Volume 9, Issue 3 - The Military in American Politics

This issue of The Forum is focused on the military in American politics. It begins by reprinting the classic overview piece from Samuel Huntington. Damon Colletta then unpacks the state of our attention since Huntington, while John Griswold follows the evolution of Huntington’s organizing focus, the National Guard. Irving Louis Horowitz considers many of these same issues in light of the current role of the U.S. in the wider world. Beth Bailey introduces the biggest piece of civilmilitary involvement, in the form of the volunteer (and predecessor conscription) armed forces. Donald Downs raises the aspect of this politics that most closely touches the university, through ROTC. Lilly Goren considers the aspect that often absorbs the greatest number of congressmen, involving base closings. Matthew Holden and Gene Giannotta think about further, fresh ways to study civil-military relations, most especially between Presidents and their generals. And Jason Dempsey and Bradley Cooper introduce the newest program aimed at a crucial aspect of the military in American life, through “Joining Forces”, the military families initiative. Three book reviews close this issue of the journal: Kenneth Mayer on Jason K. Dempsey, Our Army: Soldiers, Politics, and American Civil-Military Relations; David Parker on David R. Mayhew, Partisan Balance: Why Political Parties Don’t Kill the U.S. Constitutional System; and Frances Lee on Gregory Koger, Filibustering: A Political History of Obstruction in the House and Senate.

“Civilian control of the military is a basic principle of the American Constitution”; so runs the commonplace. It is the thesis of this article that the cliché could hardly be more inaccurate, for actually the American Constitution in the twentieth century obstructs the achievement of civilian control. It is well known that civil supremacy was a major concern of the Framers. They provided for it in the only form in which they knew it. But civilian control in the eighteenth century is very different from civilian control in the twentieth century: the Constitution which was expertly designed to provide for it then, for this very reason, frustrates it now. In presenting this thesis, it is necessary: (1) to show how the meaning of civilian control has changed over the intervening years; (2) to describe the Framers' concept and show how it was embodied in the Constitution; and (3) to demonstrate how the provisions which they thought would guarantee it impair its effectiveness today.

The resurgence of American civil-military relations scholarship over the past twenty years has been led by political scientists from the subfield of International Relations and American military sociologists. Samuel Huntington's seminal work, The Soldier and the State (1957), laid the foundation for considering civil-military affairs as a major influence on sound strategic policy. By recommending autonomy for a separate sphere of military operations, it also threw down the gauntlet for structuring a cohesive society that could encompass both liberal values and the military profession. To this point the political science subfield of American Politics has remained aloof from the fray. Were American Politics to engage civil-military relations in earnest, there would likely follow an important recasting of civil-military relations scholarship, with greater emphasis on the fluidity of institutional patterns and the kind of political concessions required from all parties—executive, legislative, and military—to maintain healthy civil-military relations under the Constitutional separation of powers.

This paper examines an aspect of United States armed forces that has been under-studied in the discipline of political science over the past three decades: the National Guard. The Guard’s roles, responsibilities, and relationships with the states and the federal government have changed significantly since the end of the Vietnam War, from “weekend warriors” to an integral component of the national security enterprise. The paper begins by defining the Guard and its constitutional role in American national security, and then evaluates the state of the political science literature on the National Guard. It illustrates changes to the Guard using three recent cases: the War on Drugs, the War on Terror, and Hurricane Katrina. Finally, it explores potential implications of these cases and other recent events on the future role of the National Guard in American politics.

Classic writings on political decision making with respect to war traditionally emphasize grand strategies. But such European generated theories are often inapplicable in less developed areas of the world, and in which nation building remains suspect and incomplete. This article emphasizes the difficulty in policy approaches that rest on older doctrines of total war and well defined victory or defeat. The new 21st century “model” often admits only of political indecisions and military constraints. All sectors of advanced societies such as the United States are thus involved in issues such as traditional customs, militant religions, and socioeconomic alignments that limit military actions. While issue of war and peace remain intact, and in many instances protracted over time, the need for revised practices on the ground have become a central need and concern of economically advanced nations. This makes for a search of effective and appropriate ways for the conduct of humane military actions coupled with democratic civilian ambitions. Where such ends are not feasible, then caution should prevail.

When the United States moved to an all-volunteer force (AVF) in 1973, the military was forced to compete in the national labor market without the cushion of conscription or draft-motivated volunteers. The Army, which needed to attract more than 20,000 recruits each month, turned to market research and advertising, began internal reform, and offered new benefits, portraying military service as opportunity rather than obligation. The turn to the labor market had political implications. As women and African Americans joined the military in unprecedented numbers, the Army served as a site of social experimentation, directly confronting the social change movements of the 1960s or 1970s and their legacies. Because an AVF requires high reenlistment rates and family-oriented benefits help retain soldiers, army dependents have come to far exceed army members, with implications for deployment, morale, and cost. And defining military service as labor market opportunity rather than citizen’s obligation is a critical shift in political definitions of citizenship.

Concerns have arisen in recent years about the alienation of the military from civil society, and especially from many major universities. This “gap” is not good for the constitutional order, and it jeopardizes the classic model of the citizen-soldier. Movements have arisen to address this issue, including efforts to return Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) to campuses from which the program was effectively banned during the Vietnam War. This essay chronicles and evaluates such political movements in the Ivy League, in particular at Columbia University, which was “ground zero” for such campus movements. The essay concludes by discussing why the presence of ROTC on campus is good for society and higher education.

Military bases have always been complicated as a policy area, with the demands of national security policy and military strategy often at odds with local and state interests and constituent demands upon elected officials. Over the course of more than 200 years, the domestic military basing structure has changed and adapted, often the result of a compendium of factors including shifting military strategies, technological advances, differing alliances, and the changing demographics and constituent desires within a given area or region. The Executive and Legislative branches have both been intimately involved in the military base decision-making process, both in determining where to establish bases and also in the process to select bases for closure or realignment. Over the past thirty years, the issue of base closures has become even more acutely political and, ultimately, led to the creation of the Base Realignment and Closure Commission (BRAC) as a successful method to select bases for closure and realignment while also compelling Congress and the President to comply with those decisions.

The role of the American President as commander-in-chief has been a major subject of discussion in political science, history, law, and other disciplines. This discussion has particularly been developed on the constitutional basis of Presidential claims, and on how such authority has been used in dealing with citizens. Yet there is enough unknown about how Presidents exercise the role that both practical need and intellectual opportunity require that some further, fresh inquiry is needed. The fields of American politics (notably executive politics and public administration), comparative politics, and international relations provide a number of starting points from which to work. Our understanding of the Presidency, the military, and the making of American national security policy can only be strengthened through a renewed focus on their political intersection, the application of theoretical and methodological tools new and old, and the dusting off of the multiplicity of cases throughout the Republic’s history that beg for attention.

This paper focuses on the members of the military and their families who have served on behalf of the American public over the last ten years of conflict. Typically referred to as the “9/11 Generation,” this extraordinary cohort of young Americans has already made major sacrifices for the American people, yet has the potential for continued service as members of the academic, and broader American, community. Yet military families also face distinctive challenges that are not always considered under the rubric of civil-military relations. The paper focuses on these by outlining the military families initiative known as Joining Forces, and suggests steps that the academic community can undertake to strengthen the connection between the military and the public it serves.