The politics of military operations
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Do domestic political institutions affect the way that states fight wars, and if so, why? I argue that military operations on the battlefield are systematically influenced by civilian politicians to favor lower-risk strategies in the months preceding a domestic election. Because domestic constituencies are casualty-sensitive, democratically elected civilians face strong incentives to temporarily trade long-term strategic success for a short-term decrease in casualties, resulting in the direct and indirect politicization of military operations. Direct politicization occurs when civilians intervene in operations through direct requests, increasing monitoring, or changing tactical guidelines, while operations are indirectly politicized when the military polices its own behavior in response to organizational, bureaucratic, or personal incentives. This culminates in a preference for defensive operations in the months leading up to a domestic election, while high-risk offensive strategies are delayed until after electoral pressures have been resolved. The first empirical chapter uses the insights developed in my theory to systematically test the effect of electoral cycles on troop movement and violence levels during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. I then use both most different and most similar case designs to qualitatively evaluate the timing of military operations during the wars in Vietnam and Iraq. The third and fourth empirical chapters evaluate systematic deviations and patterns in bombing operations over North and South Vietnam using a recently released dataset that enables analysis of bombing runs from 1965 to 1975. Finally, I conclude with a comparative case study of the strategic bombing campaigns as executed by the United States and United Kingdom during World War II. In each case, I show that domestic politics profoundly influence civilian decision-making during conflict, and that this influence is most pronounced in the months immediately preceding an election. These findings challenge our current understanding of battlefield effectiveness, normal civil-military relations, and how democracies fight wars more generally.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic; electronic resource; remote |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Publication date | 2015 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Associated with | Lee, Carrie Ann |
|---|---|
| Associated with | Stanford University, Department of Political Science. |
| Primary advisor | Sagan, Scott Douglas |
| Thesis advisor | Sagan, Scott Douglas |
| Thesis advisor | Fearon, James D |
| Thesis advisor | Laitin, David D |
| Thesis advisor | Schultz, Kenneth A |
| Advisor | Fearon, James D |
| Advisor | Laitin, David D |
| Advisor | Schultz, Kenneth A |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Carrie Ann Lee. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Department of Political Science. |
| Thesis | Thesis (Ph.D.)--Stanford University, 2015. |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2015 by Carrie Ann Lee
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-NC).
Also listed in
Loading usage metrics...