comprehensive new dataset covering the military experience of historical SecDefs, cross-tabbed with descriptive variables in order to better understand the background and expertise each secretary has brought to the position. Finally, the paper uses five mini case studies to analyze the effect of extensive military experience on civilian control of the military. It is the first empirical study designed to explore this effect. I find, first, that all Secretaries struggle in the role in some capacity. Additionally, I find that, a SecDef’s military experience is not a strong driver in determining whether a Secretary will enhance or degrade civilian control of the military during his or her tenure.

Existing security studies literature focuses on causes of war onset and conditions for war termination. Yet presidents regularly face major inflexion points where they must make a major war policy change, whether to deescalate, escalate, or conduct a hybrid approach. These decision points come after significant sunk costs, including lives lost, treasure invested, and political/diplomatic capital spent. The gap in research on mid-conflict policy adaptations, and on theoretical frameworks to explain them, presents an empirical puzzle that is the subject of this dissertation.

This dissertation further scopes that topic, answering the following question. Why did presidents in the “shadow” of the Vietnam War make major war policy changes to cut losses and bring troops home, or to double down? To answer that question, this dissertation conducts a structured, focused comparison of four case studies: Lebanon (1984), Somalia (1993), Iraq (2007), and Afghanistan (2009). It is structured in that it uses the same questions to uncover presidents’ rationale across each case. It is focused in that it orients each case on a specific presidential “sunk cost trap” decision. It uses a variety of primary and secondary material, including archival research and new, senior level interviews with former administration officials and military generals.

This dissertation finds that historical “lessons” act as a filter for strategic calculations among policy elite, ultimately influencing decision outcomes. Between the Vietnam War and 9/11, the Vietnam lesson to avoid quagmires by treating sunk costs as sunk and avoiding incremental escalation was dominant. The fear, or anticipated regret, of their own “Vietnam” created deescalatory pressures on presidents, demonstrated in the exits from Lebanon (1984) and Somalia (1993-1994). After 9/11, the logic flipped due to new lessons learned, including the need for proactive counterterrorism overseas and counterinsurgency strategies. This created escalatory pressures in Iraq (2007) and Afghanistan (2009) because of presidents’ desire to avoid another “9/11” on their watch.