1Civil-Military Relationsin

the Information Age

Damon Coletta and Peter FeaverDRAFT 8/15/03

Abstract

Recent research on US civil-military relations has applied principal-agent logic to analyze the post-Cold War friction between civilian authorities and top military commanders. This paper proposes a revised model in order to focus on the effects of newmonitoring technologies available to the civilian principal in the Information Age. As monitoring capabilities increase and military agents perceive their autonomy disappearing, tacit bargaining over the presidents level of resource commitment to a crisis should become more prevalent. This idea receives support from a comparison across case studies of the limited use of force taken from three different technological eras. A new style of civil-military bargaining presents both challenges and opportunities for the traditional conception of military professionalism.

Prepared for Presentation at the American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, August 28-31, 2003.

* This paper in no way reflects the opinions, standards, or policy of the United States Air Force Academy or the United States Government.

2Civil-Military Relations in the Information AgeColetta and Feaver

DRAFT 15 August 03

The first week of NATOs limited air campaign in Kosovo did not go as civilian leaders had planned. After three days of bombing, Yugoslavian President Milosevic was more defiant than ever, and thousands of frightened Kosovars were fleeing from their homes to escape Serbian military and police round-ups. Together, the nineteen members of the NATO alliance possessed overwhelming military capabilities, but Milosevics tactics placed the allies in an acute dilemma. Particularly for the United States, the country executing some 80% of the combat sorties, employing too much force, or employing it in the wrong way, would cost the alliance and Serbian civilians in ways that members politically were not prepared to accept. On the other hand, imposing too many restrictions on the Supreme Allied Commander, American General Wesley Clark, could drag out the war and leave NATO nations with at best a Pyrrhic victory: Milosevic militarily defeated but much of Serbia, including Kosovo, ruined; Kosovars decimated; and NATOs credibility shattered.

Not surprisingly, President Clinton and his military advisers in Washington held different views from General Clark in the field on how to resolve the dilemma posed by the application of limited force in Kosovo. Whereas Clark wanted an expanded target set to include Milosevics assets for political control in Belgrade, Washington worried about the effect of additional collateral damage on cohesion among its NATO allies. Clark wanted to employ Apache helicopters that stood a better chance than fighter-bombers of catching Serbian small-unit forces in the open, but Washington fretted that American casualties would inflame opposition to the war at home. Tension between more politically attuned leaders in the capital and theater commanders directly accountable for winning battles routinely emerges out of contrasting perspectives on awesome responsibilities. This friction between civilian principals and military agents in American history began during the Continental Congress oversight of General Washington, and it continues beyond the Clinton administrations management of the war for Kosovo.

Recently, however, one aspect of civil-military dynamics has changed as transportation and particularly information technologies have improved. With new means for collection and communication has come greater awareness of military operations in the field. Because the military employs professional expertise in the management of organized violence and because military action often takes place remote from civilian authority, monitoring has always played a critical role in determining how well strategy aligns with overarching political objectives. In the eighteenth century, General Washington sent reports back to Congress on horseback after the action concluded. Today, commanders are expected to provide telephone or even video updates as their operations unfold. The new technologies grant civilians the potential, at least, for

3much finer control over their military agents. The expanded opportunities for civilian micromanagement alter the bargaining relationship between civilians and military, lending fresh urgency to questions regarding the significance of military professionalism and the appropriate boundaries of military autonomy.

Historically in civil-military relations, even a commander-in-chief with military background perforce relied heavily on the professionalism of his military commanders. Both president and general understood that while legitimacy for articulating the nations interests lay with the civilian commander-in-chief, immediate power to secure victory or risk defeat lay with the general officer. Remote from the capital, more aware of the immediate challenges facing his forces, a general ultimately decided how his orders would conform to the presidents political guidance. If military maneuvers strayed too far from the presidents aims, witnesses might sound the alarm and the general might be sanctioned. Yet the processes of detection and punishment, both realized, left ample room for commanders judgment, so very often it was a sense of duty rather than fear of punishment that constrained a general from pursuing his own ends, in other words, what he thought was best for the country. Advancing information technology promises to place more bargaining power in the hand of the civilian principal, allowing more specific instructions and more comprehensive monitoring. At the same time it threatens to constrict the space for commanders judgment, for the information-age president can say that now he, too, sees the situation facing the military as well as the broader political circumstances and that he is in the best position to make timely judgments about whether certain military orders conform to the national interest.

Developments in civil-military communications, though, are not simply driven by advancing capabilities in modern technology; they are fundamentally political. The political element makes for a surprising twist to the conventional economic logic that governs employer-employee relationships. As civilian authorities approach near real-time control over military forces, their field commanders still have political cards to play. Whereas an ordinary employee might suffer silently the loss of autonomy that comes with state-of-the-art monitoring systems as long as the pay remained good enough to keep on working, a general officer at the pinnacle of his profession, who cares less about marginal salary increases and more about policy, might instead take disagreements to the presidents political rivals. Such a tactic could hardly be used lightly, but to borrow General Clarks title from his Kosovo memoir, making modern war involves new political constraints and therefore new survival strategies for generals in the field. The militarys willingness to assert political power in defense of at least some of its autonomy in the information age limits the extent to which new monitoring technologies can increase civilian control. Especially in the case of a vulnerable president like Clinton in Kosovo, operating as he was on low reserves of political capital, civilians should see the practical wisdom in soft-pedaling schemes for intrusive monitoring if the military in turn exercises even greater self-restraint with respect to the political fray.

The remaining sections of this paper explore a model to formalize the political logic of American civil-military relations in the information age. First, the classic approach to principal-agent problems is introduced with an explanation as to how the

4usual assumptions might apply in the context of civil-military relations. Next, a brief review describes how principal-agent logic has influenced previous studies on civil-military relations. A new game-theoretic model extends previous approaches in order to isolate the effect of advancing technology for civilian monitoring. The basic conclusions of this model are that civilians will exploit information technology up to some threshold set by the presidents political strength and that some monitoring opportunities will be bargained away to solidify political-military backing for a limited use of force. In order to illustrate how these conclusions play out in the historical record, Thomas Jeffersons efforts against the Barbary pirates demonstrate the comparatively wide latitude granted to Naval and Marine commanders for suppressing the threat against American merchant shipping in the Mediterranean. A brief account of Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoovers attempts to destroy the guerrilla bands under Augusto Csar Sandino shows how emerging technologies in aircraft and radio were used to track Marine operations in the Nicaraguan jungle. Finally, the record of US targeting policy as Bill Clinton oversaw the limited use of force to expel Serbian units from Kosovo supports the notion of a politically inspired technology threshold. Beyond this threshold for monitoring, presidents grant the military maneuvering room and restrict certain technology they might have used for shadowing their field commanders.

MONITORING TECHNOLOGY AND CIVILIAN CONTROL

During one of the first instances of extended force projection by the United States, the naval campaign against the Barbary pirates of 1801-1805, President Jefferson received his reports by letter. The correspondence was often a summary account composed by a naval officer or a consular official. It typically arrived, like a modern mail order subscription, six to eight weeks after a set of maneuvers or a particular military transaction had concluded. In fact, the first Naval squadron sent by Jefferson, embarking after the Pasha of Tripoli had declared war on the United States, sailed under orders to first find out whether any or all of the Barbary states were openly attacking American shipping. Because the commodore of this squadron had no way of communicating the details of events in the Mediterranean back to the president in timely fashion, Jeffersons instructions left ample room for commanders judgment as to what constituted systematic attacks and which offensive tactics kept the risk to US forces within reasonable bounds. Different commanders off the Barbary Coast, from Richard Morris to the intrepid Stephen DeCatur used this latitude in quite different ways.

Broad delegation of decision making authority to the Navy contrasts with the story of targeting during the Kosovo air war. Once the NATO allies were forced to build target lists on the fly, information age collection and communications technologies were used to funnel in a constant stream of directives from political authorities. Until a standardized procedure could incorporate this detailed information, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Henry Shelton made daily visits across the Potomac to President Clinton with a briefcase of target files.1 Before the 72-day campaign ended, the political

1 See the series of Washington Post articles by Dana Priest, especially 30 May 1999.

5leadership in France had installed new communication lines to address their targeting concerns as the conflict evolved day-to-day. In at least one instance, US Air Force Chief Joseph Ralston, who was in Washington filling in for General Shelton, called off planes en route to a sensitive target.2 So close was the monitoring and so high the expectations of performance to the civilian standard that in the dark days after the unintentional bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, an operations center commander in Vicenza, Italy felt besieged enough to greet visitors to his office with a sign reading, We are the good guys.3

The obvious differences between the broad, laissez faire instructions of Jefferson and the laborious targeting process under Clinton seem to imply a straightforward effect as civilian monitoring methods advance. For situations involving the application of limited force, near real-time collections and communications permit civilian principals to issue ever more frequent and ever more detailed guidance to their military commanders so that the timing, amount, and type of force conforms to tailored political desires rather than enduring military exigencies. This initial impression of tightening civilian control gains credibility because it happens to follow logic established by the classic economic model for principal-agent relations.

In this formulation, the principal controls resources in order to create an incentive structure, or a contract, for a worker who cannot be observed directly.4 Because the worker has different preferences from the employer and because worker effort is not the only factor in determining final output, the contracts in these situations strike a balance between rewards to encourage participation and penalties for workers, or agents, who participate but in a manner contrary to the principals interest. In the context of factory or sales work, such shirking generally corresponds to fecklessness: the laborer accepts payment but does not do what the employer asked.5 The employer, in turn, encourages worker responsibility by offering a piece-rate or a commission, which ensures greater pay for greater output.

The contract, however, cannot guarantee against some lackadaisical or incompetent agents stumbling into good fortune and somehow associating themselves with more product than even some dedicated agents. Cheap and efficient monitoring technology offers the principal a solution for the costs incurred from lack of information. Handsome pay for shoddy work need never occur when compensation can be tied to the agents every move. Applying this economic logic in the civil-military realm leads to the prediction that between civilian employers and military agents, advancing collection and communication technology will encourage more exacting statesmen and more pliant soldiers.

2 Priest (1999b). Presumably, General Ralstons emergency intervention was intended to keep military

operations pegged to political guidance that US civilian leadership was imposing. It would be highly exceptional for a staff general, remote from forces and circumstances in the field, to second guess the military effectiveness of such a strike.3 Ibid.

4 Examples of textbook formulations for the principal-agent model are McMillan (1992); Milgrom and

Roberts (1992); and Kreps (1990).5 Feaver (2003).

6It turns out, though, that the relationship among professionals can be modeled differently than the classic negotiation between management and labor. Special properties in the power structure linking civilians and the military open up new possibilities, so the level of control over military agents does not monotonically increase with more capable monitoring technology. In the principal-agent model that better suits the US civil-military relationship, top soldiers have political options as the president endeavors to watch them more closely. At some point, political influence held by the military draws the civilian monitoring system itself into the principal-agent bargaining.

In the instance of the Kosovo air campaign, the monitoring system did not amount to what the President could physically arrange to most efficiently observe Supreme Allied Commander Clark. The President also had to consider whether a less intrusive monitoring scheme that partially obscured Clark and reduced control over him in a technical sense might actually help preserve a fragile coalition. At the time, presidential advisors, Congress, allies, and the field commanders supported, if only barely, something close to Clintons own preferences for strategy in Kosovo. In order to successfully manage the crisis, that rough consensus needed to outlive Slobodan Milosevics will to resist NATOs demands.6

PRINCIPAL-AGENT LOGIC IN THE STUDY OF CIVIL-MILITARY RELATIONS

Though there is correspondence between the classic principal-agent logic of economics and the historical tension separating US presidents from general officers, analyses explicitly linking the economic theory with civil-military case studies are still quite rare. Here, we review the connection to show where a revised principal-agent model might make an important contribution. Samuel Huntingtons seminal work on US civil-military relations, The Soldier and the State (1957), finessed the issue of principal-agent competition. Huntington elaborated the theoretical concept of professionalism, suggesting that it held the key to civilian control of the military.7 If officers were permitted to pursue soldiering as a pure profession, they would internalize a set of obligations as well as privileges. The privileges would manifest themselves in the freedom to hone and apply professional military skill with minimal civilian interference, in the terms of this essay, with non-intrusive civilian monitoring. Professional sense of responsibility, rather than constant checks and corrections, offered a surer method for preserving civilian control over the long term. As the twentieth century progressed, the skills of officership were becoming more specialized so that military decisions made without the benefit of professional expertise were more likely to court disaster in the field.

6 In the Nuclear Age and the Computer Information Age, there are several situations involving bogus

threats and strategic interaction where tightly-coupled systems are more vulnerable than older arrangements using less efficient control links (Bracken, 1983; Perrow, 1984; Sagan, 1993). In the context of modern civil-military relations, American presidents may be approaching a situation where the cost of missing limited military transgressions is surpassed by the political difficulties inherent in micromanaging field commanders with tightly-coupled command and control. 7 Huntington (1957: Ch 4).

7Constant civilian interference in the execution of military operations also increased the chance that powerful officers would become politicized, divided along the lines of their civilian counterparts.8 At that point, at least some of the officer corpsthose aligned with the political oppositionwould be laboring to unseat their civilian masters. Neither politicization nor botched execution would occur with a quintessentially professional force, but paradoxically, the esprit dcorps that guaranteed obedience to civilian authority could flourish only if military leaders possessed the autonomy to keep their own house in order.

Huntingtons reliance on professionalism during the height of the Cold War remains provocative today for several reasons. On the one hand, the ideal remains highly prized by American military leaders. Before they receive their commission and throughout their careers, officers study the real causes and effects of Huntingtons key elements: expertise, responsibility, and corporateness.9 Great leaders demonstrate these qualities in order to rise through the military ranks, and once they do so, their outstanding professionalism earns them a kind of autonomy, a grant of power over others in the form of commanders judgment.

In addition to generations of tradition, Huntingtons solution for maintaining civilian control proves difficult to dismiss because compelling functional logic supports it. In order to succeed in technical, organized fighting, collections of warriors and their junior officers must place their trust and faith in commanders. Even in the case of life-or-death decisions, the troops must abstain, denying their instincts and submitting their fates to the choices of their leader. Particularly in an all-volunteer force, the enthusiasm and efficiency with which this collective feat of will is accomplished hinges not on fear of the lash but on the conviction that the commander is indeed an exemplary professional.

The potency of Huntingtons ideal receives additional support from both the general public and civilian elites. In a recent, detailed survey on public attitudes toward the American military, clear majorities of opinion groups with varying levels of military experience agreed strongly with the statement that they possessed confidence in the militarys ability to perform well in wartime. The high percentages reinforced strong showings the military has enjoyed relative to other American institutions in Gallup polls since the late-1980s.10 From the standpoint of measuring Huntingtons professionalism, it is interesting that Gronke and Feaver (2001) found confidence in military performance remains strong despite evidence of alienation dividing military from civilian elites. Both groups profess reluctance to adopt each others values. Civilian willingness to trust that officers will perform to task, that they will meet objectives,

8 Ibid.

9 Huntington (1957) defines professionalism in his opening pages (8-11). In Part I of Soldier and the State,

he relates the concept to Western military institutions and ethics. Part II provides a history of the development of military professionalism in the US context. For recent commentaries on Huntingtons concept and the enduring influence it has had on the study of American civil-military relations, see Feaver (2003) and Cohen (2002).10

Gronke and Feaver (2001: 134, 140); King and Karabell (2003).

8coexists with civilian rejection of the idea that military priorities should determine overarching political goals.

Reconciling nearly contradictory impulses to both trust and reject the military is exactly what Huntington had in mind for professionalism.11 Even if most members of society do not embrace the military code, the public can still trust professionals with different values to practice self-restraint. Professionalism is strong enough that in a liberal society, presidents can publicly boast about giving the military a general objective in a crisis then staying out of the soldiers way as they apply their skills on the battlefield.12

With respect to academic analyses of civil-military tension, the undeniable influence of military professionalism has slowed the development of the principal-agent approach. First, professionalism resolves the fundamental difficulty posed by principal-agent logic. If the agent is duty-bound to serve the principals ends, then there is no need to devise an optimal incentive structure. Conversely, if the classic principal-agent problem obtains, then the ideal of an obedient military professional, who always behaves as if civilians have the right to be wrong, is somewhat tarnished. Huntingtons professions call their members to service beyond narrow self-interest. Doctors are obligated to care for the sick in an emergency even if the patient cannot pay. Professional military officers obey their civilian masters even if they do not share common political views and even when they will not gain promotion as a result of their fealty during a crisis. By contrast, the classic principal-agent model in economics presumes a narrowly self-regarding agent that will only act in order to maximize utility according to its own preferences. Not surprisingly, efforts to apply this type of rational actor framework for high-ranking officers charged with sacred responsibilities have prompted legitimate concerns and probing questions from audiences within the military.

Nevertheless, several events in the last fifteen years have created a more favorable environment for principal-agent models in the context of US civil-military relations.13First, the Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986 concentrated more power from the individual

11 Huntingtons (1957) final chapter, in which he favorably compared the regimented discipline of West

Point to the unruly dissonance of nearby Highland Falls, New York, drew intense criticism from reviewers who perceived a thinly veiled call for more conservative politics in the United States. Huntington was almost certainly stirring the pot with such open-ended comparisons, but he stopped well short of calling for a new constitution that would weaken any of the American guarantees for individual liberty. Rather he reserved his most venomous attacks for a brand of liberalism made grotesque by an obsessive hostility toward the common interest. Whereas most international relations scholars would associate liberalism with tolerance, intolerance pervaded and disfigured Huntingtons liberal ideology. It was as if liberals would rather be conquered by totalitarian armies than allow the military point of view a fair hearing in the competition for American citizens hearts and minds. If liberal intolerance disappeared from US society altogether, under the current Constitution there would actually be more room for an authentic debate between progressive civilian and conservative military values. Because the end of hyper-liberalism would not bring about a homogenous society, the concepts of professionalism and objective control were still necessary to field a military powerful enough to defeat the Soviet Union yet honorable enough to neither destroy nor be destroyed by the pluralistic society it had sworn to protect. 12

Cohen (2001); Feaver (2003).13

Burk (2002).

9service chiefs into the position of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, which formally became the primary source of military advice to the president. Furthermore, regional commanders-in-chief (now combatant commanders) became the primary controllers of land, sea, and air forces for a specified area of operations. As the political-military environment after the Cold War presented novel challenges, Goldwater-Nichols made it even more difficult to separate military from political responsibilities. A savvy Chairman of the Joint Chiefs like Colin Powell could conjure political tidal waves for the president by submitting a carefully worded version of his military advice to the national press.14After General Powell retired, President Clinton selected relatively pliant chairmen, but even so, the fault line for civil-military debates simply shifted from the Potomacbetween the White House and the Pentagonto the oceans dividing politically oriented staff in Washington from crisis field commanders.

The circumstances of Bill Clintons ascendancy also contributed to rising civil-military tensions. He was the first Democrat since Goldwater-Nichols, and he presided over an officer corps whose members increasingly identified themselves with the Republican Party.15 Clintons own record with respect to military service consisted of maneuvers to avoid being drafted for Vietnam. With precious little political capital during his first weeks in office, he assaulted military tradition, pressing the services to openly integrate gays into their ranks. Clintons first years were no easier than his first weeks. He faced an unwelcome and unpredictable trinity of twilight struggles in Bosnia, Somalia, and Haiti, where a frustrated US military found itself entangledand sometimes dangerously handicappedby political constraints.16 While these developments did not diminish the militarys pride in its professionalism nor erase the publics confidence in American soldiers ability to perform in battle, awkward manifestations of civil-military friction prompted scholarly observers to question whether military professionalism obviated the usefulness of a principal-agent framework for understanding the marked deterioration in relations.

Deborah Avant (1994) asked whether the open reluctance of warriors serving under the Clinton administration to engage the presidents humanitarian, peacekeeping, and nation building missions implied a loss of civilian control over the use of force, a coup in effect if not name. Both the research question and the principal-agent logic she appropriated to answer it had explosive potential, for in the classic models, there is noquibbling: agents either obey or shirk. However, Avant deftly avoided placing too much blame on either side. Civilians were not wrong so much as understandably divided in the murky strategic environment immediately following the disappearance of the Soviet Union. Given a conflicted principal, it was neither surprising nor alarming that military agents were more assertive in defending their preferences.

14 Colin Powell famously did so in an editorial connected to candidate Clintons Bosnia policy, mere weeks

before Clinton was elected (New York Times, 8 October 1992, Powell (1992b)).15

Holsti (1998/9).16

The amount of blame attached to political constraints depends on how one views the reasons for first sending then withdrawing ill-equipped US peacekeeping troops on the Harlan County as it arrived to rioting on the Haitian docks (Feaver, 2003). Analysts also differ on how political constraints influenced mission planning for the ill-fated US Rangers in Somalia (Bowden, 1997; Allard, 1995).

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Still, as the Clinton team gained more experience and charted foreign policy successes, the friction continued. In a subsequent analysis of the civil-military gap, where Avant demurred, Peter Feaver (2003) resorted to the more controversial approach: their unique profession and code of honor not withstanding, military officers for some questions could be modeled as ordinary bureaucrats who do not always see eye-to-eye with their political masters. Building on John Brehm and Scott Gates (1997) study of shirking behavior on US government organizations, Feavers model presumed a direct conflict of interests between civilian masters and their military agentsa preference gap that could not be blurred or smoothed over by either divisions within the principal or pure professionalism among the agents. Feavers officers act upon their own ideas unless dissuaded by threats of civilian monitoring and punishment.17 Not surprisingly, Feavers modelsupported by the long series of civil-military contretemps throughout the Clinton yearspointed to a pessimistic conclusion. The sources of civil-military friction, including a wider preference gap; lower monitoring costs; and greater political difficulty in punishing misbehavior, were all growing during the Clinton years. Although the United States did not appear close to any sort of coup, military resistance to civilian control could increase with time, especially if civilians asked the military to perform under highly constrained, politically delicate circumstances.

The prediction of deteriorating relations is not as applicable to the current situation: a Republican sits in the White House and, after September 11th, a greater threat confronts the United States. The preference gap between American civilians and militaryis not as prevalent as it was in the 1990s. On the other hand, Feavers principal-agent modelas Huntingtons historical analysis did some 45 years agomay supply a needed dose of unvarnished realism as the United States reorganizes itself to meet adversaries simultaneously on several fronts. Thinking in terms of an unconventional framework where high-ranking officers are autonomous agents could prepare officials on both sides of the gap, so they are not caught unaware if tension erupts anew.18

In either case, Feavers formal approach breaks the ice; it allows for new questions that would not arise under strict adherence to the Huntington school. The insertion of normal principal-agent dynamics into civil-military relations raises fresh concerns about monitoring. After all, if civilians could perfectly observe their military agents without paying an exorbitant price, the politicians should enjoy invaluable leverage. In fact such technology, like Huntingtons professionalism, would be a magic bullet. Suddenly, divergent preferences would not matter, for in the case of perfect technology, an employer could pay the agent enough to participate and threaten to punish every detected deviation from the desired plan of action: in this incentive system, there would be no rational incentive for shirking.

17 The formal model appears in Chapter 4 of Feaver (2003).

18 Some would argue that tension already has erupted as a result of Secretary of Defense Donald

Rumsfelds aggressive approach toward Defense Transformation. The model presented here, however, has more to do with the improving communications that link Washington to far-flung US field commanders and less to do with any rifts inside the Pentagon (Whitmore, 2003).

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The civil-military relationship, however, does not fit the classic model entirely. Generally, in the economic models, agents do not wield political power to resist the principals punishment. Even with very reliable monitoring technology, a weak president may not avoid shirking by the military. Feaver mapped this logic using an extended game tree, where the payoffs of potential outcomes are expressed in terms of several exogenous parameters. Civilians and military officers choose according to (1) the utility of values for working and shirking, (2) the cost and effectiveness of monitoring technology, and (3) the probability of punishment if the military were caught deviating from civilian intent. Under some range of plausible values for the several parameters, the high friction outcome of military shirking under intrusive civilian monitoring becomes an equilibrium outcome.

At this point in the development of the principal-agent approach, there is reason to believe that, for weak presidents unable to reliably punish the military, improving technology for monitoring will not provide a smooth, frictionless path to greater civilian control. It remains to support this hunch with evidence from historical cases. Going into this project, though, there is no guarantee that the historical record will show high-ranking officers pushing back against civilians to temper modern monitoring technology. Officers subscribing to Huntingtons ennobling brand of professionalism instinctively recoil against playing off political competitors against their Commander-in-Chief.

On the other hand, the professional military oath is to defend the Constitution, not protect the political position of the president. Military values of expertise, responsibility, and corporateness also motivate professional officers to deliver the best performance possible for the national interest. As new monitoring technology erodes commanders flexibility, making it impossible to deviate from politically inspired constraints on military resources, one honorable coping strategy is to spread expert appraisals of the military situation to a wider circle of leaders in Washingtonor, in the case of unclassified information, to the presswho, under the Constitution, have a right to criticize the presidents strategy. In doing so, professional officers can at least argue that they fulfill their obligation to the country, providing their very best advice on how to square resource commitments with the foreseeable demands of limited force operations. In interpreting their professional duty this way, commanders alter their presidents political calculations, perhaps, but not by becoming political operatives themselves. 19

Most presidents, especially those handicapped by political weakness with respect to advisers, lawmakers, or the public, will see the situation differently. From the Commander-In-Chiefs perspective none of the other sources of political power in the American system of government has a comprehensive view of international crises that might call for the use of the US military. It is neither in their personal interest nor in the

19 Some observers strenuously disagree with this position. General Powells New York Times editorial on

Bosnia in October 1992 can be viewed as direct political interference to undermine the likely policies of his future Commander-In-Chief. As such it would constitute insubordination rather than the simple provision of professional advice. Powell, however, had requested clearance for his editorial and was not punished once President Clinton entered office. Moreover, in all three illustrative cases of limited force used for this study, military officers are required to interpret presidential constraints on how they accomplish their duties.

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national interest if political pressure emerges from any quarter to push presidents off their optimal level of resource commitment.

As the ability of Washington to see the details of US field commanders in action improves, all presidents will reach a moment when averting Washingtons gaze is less damaging, in both domestic and geostrategic terms, than fighting a top generals professional objections. Moreover, this moment will be reached sooner for those who are more vulnerable to their political opposition. Whenever the time comes, presidents will see an advantage and the military will see no disadvantage in concluding a bargain: less interference against the presidential position on resources for less intrusive monitoring o n whether the military sticks exactly to the presidents limits.

To put these logical possibilities in terms of observable historical outcomes, empirical research should show evidence of a trade-off. In cases where high technology for near real-time monitoring is available, public statements from the military that challenge the presidents crisis strategy or even indirect criticisms referencing military sources should increase around the same time that military commanders obtain more breathing room to execute their operations. In this regard, it is interesting to note that targeting procedures for General Clark in Kosovo relaxed as pressure mounted against President Clintons original refusal to commit ground troops.

Thinking further in terms of observable patterns in limited force case studies, the bargaining over monitoring technology is bound to be tacit. The professional military tries to avoid the starring role in party politics, and presidents prefer not to advertise their own political weakness. The most researchers can realistically hope for then is temporal correspondence between telltale signs rather than some document or transcript elaborating a civil-military quid pro quo. Although the exchange of signs is somewhat vague, the principal-agent model predicts that such a trade-off is much more likely to confront all presidents after monitoring technology has reached a high level. This last claim can be tested, or at least illustrated, using multiple case studies from different technological eras.

THREE CRISES: BARBARY PIRATES, SANDINISTAS, AND SERBIAN FORCES IN KOSOVO

We select the Barbary pirates, the original Sandinistas, and Kosovo because they represent three cases where the US president in cooperation with the military had to decide upon the limited use of force. In each case the president at the time was operating on limited political capital; his political adversaries at home were eager to exploit any misadventures abroad. At the same time, each president confronted serious limitations in terms of how much force to send. None of them wished to send force packages large enough to fight a major war overseas. None fully mobilized public opinion or budget authority behind their uses of force. All expressed concerns about alarming other powerful nations and flirting with international isolation in an important region of the world. It turns out that in all three cases, the limited force mission proved to be more

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difficult than anticipated, so each president faced the prospect of pressure from his military leaders to commit more resources and deal decisively with the crisis.

While many variables play into the tension between civilians and military across international crises, the customized principal-agent model introduced in the previous section sets up a clear expectation for what should happen in this relationship as the presidents monitoring options expand over time. Through all the changes in personalities and tactical vicissitudes there ought to be a tendency for civilian leaders to employ new monitoring technologies that promise finer control over their military during limited force contingencies. That pattern should hold up to a point, a threshold where the military is watched and restrained at such tight tolerances that officers begin to take a qualitatively different interest in the resource limits imposed by the president. When collection and communications devices allow Washington near real-time control over which weapons are used and which targets are struck in a crisis zone thousands of miles away, we should begin to observe the outlines of a new civil-military bargain: less precise monitoring technology in return for greater military support for the presidents resource decisions.

Thomas Jefferson and the Barbary Pirates20

In 1801, President Thomas Jefferson finally had the opportunity to punish the Barbary powers in Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli. Since the American Revolution and the removal of British protection, pirates had been capturing American merchant ships on their way to Mediterranean ports, on occasion turning their crews over to Muslim rulers who would hold them for spectacular ransoms. As far back as the 1780s, Jefferson from Paris had tried to organize a league of trading nations to crush the pirates and secure the Mediterranean for international commerce. Naval powers Britain and France understood Jeffersons argument for civilized commerce in principle, but in practice they enjoyed greater respect from the deys and pashas of North Africa and rather appreciated the costs Muslim pirates imposed on their small commercial competitors from Scandinavia and the United States. In addition, Jeffersons counterpart in London, John Adams, remained convinced through the first years of the Republic and his own term as US president that the more economical method for dissuading piratical attacks on American shipping was to pay an annual tribute to their sponsoring ports on the North African coast rather than risk war against the Muslim world. By 1801, however, US treaties, particularly with Tunis and Tripoli, had been violated by both sides, and, in May, Tripoli declared war against American shipping.

As President Jefferson launched a campaign to reverse Tripolis decision and secure the same protections enjoyed by British ships, his systems for monitoring the naval action and maintaining civilian control consisted mainly of ship borne letters. They permitted him only general guidance written to address the few broad contingencies that

20 Rodd (1932) provides a detailed account of William Eatons exploits on the ground in North Africa.

Allen (1965) and Wright/Macleod (1945) give more attention to the American naval campaign between 1801 and 1805.

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he could anticipate over the passage of months in some instances. Despite this primitive technology for civilian monitoring and control, Jefferson eventually succeeded in his limited war against the Barbary pirates. As the stakes escalated in 1804-05, Jefferson tightened his effective control by employing multiple agents with overlapping but not identical instructions. This low-technology form of civilian control served its purpose, but it also entailed political costs that may not have occurred in an age with more capable information systems.

Jefferson well understood the dilemma of limited force that confronted him. Too little force might fail to destroy sufficient pirate crews to deter the rest so that newcomers would actually be encouraged to attack and Muslim states would raise their demands for tribute. Too much force would provoke a counter-response from European powers in the area, the same powers whose interests in North America posed the highest priority security threats to the United States. Too much force also increased the chances that the squabbling rulers of Algiers and Tunis would actually unite with Tripoli in resistance against the American naval intervention. Such concentrated action would dramatically increase the costs of Jeffersons coercive gambit. Particularly during his first years in office, the President was working with very little margin both in terms of the navalbudget and supporting votes from Congress. In short, Jefferson had to find the right balance of force, taking his adversaries, the European powers, the US Congress, and his military commanders into account.

Jeffersons foreign policy challenge with respect to Barbarys extortion shared important similarities with President Clintons attempt to turn back ethnic cleansing in the Balkans 200 years later. Jefferson, however, had to apply surgical strikes without precise knowledge of his instruments or timely reports from the multiple patients on which he was operating. He could expect that Pasha Yusuf of Tripoli, who became his primary foe, would take delays in diplomatic correspondence into account. Yet, the consequences of naval action also pushed the pace of some key decisions far beyond the 10-12 week cycle time of Jeffersons ship borne command and control system. Opportunities to press the attack and intensify the shelling of Tripoli or retire toward a friendly Neopolitan port for the purchase of additional support craft passed before Jefferson could learn of their existence. He was thus obliged to extend broad powers to his representatives to the point of decidingwithin a range of possibilitieswhat the final terms of settlement would be.21 Moreover, before the details of an agreement reached his desk, it was impossible for him to stay abreast of the balance of forces. Jefferson primarily depended upon letters streaming in from several quarters giving different versions of events often at second hand and weeks after the fact.

Under these limiting conditions, Jefferson nevertheless demonstrated a steady sense of purpose. His consular agents in Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli felt nearly abandoned at times, but with each setback in the campaign, and despite the reluctance of Congress to provide political cover for the operations in Barbary, Jefferson responded.

21 In principle, Jefferson retained the option of rejecting the treaty and firing the American representative,

but in practice, this action would convince an adversary that the US was negotiating in bad faith, thereby raising the cost of future settlements to end the limited war.

15

The second commodore sent against Tripolitan pirates, Richard Morris, turned out to be too passive. Revolutionary war hero Thomas Truxtun had refused the command of this squadron because the force package was not sufficiently large. It was possible that Morris felt his government was less than deadly serious about punishing Tripoli. Historians Louis Wright and Julia Macleod note that Morris sailed with his wife, and both spent several weeks during the campaign of 1802-03 in relative comfort at some of the finer Mediterranean ports.22 Even at sea, Morris concentrated on escorting American merchant ships past the Barbary Coast rather than adopting the riskier tactics of seeking and destroying pirates or attacking Tripoli itself.

Commodore Morris and American Consul to Tunis William Eaton held opposite views on US Naval policy. Though Morris at one point rescued Eaton from a money dispute with the Bey of Tunis, the Consul along with other diplomatic representatives in the Mediterranean railed in their letters against Morris reluctance to attack. Though it took several months, Jefferson recalled Morris in June 1803. Although the new commodore, Edward Preble, needed no extra motivation, back in the United States, Jefferson took the unusual step of revoking Morris commission without a court marshal.23 Morris responded with a lengthy written defense of his cautious approach, which he essentially argued protected the interest of his squadron and the US Government given the resources at his disposal. Jeffersons political rivals questioned whether Morris had been fairly punished, but to Eatons delight, Preble invigorated the campaign in Tripoli.

With more aggressive tactics came greater risk, and Jefferson soon faced a serious challenge to his limited war policy in the Mediterranean. The 36-gun frigate, Philadelphia, a decisive naval weapons platform in early nineteenth century warfare and a significant portion of Prebles total force, had caught a sand bar while pursuing a smaller craft into shallow waters. The helpless Philadelphia, with its crew of some 300 men, surrendered to Tripolitan forces. To make matters worse, with the change of the tide, the Tripolitans were able to repair the Americans frantic attempts to scuttle the ship and lift the Philadelphia off its perch, ironically delivering on a key demand that had led Pasha Yusuf to declare war in the first place.

Before Jefferson could weigh in, one of Prebles lieutenants, Stephen DeCatur, was able to sneak into the Pashas harbor with a few men and burn the Philadelphia. Even with that bittersweet consolation, Jefferson now faced a Muslim foe with 300 Christian hostages. In the event, Yusuf did not torture these men, but speculation about their fate and periodic letters from the captured officers themselves became grist for American newspapers. The calculations for how to compel Pasha Yusuf became far more complicated, though Jeffersons tools for managing the situation remained as primitive as before.

On the home front, even in the face of multi-million dollar installments on the Louisiana Purchase, Jeffersons Treasury Secretary, Albert Gallatin persuaded Congress

22 Wright and Macleod (1945: 118-9).

23 Allen (1965: 133-6).

16

to set aside more dollars in a Mediterranean Fund for additional naval resources. Meanwhile, without much detailed guidance from Washington, Commodore Preble did his best with his remaining forces to pressure Tripoli. Despite the proximity of the captured American crew, Preble shelled Tripoli in July, August, and September of 1804. Still, Pasha Yusuf did not bend. Short of a ground invasion, which was more than Jefferson had contemplated to clear the Mediterranean sea lanes, there did not seem to be any means for bringing the Pasha to reasonable terms. William Eaton, now back in the United States, cheered the reports of Prebels bombardment and urged that even more force be brought to bear on Tripoli.

It is not clear just how favorably President Jefferson assessed his onetime Consul to Tunis, whom he had inherited from Adams. Jefferson and Eaton met at least once to discuss Eatons plan for winning the war, and, as Consul, Eaton had written several letters broaching his idea with Jeffersons Secretary of State, James Madison. In any case, Jeffersonwithout adequate technology for monitoring Eatons land operations but keen to improve US leverage over Pasha Yusufdecided to unleash Eaton only after setting him at odds with his new chief negotiator for the region, Tobias Lear. Though not as familiar with North Africa as Eaton, Lear was both discreet and formidable. During the Revolutionary War, he had served as General Washingtons Secretary. Later, as chief US diplomat in Santo Domingo, Lear had maneuvered to frustrate Napoleons attempts to take Hispaniola while still keeping America out of war with France.

After receiving official approval of sorts, Eaton, now with the rather unusual title of Naval Agent for the Barbary Regencies, sailed back to the Mediterranean with Samuel Barron, who was to replace Preble as Commodore of US Naval forces. Together, Eaton,Barron, and Lear coordinated on a plan to find Pasha Yusufs exiled brother in Egypt and use him to raise a land threat against Tripoli. It was thought that the simultaneous approach of cannon from the sea and an army from the east would break Yusufs resolve or would actually succeed in encouraging a successful rebellion against him. Less clear is what Lear and Barron promised Eaton, for in order to persuade the exiled HametKaramanli to risk his life, Eaton had to be absolutely credible regarding his full commitment to regime change in Tripoli.

By the time Eaton finished, he had convinced not only Hamet, whom he recruited in Alexandria, but close to one thousand others. For the ground assault against Yusuf, Eatons army comprised seven US Marines and two officers, about fifty Christian troops from European countries, and hundreds of Arabs from various tribes that he and Hamet convinced on their 500-mile march to the city of Derna. On this expedition, Eaton not only demonstrated physical stamina and martial courage but also heroic faith in his countrymen. For a large portion of his march, the Naval Agent turned General was compelled to lead his troops inland, emerging back onto the coast only a few miles from the second largest city under Pasha Yusuf and in desperate need of supplies. Commodore Barron did not send everything that Eaton had requested, but the Constitution contained enough provisions and supplied enough fire support to help Eaton conquer Derna and hold it for several weeks.

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Eaton might have failed at any of several points during his fourteen-week campaign, but when the long-shot victory at Derna came through, Lear took quick advantage. Suddenly, Pasha Yusuf was willing to release his American hostages and discontinue his war against American shipping if the Americans would betray his brother Hamet and leave Derna. Once the agreement was assigned, Barron dutifully sent the shipConstellation to rescue Eaton. In the nighttime evacuation, the Christian soldiers, Hamet, and Eaton were saved, but the Arab troops with whom he had fought and the inhabitants of Derna who had supported Hamet over the Pashas governor were left to flee for their lives.

From the remorseless perspective of American limited war policy, Jeffersons form of civilian control without timely information worked as well as he could have hoped. For some $25,000, a small amount of naval stores, and a handful of marines, Eaton had dramatically altered the Pasha of Tripolis calculations, and before Eaton could escalate out of control, the counterweight, Lear, managed to cut a deal. As pragmatic as Jeffersons scheme of dueling agents against the Barbary pirates turned out to be, it incurred tragic costs at the political and personal level. The terms of the treaty with Pasha Yusuf helped fortify Federalist attacks on Jefferson during his difficult second term, and neither Eaton nor Hamet, perhaps the two men who had most served US interests in the Mediterranean, ever recovered from the American betrayal at Derna.

Advancing Monitoring Technology and Civil-Military Bargaining During the 1930s Intervention in Nicaragua24

Given the destructive side effects of Jeffersons indirect method for civilian control, it is not surprising that subsequent US Presidents, endowed with better monitoring technology yet suffering similar dilemmas in the limited use of force, sought ways to increase their direct control. From the early nineteenth to the early twentieth century, electronic communications and air transport replaced the ship borne letter. Here, we briefly describe the ways in which these new means for monitoring were used by Presidents Coolidge and Hoover to control US Marine operations against the original Sandinistas in Nicaragua from 1927-32. This section precedes the 1999 Kosovo casewhen electronic communications advanced enough to bind American commanders of the air campaign very closely to their presidents wishes both in terms of political-military assets committed and the precise manner in which those resources were used.

With respect to the to the earlier ground war against the Sandinistas, the technologies of telegraph, telephone, and aircraft in the late-1920s allowed civilian authorities to maintain much more sophisticated control over American forces than what Thomas Jefferson could impose 125 years earlier. Recalling that Naval Agent William Eaton was out of contact with the US Commodore for most of his seven-week march across North Africa and that Commodore Barron in the Mediterranean was yet another six weeks away from contacting President Jefferson by letter, individual Marine officershunting Augusto Csar Sandino in the rough terrain of Northern Nicaragua had much

24 The account here relies heavily on Musicant (1990).

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more contact with their commanders headquarters in Managua and much tighter connections with political authorities in Washington.

Between 1927 and 1932, US military engagements in Nicaragua typically consisted of somewhere between ten and one hundred Marines, often accompanied by a larger party of US-trained guardia troops using rifles, grenades, and one or two machine guns to fight off an ambush from 50-250 Sandinistas. The Sandinistas carried similar classes of weapons, but on many occasions, they suffered horrendous losses from the Marines use of close air support. The same one or two airplanes that would bomb or strafe enemy troop concentrations could also send and receive messages between the fieldand headquarters.25 From Managua, the US Ambassador could cable battle reports to the State and Navy Departments in Washington.

Some patrols in search of the Sandinistas lasted weeks. In between firefights there might be twenty-four hours or more, time enough for the patrol to receive telegraphed instructions if they were near a town or to recover an air-dropped package. Field radios, though primitive, could raise reinforcements within one or two miles, even in rough terrain. When it became clear that a town such as Ocotal near the Honduranborder would acquire strategic importance in keeping Sandino off balance, Marines could quickly bring it into their network by supplying telegraph lines and constructing an airstrip.

In principle, then, civilians in Washington could redirect Marines on the move away from politically sensitive targets. During most of the war against Sandino, they rarely did so. Monitoring and communications primarily functioned for military purposes, to relieve a column that ran into trouble or steer it toward targets of opportunity. Insofar as it did not take full advantage of available information technology to maintain tight control over the Marines, the Coolidge administration deviated from principal-agent logic. To be sure, Coolidge sustained steady criticism for imperialist tactics that were wasting American lives and treasure in Nicaragua, and pro-Sandinista reporters did send inflammatory stories back to the United States from towns in the guerrilla zone. Still, patrols rarely sustained heavy casualties all at once, and most of the battles with Sandinistas took place away from civilian areas.26

Both the character of the war and the monitoring style changed as the guerrilla war approached its endgame in 1931-32. During the run-up to Nicaraguan elections, Herbert Hoovers Secretary of State, Henry Stimson, took a more assertive role in Marine operations. As special envoy of President Coolidge in 1927, Stimson had negotiated an end to the civil war between Nicaraguan Conservatives and Liberals, the truce thatSandino, the erstwhile Liberal, rejected before taking to the hills. Four years later,

25 In his history of the Marines in Latin America, Musicant (1990) describes panels placed in a clearing to

send simple coded messages for planes flying overhead. More complex communications were picked up using a weighted line trailing from an airplane. Flying in low and slow, the plane would catch a message packet suspended between two flagpoles that were held in the air by Marines (p.305). 26

Musicant (1990: 360) reports that the Marines suffered 136 dead in 150 engagements over the six-year war against Sandino.

19

Sandino was more dangerous in military terms but in many ways less viable as a political alternative for Nicaragua. Stimson wanted to make sure that the Sandinistas did not disrupt the elections, but he also wanted to send an unambiguous signal to Nicaraguan authorities that US Marine units would be leaving soon and that Nicaraguans would have to rely on their own guardia soldiers to stop Sandino. During the spate of attacks leading up to electionsSandinos last opportunity to wrest control from Nicaraguas two major political partiesStimson exercised significant tactical control over US Marine units.

Though US troops poured off ships to defend important coastal cities while guardia units went off toward the interior to beat back guerrilla offensives, the Standard Fruit Company near Cape Gracias requested but did not receive US protection. Eight American employees were lost in a direct Sandinista assault. When Sandino crossed the last major rail line separating Managua from northern departments, Stimson permitted US Marines to guard trains, but it was the guardia that marched from Len to turn Sandino back toward the north. On January 2, 1933, two months after the election and a day after the new Nicaraguan presidents inauguration, the Marines left the defense of the country entirely to guardia troops, now under their first Nicaraguan commander, Anastasio Somoza.

Although Stimson never succeeded in building a stable Nicaraguan democracy, hedid ruin Sandinos capacity for threatening American interests, and he finally extracted the Marines from a seemingly endless series of jungle ambushes. Integral to Stimsons policy were tactical restrictions on US Marine deployments to convince the Nicaraguan government that the guardia troops would soon shoulder the burden of thwarting Sandino. Executing these restrictions required that Stimson as Secretary of State in Washington receive accurate information about the movements and destructiveness of Sandinos guerrillas within hours of action on the battlefield, a vast improvement from the monitoring frequency and detail that Jefferson had at his disposal during the Barbary campaign. In comparing the Barbary and Nicaraguan cases, a basic prediction of the principal-agent model for civil-military relations seems to bear out: civilian leaders in politically sensitive limited force missions reached for the latest collection and messaging technologies to make ever finer distinctions in where and how forces were used.

At the same time, the principal-agent equations do not include all relevant details for how civilian monitoring proceeds in practice. For example, in the cases, even as technology improves, top civilians cannot track operational information from every unit. Furthermore, if politicians wish to break their adversarys will while simultaneously applying high profile force constraints to reduce domestic political risk, there may be an incentive to permit selective breakdowns of a tight monitoring system. This probably explains the relatively loose civilian control with respect to Chesty Pullers Company M unit toward the end of the intervention in Nicaragua.

In the 1932 election period, when Sandino pressed down the western coast toward Managua and Secretary Stimson refused to engage Marine units directly, Puller and his Nicaraguan soldiers, some forty men on patrol, harassed Sandinos supply routes near the northern town of Jinotega. Jinotega may have been more remote than Managua or Len,

20

and the patrol may have been designated as guardia rather than US Marine, but these distinctions hardly seem sufficient to place Company M outside Stimsons strategic thinking. US MarinesPuller, Lee, and Lewisled the guardia unit and could easily have died during its 120-mile search and destroy mission in September 1932.27

Chesty Puller certainly provided sensational copy for isolationist and leftist reporters who had been reporting from towns like Jinotega for years: one story alleged that Puller encouraged his troops to wear Sandinista ears on their belts as trophies.28Nevertheless, in marked contrast to other aspects of the US war during these months, Puller enjoyed relative autonomy from civilian interference at the tactical level. He collected his own intelligence, mustered his own forces, and selected the line of march for his unit in the northern jungle. Puller did operate far from the areas where more conventional guardia units defended Managua. Stimson may have felt that he could afford to give Puller a long leash, weakening Sandinos ability to scuttle the 1932 elections without alleviating the pressure on Managuas Liberal and Conservative parties to cooperate with the United States and accept a growing share of responsibility for Nicaraguas security.

Puller, of course, was never the overall US commander in Nicaragua. Indications are that top commanders for the intervention worked under closer civilian scrutiny at the operational level. In 1929, General Feland, during his second stint leading the US Marines in Nicaragua, finally accepted Liberal President Moncadas request for armed voluntario units to supplement the nonpartisan but less trustworthy guardia. US Ambassador Eberhardt complained to the incoming Hoover administration, and General Feland was quickly recalled. Essentially, civilians in Washington could not ignore the Marine commander spending too much political capital without authorization. In order to raise the level of effort against Sandino, General Feland had compromised the Americanpolicy of neutrality between Nicaraguas Liberals and Conservatives.

Monitoring and Bargaining in Kosovo29

As monitoring systems benefit from satellite communications, video teleconferencing, and remote imaging systems, it becomes even easier for both field commanders and their civilian superiors to intervene not just at the operational level but at the tactical level as well. This sets up an interesting question: As communications with civilian authorities improve and commanders feel their political-military flexibility for winning wars slip away, will they find new ways to relieve the civilian pressure ? Specifically, during a modern limited use of force such as the 1999 air campaign over Kosovo, it seems we do find relaxation of civilian constraints and some strategically significant military moves that were not closely monitored. The result was that more

27 Details of Pullers mission appear in Davis (1988) as well as Musicant (1990).

28 Musicant (1990: 357).

29 Much of the factual information for this case appears in the memoirs of General Wesley Clark (2001) and

in a series of reports from the RAND Corporation (Nardulli, 2002; Hosmer, 2001; Lambeth, 2001; Peters, 2001).

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political-military resources were dedicated against the adversary without overtly revising the Presidents limits for use of force in the Balkans.30

In the early stages of the campaign to eliminate Slobodan Milosevics threat to Kosovo, President Clinton felt strong allied pressure to limit property destruction and civilian casualties. With no vital national interest engaged, the President also feared that numbers of NATO casualties could inflame domestic opinion against the war. In short, the President desired a precise application of air power that would bring Milosevic to heelin short order without generating enough collateral damage to alienate any member of NATO. As Secretary Stimson had done seventy years before, civilian leadership inserted itself into military operations at the tactical level. By March 1999, information technology had advanced enough that President Clinton and other Allied leaders could participate in the air targeting process; in the opening days of the campaign, they stamped their final approval on every fixed target for coalition bombing.

Unfortunately, Milosevic was not intimidated by NATOs controlled demonstration of firepower. The Serbian leader accelerated rather than abandoned ethnic cleansing of Kosovar Albanians, and as the air campaign extended into April with Serbian propaganda playing up civilian casualties, NATO found itself running out of sanctioned targets. Given the three options of admitting defeat, expanding the target set for air power, and amassing ground forces for the Allied invasion of Kosovo, NATO essentially selected the latter two. Nevertheless, President Clinton had to be very careful on both counts. France was particularly vigorous in vetoing air targets such as electricity and telephone systems that would increase ordinary Serbs suffering in Belgrade. The German and Greek governments were politically vulnerable if NATO actually proceeded with a ground campaign. Public shifts by the US toward a more aggressive posture in the air or on land risked accusations of betrayal from one or more NATO governments, dissolution of the coalition against Milosevic, and long-term damage against NATOs credibility as a force for security in Europe. Though they did not always agree, General Wesley Clark, NATO Secretary General Javier Solana, and officials in Washington such as Secretary of Defense William Cohen managed over several tense exchanges to increase the force against Milosevic without losing the NATO Allies.

On the ground, General Clark eventually received permission to deploy Apache helicopters in neighboring Albania. The Apaches arrived at a snails pace, and they were forced to modify their usual close air support tactics in order to prepare missions against Yugoslavian units without friendly ground forces. There was also little likelihood that Washington would grant permission for the indiscriminate suppressive fire that would protect the helicopters from shoulder-fired rockets as they flew across Kosovo. All of these hurdles actually helped make the deployment tolerable to the more skittish Allies,

30 This conclusion partially conflicts with Andrew Stiglers (2003) recent analysis in International Security,

which draws upon many of the same sources. Stigler sought to make the best case for air power as the decisive threat compelling Slobodan Milosevics surrender. Here, we argue that both the air power and ground power actually employed exceeded the level that would have been used had modern technology kept military tactics and US policy strictly in line.

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but they vexed Clark who wanted Milosevic to fear a growing ground threat against Serbian forces in Kosovo.

Though experts struggle to measure precisely how much the prospect of a NATO invasion weighed in Milosevics eventual capitulation, Clark did assemble more political-military resources through the Task Force Hawk Apaches without tripping alarms in Brussels or Washington. Deploying the helicopters as an independent task force complicated force protection requirements. As they addressed NATOs low tolerance for Allied casualties, commanders added infantry, armor, and multiple rocket-launcher units to support the Apache air crews. The extra weight contributed to deployment delays, which conveniently for the Allies shook Washingtons confidence in Task Force Hawks readiness to meet the challenges awaiting it in Kosovo. However, the additional equipment also meant that Milosevic had to contend with a ground force capable of withstanding Serbian small-unit attacks just miles from the Kosovo border. Though this force was not nearly enough to invade Kosovo, it effectively closed off hot pursuit of Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) fighters into Albania. Moreover, Task Force Hawk could at some point become a lead element, paving the way for a much larger concentration of forces.31

In order to avoid extra pressure on the coalition, President Clinton refused to permit official planning for a ground operation. By itself, this would vitiate the invasion threat against Milosevic and remove an important high card from Clarks hand. However, Washington did not prevent quiet planning conducted by small, independent cells reporting to Clark. Although these cells were not adequately staffed or integrated across areas of specialization to produce a full-fledged battle plan, they did have the benefit of tying into the British national system, and they did develop a limited force option. Dubbed B-minus, this proto-plan anchored discussion among US civilian leadership and the Joint Chiefs of Staff as they prepared to meet on June 3rd. At this meeting President Clintons advisers were to discuss whether to recommend a reversal of their boss earlier declaration by placing invasion firmly and publicly on the table.

Anticipating this crucial decision point, Clark ratcheted up planning requirements for KFOR, the NATO force designed to stabilize Kosovo after Milosevic capitulated. Before Milosevic surrendered, thousands of troops were added to bring the total significantly closer to the B-minus force. Civil engineers refurbishing the road from Albania to Kosovo were instructed to reinforce it to withstand heavy armored columns, a specification not normally required for a peacekeeping force. By means of the KFOR adjustments and the unofficial planning cells, General Clark moved forward on the ground option. Some of this movement was visible to Belgrade; all of the movement squeezed more resources out of civilian guidance in ways that might have been monitored but were not.

In the air, Clark also expanded the campaign without pushing reluctant governments into a corner where they would have to withdraw political support for the bombing. After Allied planes hit the list of Phase I targets without denting Milosevics

31 Nardulli (2002: Ch 4).

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defiance, Clark foughtagainst his Air Force subordinates and advisersto shift the focus more toward the Yugoslav forces perpetrating ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. Most of the air commanders felt that their assets could not be effective at isolating and killing the dispersed, mobile units that were terrorizing Kosovar civilians. However, shifting to the ground operations had an advantage in that the rigorous civilian monitoring system for fixed targets outside of Kosovo did not apply.

As more assets, such as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and Q-37 fire radars embedded with Task Force Hawk, entered the theater, the Allies, and in particular the Americans, improved their process for identifying tactical targets. Toward the end of the campaign, UAVs and radars near southeastern Kosovo coordinated their operations with the Combined Air Operations Center in Italy. Information for mobile targets or targets of opportunity could be prioritized and passed forward to the appropriate battle management and strike systems within three hours.32 This far outpaced the process for Belgrade, which involved the presentation of collateral damage estimates and final approval at high political levels.

Interestingly, Clark was able to import elements of this tactical philosophy to the strategic campaign. Without forcing a formal vote on the issue, Javier Solana announced just before the NATO summit on April 23rd that, as the target set expanded to Phase III, he would henceforth implement standing guidance from political authorities in the North Atlantic Council and approve targets without necessarily awaiting positive confirmation from nineteen different national reviews.33

In terms of both strategic and tactical bombing, then, civilian monitoring was effectively relaxed in significant ways even as other procedures were tightened to prevent additional mistakes. The bombing of the Chinese Embassy on May 7th illustrated not only that high-technology US targeting practices were only as good as theinformation input into its geographic databases but also that other nations were no longer reviewing every fixed target in Belgrade.34 As the number of listed strategic targets expanded to nearly one thousand during Phase III and as US tactical air power cooperated with the KLA to defeat Yugoslavian units at Mount Pastrik, Clarks license from US political authorities to exercise judgment about the political sensitivity of targets broadened.

No smoking gun shows that Clark strong-armed authorities in Washington. Clark never carried out a frontal assault against President Clintons ban on ground troops nor were there loud retaliatory calls to charge Clark with insubordination. Clark, though, had direct contact with several of the key decision makers in Washington and Europe. He was political, not just a military presence in Clinton administration deliberations.32

Nardulli (2002: 91).33

All NATO members retained the right to veto targets on the list, and smaller countries did veto a few targets, but in practice the United States, the United Kingdom, and France had the most influence over approvals (Peters, 2001: 25-29).34

In after action reports, operational allies France and the United Kingdom both complained that US intelligence sharing had been inadequate for purposes of coordination. During the campaign, the Allies often did not know when or how the US planned to hit a target until after the fact (Peters, 2001).

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As the Joint Chiefs and Clinton officials prepared for their June meeting to officially decide upon ground force planning, they did not invite their field commander to personally provide his military judgment. Ostensibly, the principals in the room already understood Clarks views, so there was no need to distract him from conducting the war in Europe. Yet, no decision on that day, June 3rd, was more important for Clarks command than the one set to take place in Washington, and it is at least as plausible that advisers reluctant to take the political risk inherent in ground force planning worried more about Clarks potential for cunning maneuvers than the thrust of his military advice.

Although the Clinton administration decided to leave Clark out of the room during its final deliberations, Clark took advantage of the fact that important members of official Washington had just arrived to visit Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) in Belgium. On June 2, Clark took Republican Senator John WarnerChairman of the Armed Services Committee and a potential critic of Clintons war strategyon a helicopter tour of invasion routes into Kosovo under the unofficial Plan B-minus.35 Warner seemed positively disposed toward the ground option, and this fact would have substituted nicely for advocacy if Clinton strategists had decided to reassure Milosevic by halting all movement in support of an invasion during the last tension-filled days of negotiations.

Making the ground option harder to kill also meant that more parties to the policy debate in Washington would at least see expansion of the air campaign as the lesser of two evils. When Clark himself reenergized the bombing by authorizing strikes at Batanjica airfield and arguing successfully against US rules protecting petroleum installations at Novi Sad, his opponents held a weak hand.36 As much as some officials in the Pentagon and the State Department worried that additional bombing in northern Serbia might prompt Milosevic to cancel talks, if tactical targets in Kosovo did not by themselves quickly generate sufficient pressure for an agreement, the far riskier ground option could not be put off much longer. For strong opponents of the ground option, it was better to allow Clark extra flexibility in the air and bet that he could use the maneuvering room to sway Milosevic.

CONCLUSION: RECONSIDERING THE IDEAL OF MILITARY PROFESSIONALISM

To the extent that General Clark pushed back against the boundaries of highly intrusive political guidance and in some instances successfully discouraged detailed civilian monitoring during the Kosovo campaign, the case offers evidence of a curious bargaining dynamic in US civil-military relations. First, the old Huntingtonian ideal of objective controlwhat Eliot Cohen termed the normal theory of civil-military relationscannot explain the continuing embrace of new monitoring technologies nor the intense civilian and staff micromanagement observed in Operation Allied Force. Though

35 Clark (2001: 343).

36 Ibid: 364-5.

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General Clark eventually won more autonomy on some issues, during the endgame in June, he still fielded secure calls and managed video-teleconferences for several authorities in Washington and Europe, and he was still compelled by political guidance to cancel several targets. Historical cases of limited force, including Thomas Jeffersons campaign against the Barbary pirates and the 1930s intervention in Nicaragua, also support the notion that with improved collection and communications technologies, civilians will generally opt for tighter monitoring of their field commanders.

The Huntingtonian ideal notwithstanding, classic principal-agent logic from economics does explain why civilian control becomes more intrusive as monitoring technologies advance. The perspective assumes that military professionalism alone fails to stop commanders in every circumstance from resisting civilian imposed constraints. Cheap and effective monitoring technology provides information that civilians can use to reliably detect and punish commanders deviations from their guidance. The principal-agent model shows why these conditions, even without draconian punishments, prompt coldly rational military agents to tow the civilian line on political-military resources. That is, under very sophisticated detection technology, commanders as agents do best by adhering strictly to what they view as suboptimal tools and tactics because civilian authorities stipulate and efficiently enforce them.

For some, the classic principal-agent model highlights an important problem for US civil-military relations in the information age.37 With the prominence of limited force missions and the capacity of electronic command and control, the serious danger, according to this view, is not that the post-Cold War military will slip from the reins of a neophyte president but rather that a politically savvy president will impose unprecedented micromanagement on the militarys crisis operations. Without meaningful autonomy, officers will not be able to exercise military professionalism.

Since professionalism inherently involves expert judgment, it cannot survive in academic primers but must be practiced and passed in apprenticeship across generations of commanders. The great fear coming out of the classical principal-agent analysis is that after many years of modern warfeaturing intrusive monitoring of highly constrained forcesthere will no longer be a reserve of military professionalism to rescue the United States when it finally faces a new rival of the old order on a par with Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union.

Our revised analysis recognizes the consistent and well-established logic supporting this concern over military professionalism. In fact, we attempt to capture the essential mechanism in mathematical terms. However, a second aspect of the dynamic between civilians and military becomes clearer with the recognition that the principal-agent equations may have multiple interpretations. On the one hand, as monitoring technology improves, rising probability of detection reduces autonomy and forces the military agents best choice ever closer to the civilian principals ideal mix of resources. On the other hand, in the US political context, senior military commanders need not accept the presidents bliss point as nonnegotiable.

37 Bacevich (2001).

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Negotiations may proceed but subtly, characterized by feints toward Congress or careful interpretations of existing proscriptions. Particularly in coalition operations, a president might prefer that resources flow toward the fight through less intrusive civilian monitoring rather than an explicit shift of his political-military commitment to the crisis. Even as the information age progresses, a military commander might still find opportunities to exercise command judgment over deployed forces.

Just as it would be facile to conclude that Thomas Jefferson exercised no control over distant naval squadrons because he lacked the radio or the imaging satellite, it is also premature to declare the death of military professionalism now that those command and control technologies have arrived. Jefferson used the politics of multiple agents with overlapping responsibilities to tighten civilian control, effectively shortening the leash that tied US officers abroad to civilian authority at home. In a time when information technology threatens to eliminate the distance between principal and agent altogether, military commanders can recreate at least some of their old maneuvering room by appreciating the analogous system of checks and balances at the civilian level.

Civil-military relations during the recent intervention in Kosovo indicate that bargaining to relax some high-technology monitoring and preserve military autonomy already takes place, but the ignominious replacement of General Clark soon after NATOs victory over Milosevic suggests that neither political nor military leaders are yet comfortable with the process. Now may be an opportune time to revise the concept of military professionalism, which has served so well to anchor debates about civilian control since Soldier and the State.

During the Cold War, Huntington argued that professionalism could persuade civilians on the merits of objective controlinvolving as it did a broad sphere of autonomy for commanding officersonly as long as being professional meant being apolitical. Today, when commanders must carve their own space from a thicket of intrusive monitoring technologies, politically informed, nonpartisan professionalism isa more useful concept.

Meaningful autonomy in the civil-military relationship has evoked profound devotion to duty and permitted the development of sound judgment among professional officers. Unfortunately, it cannot easily coexist with information age monitoring unlessmilitary commanders acquire a certain political savvy before they wage modern war. Brash attacks against the presidents policy or covert information campaigns to favor the opposition party are political in a way that Huntington rightly censured, but they are notgenuinely informed in the sense of a thorough understanding about how war making power and expertise on war are constituted or distributed in the United States. Political sensitivity without political posturing in the information age opens possibilities for military advice and implementation that will reinforce venerable military virtues, improving national security without compromising civilian control.

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