Publication

This paper examines the issue of US civil-military relations with a focus on the Dayton Agreement. The author argues that the demands placed by military officers on the provisions of the Dayton Agreement reflect a steady increase in the influence of military officers in crafting defense policy. The paper concludes that in the historic sense, the military will use its special knowledge to shape defense policy to ensure that US forces are not committed to operations by their civilian superiors if they face the same constraints that existed in Vietnam and Somalia, or if they pose a risk to the institutional well-being of the military.