Beyond the Neutral Card: From Civil-Military Relations to Military Politics

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How should senior military officers in democratic states influence their domestic political environments? The flippant answer is that they should not; they should do as they’re told. The American civil-military relations literature, written largely in the shadow of Samuel P. Huntington’s myth of an apolitical military, has consistently downplayed the positive role officers play in politics, to such a degree that we have only a dim outline of what constitutes appropriate and effective political influence by officers Thus, in practice, we fear that too many officers find their professional military education fails to prepare them for the realities of being a commander. They discover to their chagrin that there is no neutral ground available; even doing nothing is a willful political act, rife with significance, which is easily turned against them. We do not believe that officers can remove themselves from politics by “playing the neutral card.” Apolitical neutrality often seems prudent from a traditional perspective, but can fail spectacularly when applied in practice. We argue instead for a new theoretical posture, for soldiers and scholars alike, that foregrounds the political agency of officers. We call this the military politics approach.

MARK MILLEY AND THE NEUTRAL CARD

The fundamental problem with playing the neutral card was underscored when President Donald Trump told Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley to join him for a short walk (which ended up taking them to Lafayette Square).[1] When told to come, Milley played the neutral card and went. One week later Milley reflected, “My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics.”[2]

What should Milley have done, if doing nothing is also doing something? Milley’s answer provides no great insight: “We must hold dear to the principle of an apolitical military…and that is not easy.”[3] Milley’s misstep and his subsequent frustration were not surprising. Officers are not educated in how to navigate complex political environments, not least because there is so little research done on this topic. Whatever the cause, there is no structured means to develop political competencies, and indeed most officers in democratic countries spend their careers being told that they are and must remain apolitical.[4]

We see a need for a new theoretical language to describe the ways officers do politics, and for a more open discussion, particularly in military education, for what constitutes effective and appropriate political influence. Consider Stanley McChrystal’s reflections on the politics of the military: “The process of formulating, negotiating, articulating and then prosecuting even a largely military campaign involved politics at multiple levels that were impossible to ignore.”[5] Indeed, we would turn the dominant argument, captured in McChrystal’s formulation, on its head. By denying that officers can, should, and do seek political influence, we (practitioners, scholars, educators) are collectively guilty of a grand deception, elevating officers to a position of enlightened disinterest that is false and untenable. The truth is that officers are powerful and their words have an impact—and so does their silence. The question is not whether one should speak or remain silent, but which tactics of influence can be deemed appropriate (and inappropriate) given the situation the senior officers find themselves in.[6] Our approach is, admittedly, discordant with the dominant traditions in American civil-military relations scholarship. Indeed, it is so far beyond the pale that we find it easier to make the case by pivoting to an alternate frame, military politics.

THE PROBLEMS WITH CIVIL-MILITARY RELATIONS

Civil-military relations and military politics have long co-existed in the global literature, although the former has almost entirely eclipsed the latter in the American context. Civil-military relations was introduced in 1940 to broadly encompass any research “bearing upon those problems of public policy which were posed by the prospect of a continuing high mobilization even in peacetime, and by the continuing necessity for a careful coordination of military, diplomatic, and industrialization policy.”[7] A little over a decade after the term was introduced, several efforts were launched to reappraise American civil-military relations.[8] Amid this flurry of activity, the young Samuel P. Huntington, working closely with the sociologist Morris Janowitz, achieved a theoretical breakthrough by using the theory of professions as the primary explanans for military effectiveness and subordination to civilian authority.[9]

The breakthrough established what became the civil-military relations subfield as we know it, coalescing (in the U.S.) around Huntington’s distinctive vision of civilian control. Peter D. Feaver and others disrupted the field in the late 1990s, giving rise to several alternative paradigms.[10] Feaver notably abandoned the use of the military profession as an explanatory variable, and shifted instead to a principal-agent model.[11] This tradition explored the gaps that separate civilian and military policy preferences. Unfortunately, both earlier and later traditions are marked by serious theoretical problems that severely limit their conceptual coherence and predictive value. Let us briefly summarize their limitations.

Huntington asked why some militaries succeed in being both effective and subordinate? And he answered: because those militaries have a professional officer corps and lack civilian meddling in military affairs. This works because a professional officer corps has monopolized expert knowledge, has a collective identity, and internalizes a sense of responsibility to the client (the state). In other words, some militaries are effective (expert) and subordinate (responsible) because they are professional (which means, in part, expert and responsible). This is equivalent to saying that to succeed, you need to be successful.[12]

Feaver asked the same question. His answer: some militaries succeed in being both effective and subordinate because they are closely overseen by civilian masters who make credible threats to keep them working. They succeed (are effective and subordinate) because they are successful (are effective and are subordinated). But why would we assume that such a tightly managed military is committed to or capable of ensuring the security of the state? Logically, we would expect almost any other outcome. Indeed, militaries run by officers who are primarily motivated by their fear of civilian punishment and who are at all times conscious of civilian oversight seem more likely to become good at buffering from civilian oversight and satisfying civilian preferences than to become good at achieving military security or wielding the military instrument.[13]

David Pion-Berlin and Andrew Ivey have argued for “scrutiny or revision” of American civil-military relations theory based on counter-indications from Latin American states, noting military dissent “has garnered no new powers for the military, nor has it eroded civilian supremacy,” but has effectively checked certain forms of corrupt behavior by civilian leaders.[14] Indeed, as Risa Brooks has argued in her analysis of the “paradoxes of professionalism”, there is still lively scholarly debate among American civil-military relations scholars concerning what constitutes effective and appropriate political influence by American officers.[15]

FROM CIVIL-MILITARY RELATIONS (BACK) TO MILITARY POLITICS

Huntington in the early 1960s still seemed uncertain about the name for the field he dominated. In an influential article published in 1961, he used “military politics” and “civil-military relations” interchangeably, and chose the former for the name of a widely reviewed edited volume he published in 1962.[16] Eventually, he dispensed with the “military politics” language, and indeed the term was abandoned by the core of the field by the early 1960s, although it was retained by scholars studying militaries overtly involved in domestic politics (mainly in authoritarian states).[17]

The military politics subfield we propose is, by contrast, primarily concerned with military-political behavior in democratic contexts. This emerging subfield foregrounds the role of military actors, institutions, and events in explaining political realities, focusing particularly on the active role played by officers in shaping their political environments.[18] This literature guides officers to become reflexive practitioners in their domestic political arenas. Here Roennfeldt has argued for “wider officer competence,” specifically in managing politically dilemmas; Allen proposed that the field adopt the “political savvy” scale to describe the political attributes that officers need to succeed; Coletta and Crosbie have argued that officers should be encouraged to develop not just wisdom but also virtù.[19] What these suggestions share in common is the idea that our scholarship should help officers be more effective in their political engagement, not to advance the interests of the military, but rather to achieve better democratic outcomes.

Although rarely communicated to officer-students, many specific methods of political influence have been noted in the literature. Best known is perhaps the “resign in protest” debates of 2017-2018.[20] Less noted have been forms of military voice ranging from Sarkesian’s “enlightened advocacy” to Feaver and Kohn’s categories of insist, advocate, advise and “be neutral” to Brooks’s observations of officers directly appealing to the public, grandstanding, shoulder-tapping, politicking and so on, or the notions of engaging in a continuous or iterative dialogue. We could logically also consider theories of social influence originating from literatures beyond the military domain, including influence tactics such as pressure tactics, legitimating tactics, coalition tactics, personal appeals, ingratiation, inspirational appeals, consultation, rational persuasion, and collaboration.[21] In this sense, officers never stand powerless before their civilian masters, for they are always armed with the tools of influence (whether they have refined these tools or not).

Let us reconsider Milley’s position from a perspective of military-political agency. Milley was directed to join the president in what turned out to be a partisan photoshoot. Through inaction, Milley believed he unintentionally brought the military into domestic politics. What we argue is that the military was (and always is) already fully inside domestic politics. What went wrong was that Milley, by playing the neutral card, chose an inappropriate tactic for the situation. A range of tactics could have been considered (and perhaps where) including advising, advocating, or insisting on a different course of action, pressuring the president, building a coalition to oppose the president’s directive, or ingratiating himself with the president in an attempt to exert a softer form of influence.[22] Those were also potential choices, and future officers who find themselves in Milley’s position would be better served considering the full banquet of options, and their appropriateness for the given situation, rather than view themselves as forced to play a losing card.

As a final word, we believe it is important to acknowledge that this theoretical intervention carries with it a risk to democracy. By following our suggestions, unethical officers may find inspiration in how to improperly influence their political environments. It is justified because it addresses what we consider to be a greater risk: another generation of ethical officers expected to muddle through the political landscape they are required to inhabit. By refining our language to better approximate how these relations really work in practice, we aim to provide civilians and military professionals alike with valuable new tools to navigate these very challenging environments. Sunlight, in this case, is the best disinfectant.