Abstract
Napoleon, Hitler, and Mussolini all lost their power as a result of unsuccessful wars. Alexander, Ghengis Khan, and Stalin on the other hand, all greatly increased their power as a result of war. To an absolute autocrat, then, war offers both an opportunity for increasing his power and a risk that he will lose it. In this chapter we will be primarily concerned with the essentially defensive problem of preventing an autocrat’s overthrow by an outside army rather than his ability to increase his power or to overthrow other autocrats. We’ll also ignore the apparently real entertainment value of war when contemplated from the position of the chief player. The statement frequently made in the 17th and 18th centuries that war was the sport of kings does seem to have had a good deal of truth in it.
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Notes
In 1978 Taraki and the Afghan Communist Party took power with Russian support. In September 1979 Taraki was deposed and replaced by Amin, in December 1979 units of the Societ Army eliminated Amin, installing Karmal in his place. For a detailed chronology, see Dunnigan and Bay, 1985, pp. 122–25.
Ibid.,p. 133.
Ibid.,p. 136.
Johnson, 1983, p. 529.
They performed the almost impossible task of producing a worse government than Amin’s. The situation has continued to deteriorate with the result that some citizens are beginning to look back on Amin’s regime as the least of all possible evils. See, The Washington Post,Sunday, August 5, 1984; pages 1, 32, and 33.
Johnson 1983, p. 657. It is notable that although the government of Vietnam in Cambodia is a vicious and oppressive one, the populace on the whole are not willing to try to overthrow it because it is so much better than the government of Pol Pot which it replaced.
Dunnigan and Bay, 1985, p. 73.
The Fulani Empire of Masna (1818–1862) which extended across the interior delta of the Niger River was the result of a Moslem crusade which forced conversation to Islam at sword point (Mair 1979, p. 71). The Empire of Mali existed from the later thirteenth century A.D. to about 1468. At its greatest it controlled both banks of the Niger River as far south as Kukuya (today Bentia), while in the west the kingdoms along the Senegal and Gambia rivers to the Atlantic coast became its vassals (Ibid., p. 5).
New York Times,February 3, 1985, p. 16.
It seems likely that Hassan himself was, to a considerable extent, responsible for the selection of their very bad strategy and tactics.
In 1984, Iran’s total population was estimated as 41,280,000, of which total defense forces constituted 2,200,000. The corresponding figures for Iraq were 14,200,000 and 515,000, respectively (Facts on File, March 23, 1984; p. 201 ).
Some of them seem to be better than their Iranian opposite numbers. This is, of course, weak praise.
Excluding South Africa, Ethiopia, Angola, Zimbabwe, Somalia, Mozambique, Uganda, Chad, and the Congo (all of which are currently involved in wars of various intensities), the average african nation devotes less than 2% of GDP to military spending. (Dunnigan and Bay, 1985, p. 373 [chart]).
Previously it succeeded in taking another bit from Mauretania. New York Times, April 23, 1984, p.5.
New York Times,December 21, 1984, p. 5; and January 3, 1985, p. 5.
The 1983 OAU meeting in Ethiopia collapsed after Morrocco refused to negotiate with the Polisario, backed by fellow OAU member Nigeria (New York Times, September 23, 1983, p. 5 ).
Johnson, 1983, p. 674–5.
According to Dupuy and Dupuy (1977, p. 124): `There was no basis, constitutional, moral, or physical for assuring the subserviency of the Guard tothe state. They had little to occupy them, and so they were frequently idle, profligate, and vicious…possessing the means to influence policies and the succession to the throne.’ The Praetorians power to make and break emperors led to an era of permanent military despotism’ beginning with the reign of Septimus Severus in 193 A.D. (Ibid.).
While at its height (in the second century A.D.) the Empire included England, France,Germany west of the Rhine, the Iberian Peninsula, Italy, the Balkans, Asia Minor, the Middle East and North Africa, there were no more than 174,000 legionary troops at any one time after 70 A.D., although if local auxiliary troops are included, the number would be somewhat in excess of 300,000 (Luttwak 1976, p. 16 ).
On January 1, 1941 (six and a half months prior to the German invasion) Soviet armed forces numbered 4,207,000 men (Fugate 1984, p. 317).
During the later eighteenth century, France maintained a peacetime standing army which averaged 182,000 (Goldhamer, 1977, p. 40).
During the period 1740 to 1786, Britain’s standing army comprised only 21,000 men (Goldhamer 1977, p. 40 ).
In Nobember 1688, William of Orange landed at Torbay in England with a small force, causing James II to flee on December 11; William assumed the crown in 1689 (Langer 1972, p. 465). In March-April 1689, James II (accompanied by a small French force) landed in Ireland, and was narrowly defeated by the forces loyal to William at the Battle of the Boyne (June 11, 1690) after which James again fled to France. In December 1715, James II (the `Old Pretender’) landed in Scotland with a small force but was soon defeated. Finally, in 1745 Charles III (Charles Edward Stuart, son of James III, called the `Young Pretender’) invaded Britain and following Culloden (April 16, 1746), he, too, returned to France (Dupuy and Dupuy 1977, pp., 558, 638, 639 ).
Major Irish rebellions occurred in 1649–50, 1689, 1914, 1916–21, 1956–57, and 1969–74 (Ibid.,pp. 553–4, 683 994, 1261).
The events surrounding the removal of Louis XVI and the Paris Revolution of 1848 represented the only serious outbreaks of anti-monarchical violence in French history. The Fronde did not actually jeopardize the life of the King.
In this, as in many other ways, the relationship between the United States and those countries which are referred to as its allies is historically very remarkable. The causes are interesting, but too lengthy to go into here.
For a more through discussion of the balance of power, see my The Social Dilemma. pp. 126–38.
Lewitter 1965, pp. 338–39.
Gulick 1965, pp. 646–655.
Ibid.,p. 660.
The Emperor charles V of the Holy Roman Empire ruled from 1519–1556. On the complexities of his shifting alliances, see Langer 1972, pp. 428–430.
The alliance remained in effect from 1795–1808 (Carr 1965, pp. 443–44).
Dupuy and Dupuy 1977, pp. 667–68. Despite these seemingly long odds, Frederick characteristically struck first and won a great victory at Lobositz (October 1, 1756 ).
Bemis 1957, p. 9.
The League of Armed Neutrarlity was founded in 1780 by Russia, Sweden and Denmark, the United Provinces of Holland joined later in the year (Mahan 1957, pp. 359–60).
In addition to the thirteen colonies, Britain gave up Florida, the island of St. Lucia, Senegal in West Africa and the island of Minorca (Muir 1924, p. 72 ).
All of this is absolutely terribly reported in the standard American history of the Revolutionary War. I recently asked a historian who, is a specialist on the Revolutionary period and who has received a Guggenheim fellowship, what was the largest battle in the war of the American Revolution [It was the Saints in the West Indies. The largest campaign of the war was Spain’s unsuccessful effort to take Gibraltar]. She didn’t know. A little further questioning indicated she was totally ignorant of the non-American part of the war. Since the war was primarily a war between England on one side, and France and Spain on the other, this was Hamlet without the prince of Denmark. [The Battle of the Saints (April 12, 1782) took place between Dominica and Guadaloupe and involved 34 British and 29 French ships-of-the-line. The siege of the British fortress of Gibralter by the Spanish lasted fromJune 21, 1779 to February 6, 1783 (Dupuy and Dupuy 1977, p. 717, 724)].
He fairly regularly won fair elections and normally faced a legislature which was dominated by his opposition. Henderson 1968, pp. 290–308.
Ibid.
Time,Vol. 114, November 5, 1979, p. 46.
According to a table listed in Tapsell (1983, pp. 158–161), of 98 Roman emperors only 36 were relatives of preceding emperors. Almost all of the 62 remaining emperors were installed by means of violence.
For example, in 6 A.D., out of a total of twenty-eight legions, four were in Spain, five were on the Rhine or beyond, two in Raetia (modern day Southern Bavaria and Switzerland), five in Illyricum (modern day Yugoslavia), three in Moesia (modern day central Balkans), and nine in North Africa, Egypt and Syria (Luttwak 1976, p. 47).
Ibid.,pp. 80–85.
In 1775, only 19 of a total of 78 British Army regiments were located in England (Kushler 1976 [chart]).
They retained a number of contacts to their regiment, and would normally tell you the regiment they belonged to. It was, however, more a social matter than a formal structure. Bruce 1980, p. 152.
Youg an Lawford 1970, p. 101.
Lloyd 1965, p. 176.
In peacetime the East India Company’s Marine was especially popular, and many officers even served temporarily in foreign navies (Ibid.,p. 179).
Charles Edward Stuart was defeated decisively at the Battle of Culloden only after attempting a surprise attack on the British army commanded by Cumberland which failed to surprise (Dupuy and Dupuy 1977, p. 639).
This in fact, scuppered the July 20, 1944 plot (FitzGibbon 1956, pp. 210–11) and fear of it evidently prevented at least two earlier plots from coalesincge, in August 1941 and March 1943 on both occasions while Hitler was visiting Army Group Center on the Russian front (Clarke 1966, pp. 121, 339).
Francia was appointed by the Paraguayan Congress to a five year term in 1811 and ruled as dictator until his death in 1840 (Weil, et. al., 1972, pp. 39–40).
The American overthrow of Diem, of course, took the form of organizing a military coup. Halberstam 1965, pp. 266–99.
Farago 1982, p. 281.
Griffeth 1980, p. 262.
The emerging concensus appears to be that he was a brilliant manager of a coalition army, with no detectable skills as a field commander (Weigley 1981).
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Tullock, G. (1987). War. In: Autocracy. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-7741-0_3
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