It is hard to know if you are walking on thin ice. The ice is opaque, and the first indication that you are in trouble is when you hear the musical cracking under your feet. This can be the case with many things, including civilian control of the military. It is very hard to know when you are in good shape and when you are in danger until after the overt actions of a coup have been attempted.
This is why it is so critical that we have complete civilian control of our military. The danger that a large and incredibly well equipped military can present should never be forgotten or underestimated. This is why it is likely that today is going to be the very last day of military service for Gen. Stanly McCrhystal. His words and actions have gone beyond the pale on more than one occasion. He was strongly reprimanded for his inappropriate statements on Afghanistan policy before the president decided to increase troops there, and now the quotes in the new Rolling Stone article showing his and his command teams disdain for the civilian leadership mean it is time for him to go.
"Originally posted at Squarestate.net"
All of this has me thinking about the novel and movie 7 Days In May. If you have not seen this movie (with Burt Lancaster and Kurt Douglas no less!) then do yourself a favor and rent it. The plot revolves around a charismatic and hard-nosed general who plots a military coup after the President announces a treaty with the Soviets to destroy all nuclear missiles.
Lancaster’s character is convinced that he knows better than the president and "for the good of the nation" intends to remove him. Without giving away too much the plot is discovered by his aid and is brought to the attention of the president. This movie has one of the best closing speeches and final scenes of any I have ever seen it is really worth your while.
In thinking about this movie it occurred to me how much closer we might be to the events in it than when it was made in 1964. In the film a big part of the plan is to seize control of all communications and to use that to prevent the implementation of the treaty. Today we see a media environment that allows those who favor the "strong" military point of view to be nearly hermetically sealed in an echo chamber of similar views. Talk Radio and Fox News have taken their audiences so far away from reality that a coup from the military would likely be praised and supported.
We have seen this in the endless efforts to delegitimize the president at every turn. The Birther conspiracy could not have sustained itself and grown as it has without the support of these media outlets and their news personalities. The frankly insane ravings of Glenn Beck about the socialist take over have made the possibility of a coup more likely.
There is also the fetishism that the criminal Bush administration has pushed on the nation in trying to support their military adventurism. The meme of "listening to the commanders on the ground" was never actually true, but they used it to give them some more credibility with the "America, Fuck Ya!" crowd. They trotted out General Petraeus and acted as though the ideas of a military commander were more important than those of the Legislative or Executive branches of our government. This sets a dangerous point of view in the publics mind, where if they do not like what the elected government is doing they can look to the military for a different solution.
Do I think that there is going to be a military coup? No, I don’t. Call me an optimist if you will but I don’t see the pieces fitting together. Gen. McCrhystal has already offered to resign (though I think that is just one more attempt to force the presidents hand by the General trying to look like the reasonable one) and it is likely that President Obama will either accept that resignation or just outright fire McCrhystal.
For all its faults and to the probable disappointment of some of the more wingnutty of the Right, the military, as a whole understands the need for civilian control. When presented with the opportunity to join in delegitimizing of the president by letting officers challenges to his deployment orders the military has come down on them hard including the ongoing court marshal of a Lt. Colonel.
There are those on the Left and Right (a fairly rare moment of actual equivalence) that argue we are already in tyranny, that the government of our nation is not actually of the people but controlled by some other group (this is where they diverge). The fact is that democracy is, at best, a kludge. It is a bunch of compromises and when it is working correctly everyone is a little bit unhappy about one aspect or another. This leaves the idea of coups open to conspiracy theory and assertion, but a working democracy also rarely has problems controlling its military.
We have a working democracy and that is why there will be no 7 Days In May played out. General McCrhystal has put the president in a trick bag, again. He has made him make the choice between keeping the architect of his Afghanistan strategy in place or asserting control of the military. I have very little doubt that when all the facts are weighed the president is going to come down on the side of asserting control. While the Afghan war might be central to his foreign policy, leaving any doubt that the civilian government always trumps the will of the military is far more important.
Today we will see the reaffirmation of one of the most important aspects of our form of government. We were only every in mild danger of civilian control breaking down, but it is a critical pillar of our society that can not be allowed to be challenged without consequence. This will, of course, not stop the news-models over at Fox and the screamers on Talk Radio from getting exactly the wrong lesson from this. They will take the fact of the president making the chain of command clear as a clearing out of those who oppose his nefarious (to them) schemes. They will rant and rave and try to lionize Gen. McCrhystal never understanding that the very tyranny they are railing against is made more likely by their actions.
The floor is yours.
UPDATE: AP is reporting that Gen. McChrystal left the White House prior to the start of the Afghanistan security meeting. While there was time between the meetings, it looks as though his services are no longer required by the president.