War Termination as a Civil-Military Bargain: Soldiers, Statesmen, and the Politics of Protracted Armed Conflict

225 Pages·2016·6.559 MB·English

by  Shawn T. Cochran (auth.)

War Termination as a Civil-Military Bargain
War Termination as
a Civil-Military Bargain
Soldiers, Statesmen, and the Politics
of Protracted Armed Conflict
Shawn T. Cochran
WAR TERMINATION AS A CIVIL-MILITARY BARGAIN
Copyright © Shawn T. Cochran 2016
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2016 978-1-137-52796-7
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First published 2016 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN
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work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers
Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills,
Basingstoke, Hampshire, RG21 6XS.
Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of Nature America, Inc., One
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Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies
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ISBN 978-1-349-58036-1
E-PDF ISBN: 978–1–137–52797–4
DOI: 10.1057/9781137527974
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Macmillan®, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in
England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke,
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Cochran, Shawn T.
War termination as a civil-military bargain : soldiers, statesmen, and
the politics of protracted armed confl ict / by Shawn T. Cochran.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. War—Termination. 2. Civil-military relations. I. Title.
U21.2.C62 2015
303.6(cid:2)6—dc23 2015019583
A catalogue record for the book is available from the British Library.
In memory of Fred Charles Ikl é , 1924–2011
Contents
List of Illustrations ix
Acknowledgments xi
1 An Unexplained Lacuna of the Politics of War 1
2 The Civil-Military Variable and How It Varies 17
3 Civil-Military Bargaining and the Politics of Blame 39
4 Israel in Lebanon (1982–1985) 71
5 The Netherlands in Indonesia (1946–1949) 95
6 South Africa in Namibia (1966–1989) 115
7 Conclusion 137
Appendix 1 47
Notes 149
References 1 85
Index 211
Illustrations
Figures
1.1 Variation in political leadership behavior (proposed model) 11
3.1 Variation in political leadership behavior (cross-case analysis) 65
3.2 Political leadership type: initial versus new political leadership 67
3.3 Civ-Mil bargaining: obstructive versus facilitative military
leadership 68
3.4 Combined framework: political leadership type and
Civ-Mil bargaining 69
3.5 Obstructive scenario: initial versus new political leadership 69
3.6 Facilitative scenario: initial versus new political leadership 69
Tables
3.1 Five narratives of failure in protracted war 53
A.1 Protracted war observations 147
Acknowledgments
I hold firmly to Einstein’s assessment that “what a person does on
his own, without being stimulated by the thoughts and experiences
of others, is even in the best of cases rather paltry and monoto-
nous.” With this in mind, I am deeply grateful to the many individuals
who have assisted with this book at various stages, providing valuable
assistance, feedback, mentoring, insights, and expertise along the way.
I am particularly indebted to Bob Pape, Charles Lipson, Paul Staniland,
David Benson, Mike Rosol, John Schuessler, Yasemin Bilgel, John
Stevenson, Morgan Kaplan, Yuna Park, Josh Sutton, Chad Levinson,
Bernard Silberman, Patricia Shields, Brian O’Connor, Elaine Fan,
Alexandra Dauler, Deepa John, Steven Miller, Kelly McHugh, Douglas
Porch, Chester Crocker, Stephen Burgess, Lindsey O’Rourke, Ryan
Grauer, Casey Lucius, Stephen Chiabotti, Tom Hughes, Joe Panza,
Daniel Conway, Richard Gabriel, Petra Groen, Hilton Hamann, Jaap
Hoogenboezem, and Thula Simpson.
And to Karen, Isabelle, and Aidan—thank you for your love,
patience, and support.
CHAPTER 1
An Unexplained Lacuna of
the Politics of War
When Henry VI was crowned king of England in 1429, the
Hundred Years’ War with France (1337–1453) was already in
its ninth decade. Over the next 15 years, English fortunes in
the protracted conflict steadily declined. Losing ground to the French
while facing a burdensome drain on state resources and growing domes-
tic unrest back in England, the young king brokered a truce in 1444
as the basis for what he hoped would be a permanent peace settlement
recognizing English claims to Normandy. In subsequent negotiations,
Henry agreed to give up the English-held province of Maine in northern
France, but his military commanders had other ideas. Resentful “they
had been sold out by politicians and even by their king,” the command-
ers balked at returning the province to the French; or, as Corson notes,
they refused to “give up territory they and their forces had captured
at great human cost for a political objective they did not share.”1 This
set in motion a series of events leading to the resumption of hostilities
and culminating in England’s defeat and wholesale loss of Normandy.
With even a marginal settlement out of reach and the war approaching
its ignominious end, the English army and its domestic allies criticized
the king and demanded a scapegoat for the debacle. In response, Henry
turned on his closest friend and most trusted adviser, the Earl of Suffolk,
who was arrested, imprisoned in the Tower of London, impeached by
Parliament, and subsequently banished to the continent.
Although banishments have become less prevalent, the above anec-
dote still hints at two central and enduring facets of war termination
politics. First, apart from cases of clear victory or outright defeat, the
decision to end a war ultimately reflects a bargain between political
2 ● War Termination as a Civil-Military Bargain
and military leadership. And second, this bargain is rarely an easy one.
In the classic Every War Must End , Ikl é writes, “In preparing a major
military operation, military leaders and civilian officials can effectively
work together . . . By contrast, planning to end a war where victory seems
out of reach is not a task on which men can easily collaborate. To search
for an exit in such a situation, government leaders can rarely move in
harmony.”2
The problem of war termination can strain civil-military relations to
the limit, creating a deep and acrimonious divide. It has pushed histori-
cally apolitical and subservient militaries to threaten coup. It has driven
political leaders to purposefully bleed their own armies in senseless bat-
tles, hoping the chastened soldier might be more amenable to peace. But
even if rare, civil-military collaboration can, and does occur; and one can
find examples of political and military leadership working in harmony
to bring costly, protracted war to a close. Under these circumstances, the
domestic politics of war termination looks fundamentally different.
This book examines the domestic politics of war termination through
a civil-military lens and seeks to explain the behaviors of political leaders
embroiled in protracted armed conflict. Such an approach has surpris-
ingly little precedent. More than 40 years have passed since Halperin
published the brief but insightful “War Termination as a Problem in
Civil-Military Relations.” 3 While the broader topic of war termination
has received substantial attention over subsequent decades, there has
been little attempt to build upon Halperin’s analysis; and his arguments
have largely gone unchallenged if not ignored. In a recent review of the
war termination literature, Maoz and Siverson note there are “at least
three aspects of what transpires within the state that are of interest.” 4
The first entails interactions within the governing regime and among
political elites. The second is the relationship between the government
and the population, particularly in terms of public opinion. And the
third is the relationship between the government and the military.
Maoz and Siverson find this latter aspect, while potentially offering
important insights into how wars end, to be the most understudied
of relevant domestic factors. Accordingly, the question of “how the
interplay between the military and the political leadership affects the
conduct of war and its termination” remains one of the “unexplained
lacunas of the politics of war.”5
With the above in mind, this book addresses both the nature of the
interplay between political and military leadership and how this inter-
play influences war termination decision-making. The central claim is
that war termination reflects a civil-military bargain, and this bargain