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Military Strategy and the Power of Democracy

Updated: Jan 6, 2023




Military Strategy and the Power of Democracy


One of my favourite stories on the power of democracy concerns a US army intelligence officer in post-invasion Iraq, part of the hunt for WMDs.


One bit of evidence the US intel community had for a nuclear weapons programme was the import by the Iraqi army of metal tubes, of a thickness and gauge that only really made sense as the spokes of uranium enrichment centrifuges.


When this intelligence officer finally got hold of someone from the now-disbanded Iraqi army who could explain this, the explanation stunned him. They'd been using the tubes to make shell casings.


This made no sense to our intelligence officer - the gauge was too narrow for that. The Iraqi army officer's explanation drew back the curtain on why, when it comes down to war fighting, democracies do so much better than dictatorships.


The Iraqi army needed narrow tubes, because the official supplier of the propellant that went into the shells was a friend of Saddam's son, and was cheating them left right and centre, selling them product so weak it could only be effectively used in atypically narrow shells. Because of his connection to the ruling family, the army couldn’t do anything about it.


War fighting is (more or less) a solved problem


I've been reading a lot about military strategy and operations over the last few months. Not just because of its obvious immediate relevance, but because there's currently a slew of great books, from the frank but theoretical 'The Habit of Excellence' by Lt Col Langley Sharp to the coruscating exposé 'Changing of the Guard' by Simon Akam.


The thing that shines through all of these is that the strategic 'how' of war fighting is (largely) a solved problem, and has been for a while.


I can't begin to comprehend the intensity of the burden experienced by the men and women out on the front line of fighting wars, or the support given the family and friends who surround them. This isn't about that - I wouldn't dare.


But the theory of war fighting seems pretty settled. I'm not going to try to summarise it here ('settled' and 'solved' don't mean simple - not by a long shot).


So where do the problems come in, and why (despite occasional signs to the contrary, and the regular gripes of every soldier I know) do these problems afflict non-democratic countries far worse than democratic ones?


The problems left in war fighting aren't in knowing what, more or less, to do. Not to guarantee success, but to make the absolute best fist of whatever situation you've got. So where's the bottleneck? What's the speed-bump?


Broadly speaking, procurement. We can conceptualise the right vehicle, artillery piece, the right infantry kit and load out and all the rest. But the problem is managing the process by which they get to you, in sufficient numbers, in time and at quality. With spares, and support, and supplies.


With troops trained to use them, co-operatively and collaboratively.


With officers trained to command using what, frankly, seem to be well established and proven approaches.


So why does this crucial thing work better in democracies than non-democracies? (And by the way, if you're wondering how I'm using those terms, I have little quibble with the EIU Democracy Index)


Very simply, it works better because of accountability, and the rule of law. Contrary to what is sometimes said, for example about fascists making the trains run on time, those two factors actually enhance, rather than degrade, the effectiveness of government. Francis Fukuyama makes this point superbly in his magisterial 'Political Order' duology - essential reading for anyone interested in the theory of government.


In Putin's People, Catherine Belton quotes Sergei Pugachev, saying:


‘Putin said this himself,’ says Pugachev. ‘Openly. I remember, I was speaking with him. He said, “What is that guy waiting for? Why isn’t he earning? What is he waiting for? He has the position. Let him make money for himself.” The ‘guy’ here being a recent appointee to a senior post in the Russian government.


This ethos runs through non-democratic countries. It's hardly absent in democratic countries, obviously. But the rule of law, and the accountability that comes through the democratic process, work as counter-forces.


Despite repeated claims by apologists for non-democratic regimes, so far they're the only things that can consistently and reliably (if not infallibly) serve as counter-forces to self-interest. Tony Blair has apparently made more money since leaving office than any prior UK Prime Minister. Putin, while still in office, is said to be one of the richest people in the world. If not the richest.


A lot of non-democratic regimes start out as demonstrative movements. They proclaim an identity, whether religious, nationalist, ethnic, or something else. But it never takes very long, at least at the top (or in the centre, pick your visual metaphor), before it becomes an extractive movement.


Need the support of someone who doesn't care about your identitarian movement? Buy them in. Someone's losing faith with the cause? Buy them in. Someone has problems downstream? Giver them money to pay the problems off. Money: the universal solvent.


And the money has to come from somewhere. So it comes from criminal enterprises - always lucrative, especially when you control the policy. Except you can't control them too precisely, so to make sure your criminal buddies are safe, you just degrade the powers of law enforcement and the justice in general.


And the money comes direct from the state coffers. Businesses don't just bid for the good or service to state wants to procure, they bid for the highest bribe. Money is a cycle, and it's just the law-abiding suckers at the bottom who lose out.


Illegal income comes to dwarf legal income for the most powerful people in the country (and a whole lot of enablers along the way). And illegal income thrives in the dark, so the people with their hands on the blinds pull them down for the whole nation.


Democracies aren't perfect, and I don't think I know one person who's worked in defence procurement in the UK or the US who doesn't admit upfront that it's a . . . shall we say 'improvable' process.


Years ago a friend of mine from Saudi said told me the difference between there and here ('here' being the UK, where he was studying at the time) was 'You have corruption scandals. We just have corruption'.


Democracies work (among their other virtues) because the three elements identified by Fukuyama are essential to good government - accountability, rule of law, and an effective state, feed off one another. They're not, as so often depicted, two against one - democracy and rule of law versus an effective state. They're three against . . . well against the myriad tides that run against good government.




 
 
 

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