There is one truth in war… good men will die, sent to the front by their senior civilian and military leadership. Throughout the short history of the United States, many published works put forth a counter position to Huntington’s The Soldier and the State. All attempt to find the “right” answer and balance to the civil-military relationship; with each essay, it seems a new conflict is on the horizon and the question is more difficult to answer. In Elliot Cohen’s book, Supreme Command, he examines the tension between these two kinds of leadership, civil and military.
Here, we will examine two accounts of civilmilitary relationships: the Civil War and Vietnam War, and determine which case best support Cohen’s general argument in his book. Cohen’s thesis, used as the base model for comparison in this essay will be his normal theory of civil-military relations. In this theory, he states, Officers are professionals, much like highly trained surgeons, and the statesman is in the position of a patient requiring urgent care. Essentially saying the patient is in the proverbial driver’s seat with many other options in front of him.
The patient can choose a different doctor, different hospital, or not have the surgery at all… the decision rest with him and him alone. What the patient cannot do is choose the instrument the surgeon is going to use. To put this thesis in terms of a civil-military relationship: the civilian senior leadership (patient) is in the position to send the military (surgeon) into harm’s way. However, the political leader whether previously trained in military matters or not, should not dictate the tactics of the campaign.
Cohen uses four examples of successful political leaders during difficult times, all with arying levels of military understanding: Abraham Lincoln, Georges Clemenceau, Winston Churchill, and David Ben-Gurion. During each of their tenure, they were successful in the outcome of their military conflict but all found themselves embroiled in conflict with senior military men. It is important to note that the political leader should not interfere in military tactical matters but that does not abdicate his responsibility as an elected official to supervise the proper strategic use of the fighting men and women.
These vaulted goals are developed and implemented at the senior and appointed/confirmed level and translated to the operational and tactical level by the military. In recent memory, one cannot think of more turbulent time in U. S. history than the Vietnam War era… the effects of which are felt today. According to Cohen, the legacy of bitterness and suspicion resulting from that war persists in America today. Using his thesis of normal theory of civil-military relations and an examination of the Vietnam War, it is apparent, the model did not fit this conflict or vice versa.
According to advocates of the “normal” theory, the wisdom of this approach was in the negative sense during the Vietnam War. “Abnormal” interference by civilians supposedly tied the hands of the military by limiting the geographic scope of the conflict, picking specific bombing targets from the White House, and so on. Cohen goes on to state that the pervasive belief is that the United States failed to achieve victory because it made the military fight with one hand tied behind their back. The fact that Vietnam was as much a political war on the home front as it was an armed conflict played a major role in the decision-making.
The President of the United States and his Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara fought the war from their offices- managing and conducting the decision-making and even approving targets for attack. They reviewed them, limiting the number of sorties, and set rules for engagement. Cohen’s theory applied to the Vietnam War leaves out one consideration – the political lens. Clearly, Vietnam is not a strong case for Cohen’s model but the fact that the President believed in a false narrative of victory drove his decision making process.
Survival in the political arena is difficult and forces one to make decisions based on survival rather than military prudence and this action failed the military. In stark contrast to the Vietnam War is the Civil War. Lincoln made his sentiments clear when dealing with Grant, his Generalin-Chief, “The particulars of your plans I neither know, nor seek to know. ” Additionally, according to Cohen, the President during the Civil War was successful because he was a leader who defined the objectives, mobilized the public, picked the right leader and handed the war over to him.
This is not to say Lincoln did not overrule his trusted military leaders, it implies that he shaped the political objectives and let his military handle the tactics. He was fierce in his approach, humble, and unwavering on the objectives. By all accounts, President Lincoln and the Civil War fit Cohen’s model more closely than the Vietnam conflict but Lincoln still maintained constant oversight of the war from the beginning to the end. In determining the correct application of civil-military relations, the academic approach to solving this dilemma can create more arguments than answers.
Cohen does more than a surface scratch on defining normal relationships and provides excellent examples of great men during difficult times exercising different levels of control over the military. Some with great success and some held the stern during a turbulent time that history will not soon forget. What we can take away from Cohen’s theory is that leading men into conflict is for the warfighter but he needs oversight from an artful and humble civilian leader. 959
