Poison Laurel
As Professor Finer tells us in this comprehensive and stimulating survey, and as events in Togo are the latest reminder, military intervention in civil government has been common in all ages. But, like the condottiere of the Renaissance or the Janissaries of Constantinople, the prototypical Roman man on horseback, a Sulla or a Marius, bore little resemblance to ..a contemporary mili- tary dictator. For, with the single exception of the English New Model Army, the modern phenomenon of miltary intervention originated with the French Revolution. It was between 1789 and 1815 that the four factors or movements were born which in one way or another have lain behind most military takeovers ever since. From this revolutionary period dates the evo- lution of a professional officer caste which repudiated alike the aristocrat and the soldier of fortune, and also the rise of the militant, crusading nation-state with the nation itself rather than the dynasty as the object of loyalty. Then, too, was born the insurrectionary army which had no qualms about overthrowing the existing social order, and, fourthly, the dogma of Popular sovereignty propagated by the Jaco- bins and codified by Napoleon made it possible for any military clique claiming any mass sup- port to overthrow an existing government. In the nineteenth century the result of these in- fluences was seen most clearly in the caudillismo of Latin America, and in our day, of course, it is seen chiefly in the successor States of the great colonial empires, where those countries that do not become part of the Communist bloc `will oscillate for a long time to come between military regimes and civilian restorations.' The writer's discussion of the motives and situations which precipitate military intervention is as thorough as his examination of the histori- cal reasons which make it possible in the first Place- When civilian institutions are weak the man on horseback frequently gives as his justi- fication for intervention 'the national interest,' ,a Move to gather support by implying that his loyalties are to the State and not to the govern- [bent. A recent example of this argument is General MacArthur's remark in July, 1951, shortly after his dismissal by President Truman: I find in existence a new and heretofore un- known and dangerous concept that the members of our armed forces owe primary allegiance or loyalty to those who temporarily exercise the authority of the Executive Branch of the Government rather than to the country and its Constitution which they are sworn to defend. No proposition could be more dangerous. 1_11 Some cases, of course, as Professor Finer
ticvmarks, a military regime may be a construe-
. e cme construe- such as Ataturk's. And while Mac- Arthur's words on this occasion were a result e_1, his great and justifiable concern over the while of the stalemate war in Korea, and 71.1e a soldier's revolt against a criminal civilian fe(Stauffenberg, Maleter) is usually justi- ,7, we should always remember that 'in a vast "thblev-.0f cases this military] intervention has been little or nothing more than an attempt upon feeble but nevertheless operative civilian insti- tutions by a. group of wilful men armed with lethal weapons, nurtured in arrogance and pricked on by pride, ambition, self-interest and revenge.'
Techniques of military pressure vary, ranging from the activities of the various defence lobbies in mature democracies such as Britain and America, through blackmail, intimidation, refusal to co-operate with the civilians, to outright violence in States with a low political maturity. Sometimes, as in the Argentine from 1943 to 1945, the military rule directly, as they did in Turkey immediately following the coup against Menderes. Indirect rule, as in Japan from 1931 to 1945, is also common and sometimes there is 'dual rule,' as in Peron's Argentine and Franco's Spain, where the soldiers rule in conjunction with other forces in the States. Most important in all the different forms of military rule dis- cussed here is the endless quest for legitimacy, a quest, it need hardly be said, inspired by the fear of endless challenge rather than by any high principle:
The same Arts that did gain A pow'r, must it maintain.
We see also, in contrast to the pervasive propaganda of the USSR which ceaselessly at- tacks the West for its alleged militarism, how that 'democratic' polity is no more free from the activity of the military pressure group than any other country. Indeed. so fearful are the Soviet leaders of 'Bonapartism' that their armed forces are completely infiltrated by the counter- intelligence services of the KGB, which also forms special units above regimental level in case of trouble. At least three times in the past decade, during the elimination of Beria in 1953, in 1955 during Malenkov's campaign against heavy industry, and again during Khrushchev's battle for survival with the anti-party group in 1957, the military intervened—decisively.
Finally, what attitude should we adopt to the proliferating military regimes which look like becoming the usual form of government in the underdeveloped countries? To insist, as some do, that we should not criticise these regimes as
they are in any case inevitable, and especially if they claim to be 'progressive,' is an insult to the inhabitants of the new countries, a form of intellectual colonialism, as we are then telling them that they are simply incapable of govern- ment by consent. In some cases, of course, it would be absurd for anything better to be ex- pected, but as a general rule we can hardly do better than to listen to Professor Finer, who has written what is surely the most interesting book on civil-military relationships since Samuel Huntington's The Soldier and the State: If we are ever asked to endorse a military regime . . . we must surely ask ourselves whether any immediate gain in stability and prosperity' it brings is not overweighed by the very great likelihood that, for an indefinite time to come, public life and all the personal expectations that hang upon it will continue to be upset, wilfully and unpredictably, by further threats, blackmail or revolt.
DAVID REES
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