In War and in Peace: U.S. Civil-Military Relations – serie

Never before or since in American history have the needs and influence of the military weighed so heavily on society. Escott analyzes the militarization of life in the Confederacy and probes the relationships between military commanders, legislators, and Jefferson Davis and his administration. As the South struggled to wage an exhausting war against the North, military necessity increasingly determined policy and shaped all aspects of life. The military had an increasingly large impact not only on policy but also on events inside civil society. Military men played important roles in bringing about extensive social change, enforcing law and order, and placing significant restrictions on individual freedoms.Ultimately the crisis of the Confederacy threatened both the constitutionalism that southern politicians long had cherished and a core principle of the tradition of civil control over the military. Key figures in the army also took the lead in urging the use of slaves as soldiers and promoting the idea of emancipation. With many portraits of high-ranking generals and civil officials and telling anecdotes that reveal the nature of their relationships, this book reveals the depth of the Confederacy's social, political, and military crisis and highlights what this crisis revealed about the foundations of Confederate society.

This is not another chronological retelling of the Mexican War. Instead, it examines civil-military clashes during the war in light of Jacksonian politics and the American citizen-soldier tradition, looking at events that shed light on civilian authority over the military, as well as the far reaching impact of political ambition during this period (specifically, presidential power and the quest for the presidency). By 1848, Americans had come to realize that in their burgeoning democracy, generals and politicians could scarcely resist the temptation to use war for partisan gain. It was a lesson well learned and one that still resonates today.The Mexican War is known for the invaluable experience it provided to future Civil War officers and as an example of America's drive to fulfill her Manifest Destiny. Yet it was more than a training ground, more than a display of imperialism. Significantly, the Mexican War tested civilian control of the military and challenged traditional assumptions about the role of the army in American society. In so doing, it revealed the degree to which, by 1846, the harsh partisanships of the Jacksonian Era had impacted the American approach to war. This is not another chronological retelling of the Mexican War. Instead, it examines civil-military clashes during the war in light of Jacksonian politics and the American citizen-soldier tradition, looking both at events that shed light on civilian authority over the military and at the far reaching impact of political ambition during this period (specifically, presidential power and the quest for the presidency).In addition to politics, a host of others factors marred civil-military relations during the war, threatening U.S. victory. These included atrocities committed by Americans against Mexicans, disobedient officers, and inefficient U.S. military governors. In the end, as Manifest Ambition shows, Polk's ability to overcome his partisan leanings, his micro-management of the war effort, and his overall strategic vision, helped avoid both a prolonged occupation and the annexation of All Mexico. By 1848, Americans had come to realize that in their burgeoning democracy, generals and politicians could scarcely resist the temptation to use war for partisan gain. It was a lesson well learned and one that still resonates today.

The Vietnam War was in many ways defined by a civil-military divide, an underlying clash between military and civilian leadership over the conflict's nature, purpose and results. This book explores the reasons for that clash—and the results of it.The relationships between the U.S. military, its supporters, and its opponents during the Vietnam War were both intense and complex. Schwab shows how the ability of the military to prosecute the war was complicated by these relationships, and by a variety of nonmilitary considerations that grew from them. Chief among these was the military's relationship to a civilian state that interpreted strategic value, risks, morality, political costs, and military and political results according to a different calculus. Second was a media that brought the war—and those protesting it—into living rooms across the land.As Schwab demonstrates, Vietnam brought together two leadership groups, each with very different operational and strategic perspectives on the Indochina region. Senior military officers favored conceptualizing the war as a conventional military conflict that required conventional means to victory. Political leaders and critics of the war understood it as an essentially political conflict, with associated political risks and costs. As the war progressed, Schwab argues, the divergence in perspectives, ideologies, and political interests created a large, and ultimately unbridgeable divide between military and civilian leaders. In the end, this clash of cultures defined the Vietnam War and its legacy for the armed forces and for American society as a whole.

This is not another chronological retelling of the Mexican War. Instead, it examines civil-military clashes during the war in light of Jacksonian politics and the American citizen-soldier tradition, looking at events that shed light on civilian authority over the military, as well as the far reaching impact of political ambition during this period (specifically, presidential power and the quest for the presidency). By 1848, Americans had come to realize that in their burgeoning democracy, generals and politicians could scarcely resist the temptation to use war for partisan gain. It was a lesson well learned and one that still resonates today.The Mexican War is known for the invaluable experience it provided to future Civil War officers and as an example of America's drive to fulfill her Manifest Destiny. Yet it was more than a training ground, more than a display of imperialism. Significantly, the Mexican War tested civilian control of the military and challenged traditional assumptions about the role of the army in American society. In so doing, it revealed the degree to which, by 1846, the harsh partisanships of the Jacksonian Era had impacted the American approach to war. This is not another chronological retelling of the Mexican War. Instead, it examines civil-military clashes during the war in light of Jacksonian politics and the American citizen-soldier tradition, looking both at events that shed light on civilian authority over the military and at the far reaching impact of political ambition during this period (specifically, presidential power and the quest for the presidency).In addition to politics, a host of others factors marred civil-military relations during the war, threatening U.S. victory. These included atrocities committed by Americans against Mexicans, disobedient officers, and inefficient U.S. military governors. In the end, as Manifest Ambition shows, Polk's ability to overcome his partisan leanings, his micro-management of the war effort, and his overall strategic vision, helped avoid both a prolonged occupation and the annexation of All Mexico. By 1848, Americans had come to realize that in their burgeoning democracy, generals and politicians could scarcely resist the temptation to use war for partisan gain. It was a lesson well learned and one that still resonates today.

The Vietnam War was in many ways defined by a civil-military divide, an underlying clash between military and civilian leadership over the conflict's nature, purpose and results. This book explores the reasons for that clash—and the results of it.The relationships between the U.S. military, its supporters, and its opponents during the Vietnam War were both intense and complex. Schwab shows how the ability of the military to prosecute the war was complicated by these relationships, and by a variety of nonmilitary considerations that grew from them. Chief among these was the military's relationship to a civilian state that interpreted strategic value, risks, morality, political costs, and military and political results according to a different calculus. Second was a media that brought the war—and those protesting it—into living rooms across the land.As Schwab demonstrates, Vietnam brought together two leadership groups, each with very different operational and strategic perspectives on the Indochina region. Senior military officers favored conceptualizing the war as a conventional military conflict that required conventional means to victory. Political leaders and critics of the war understood it as an essentially political conflict, with associated political risks and costs. As the war progressed, Schwab argues, the divergence in perspectives, ideologies, and political interests created a large, and ultimately unbridgeable divide between military and civilian leaders. In the end, this clash of cultures defined the Vietnam War and its legacy for the armed forces and for American society as a whole.

Civilian control of the military is one of the cornerstones on which America is built, extending back even before the founding of the nation. In this volume, Byler examines the development of civil-military relations from the end of the Civil War until the start of the First World War, looking at what happened and why. During this period, an initially small, poorly funded, and often unpopular military continued its traditional subordination to civilian authority despite the dissatisfaction of many of its leaders. This volume explores why this was the case. It then demonstrates that even after the military achieved victory over Spain and began to rule overseas colonial possessions, giving it new prestige and influence, the experience of the previous decades ensured that the traditional principle of civilian control remained strong.Significant tensions developed between civilian and military leaders as the small and poorly-funded military was sent on missions in the Reconstruction South and the Indian West, into overseas wars against the Spanish and the Filipino nationalists, and on interventions in the Caribbean and Central America. Nonetheless, officers continued to obey civilian authorities because of a developing professional ethos that emphasized the tradition of subordination to civilian leaders and the disengagement of the military from politics. Even as the military gained the size, strength, and prestige to challenge civilian control, it did not do so directly. Instead, it became adept at working within civilian institutions, forming alliances with leaders inside and outside government to shape the policies it wanted.

Between 1815-1860, the tiny American army took on many new and often daunting tasks. In the face of civil opposition to the very existence of a professional military, the first battle officers and supporters had to win after 1815 was that of simply preserving some small professional force. As American interests expanded further west and conflict with Native Americans increased, the army was charged with the dual responsibility of peacekeeper and conqueror. Its most dramatic successes, however, came during the Mexican War and the conquest of the American Southwest. Against this back drop, Wetteman crafts a narrative overview of the rivalries, personalities, and events that defined civil-military relations during this era.Beginning in 1815, the U.S. Army struggled for existence within a society that was not convinced that a standing army was worth the expense. At the same time, many questioned the viability of a professional officer corps, citing the innate ability of the American fighting man as demonstrated in earlier conflicts. Although efforts were undertaken early on to define the role and status of a peacetime army, issues of national defense, domestic security, Indian policy, and internal improvements shaped civil military relations over the next 4 12 decades. While the true position of the citizen-soldier in relation to a standing army had not been clearly defined by 1860, the nation had made giant strides towards full acceptance of the idea that the U.S. Army, a standing force commanded by military professionals, was a national necessity.

The First World War marked a key turning point in America's involvement on the global stage. Isolationism fell, and America joined the ranks of the Great Powers. Civil-Military relations faced new challenges as a result. Ford examines the multitude of changes that stemmed from America's first major overseas coalition war, including the new selective service process; mass mobilization of public opinion; training diverse soldiers; civil liberties, anti-war sentiment and conscientious objectors; segregation and warfare; Americans under British or French command. Post war issues of significance, such as the Red Scare and retraining during demobilization are also covered.Both the federal government and the military were expanding rapidly both in terms of size and in terms of power during this time. The new group of citizen-soldiers, diverse in terms of class, religion, ethnicity, regional identity, education, and ideology, would provide training challenges. New government-military-business relationships would experience failures and successes. Delicate relationships with allies would translate into diplomatic considerations and battlefield command concerns.

Civil-military relations in the era of the War of 1812 must be seen as a broad theme, not just the particular relationships between officers, military organizations, and civil government and civilians. Civil-military attitudes were interwoven in the lives of Americans and must be seen as ideological and social in character with political expressions. Secondarily, the War of 1812 was a transition period from the matrix of ideas inherited from English history and the War of Independence experience with an Atlantic orientation toward the national experience and continental orientation of the 19th Century.This book is a thematic exploration of civil-military themes in the era of the War of 1812. It begins with the immediate post-American Revolutionary era, the Constitutional Founding, and works through events in the 1790s and 1800s that illustrated how the Founding Fathers used the military as an aid to the civil power to maintain political order; how republican ideology colored the kind of military system American leaders in this era believed their country should have: in particular the heavy reliance upon the militia as an ideological ideal that failed in practice; the first glimmerings of volunteerism as an alternate, and later substitute for the militia idea; and an episodic use of military power to enforce civil political authority. The evolution of these civil-military themes occurred within the larger evolution of the United States as a small country with an Atlantic orientation perched along the eastern seaboard of North American into a continental country after 1815 because of the defeat of Indian tribes, the eclipse and elimination of Spanish territorial control in the Gulf of Mexico littoral and the trans-Mississippi West, and the rapprochement with Great Britain on sharing upper North America.