Occupational Hazards Occupational Hazards David M. Edelstein Why Military Occupations Succeed or Fail When Gen. Eric Shin- seki, chief of staff of the U.S. Army, testiªed in February 2003 that an occupa- tion of Iraq would require “something on the order of several hundred thousand troops,” ofªcials within George W. Bush’s administration promptly disagreed.1 Within two days, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld declared, “It’s not logical to me that it would take as many forces following the conºict as it would to win the war”; Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz char- acterized Shinseki’s estimate as “wildly off the mark.”2 More than a year after the occupation of Iraq began, the debate continues over the requirements and prospects for long-term success.3 History, however, does not bode well for this occupation. Despite the relatively successful military occupations of Germany and Japan after World War II, careful examination indicates that unusual geopolitical circumstances were the keys to success in those two cases, and his- torically military occupations fail more often than they succeed. Why do some military occupations succeed whereas others fail? Although the occupation of Iraq has prompted a slew of analyses on op-ed pages, there is almost no academic literature answering this question.4 The most relevant studies choose “nation building” as their primary subject of interest and focus David M. Edelstein is Assistant Professor in the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service and the De- partment of Government at Georgetown University. For helpful comments, the author would like to thank Andrew Bennett, Daniel Byman, Jasen Castillo, Donald Daniel, John Dower, William Durch, Charles Glaser, Matthew Kocher, Ronald Krebs, Adria Lawrence, Charles Lipson, John Mearsheimer, Robert Pape, Christopher Twomey, Leslie Vinjamuri, Stephen Walt, two anonymous reviewers, and participants in workshops at Georgetown University and the University of Chicago. Georgetown’s Center for Peace and Secu- rity Studies offered valuable ªnancial support, and Christopher Machnacki provided outstanding research assistance. 1. Hearing of the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee, 108th Cong., 1st sess., February 25, 2003. 2. Rumsfeld quote from “Secretary Rumsfeld Media Availability with Afghan President Hamid Karzai,” February 27, 2003, http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/2003/t02272003_t0227ap .html. Wolfowitz quote from “Prepared Statement for the House Budget Committee on the FY 2004 Defense Budget Request,” 108th Cong., 1st sess., February 27, 2003, http://www.defenselink.mil/ speeches/2003/sp20030227-depsecdef0044.html. 3. On the occupation of Iraq, see Conrad C. Crane and Andrew W. Terrill, Reconstructing Iraq: In- sights, Challenges, and Missions for Military Forces in a Post-Conºict Scenario (Carlisle, Pa.: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2003); and Julie Kosterlitz, “Occupational Hazards,” Na- tional Journal, Vol. 35, No. 12 (March 2003), pp. 910–915. 4. For one exception, see Eric Carlton, Occupation: The Policies and Practices of Military Conquerors (New York: Routledge, 1992). International Security, Vol. 29, No. 1 (Summer 2004), pp. 49–91 © 2004 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 49 International Security 29:1 50 on liberal democracy and successful economies as key objectives.5 Nation building, however, is not the central goal of occupations, and, further, not all occupations aim to build nations. Rather, the primary objective of military oc- cupation is to secure the interests of the occupying power and prevent the oc- cupied territory from becoming a source of instability. When creating certain political or economic systems, such as liberal democracy or an open economy, has been the goal of an occupying power, it has been so because it was thought that democracy and open markets would further the occupying power’s secu- rity goals. Security objectives and nation-building objectives sometimes coexist within occupations, but conºating occupation success with the establishment of liberal democracy and functioning economies is misguided. This study rec- ognizes the different goals of military occupation and includes occupations with objectives other than nation building. Further, in these studies of nation building, the logic of case selection is usu- ally not explicitly presented. Discussions of the current occupation of Iraq of- ten either turn to the relatively successful cases of post–World War II Germany and Japan or randomly select a subset of occupations to examine, but a valid study of occupations must examine both successes and failures.6 I present a data set of twenty-four military occupations since the Napoleonic Wars, which allows for a more systematic examination of the causes of occupation success and failure. Finally, many studies of nation building offer interesting and provocative ar- guments, but they stop short of answering the most important questions. For example, a recent RAND study concludes that successful nation building re- quires a lengthy time commitment, normally at least ªve years, but that study does not ask what conditions are conducive to occupiers making the costly commitment to a lengthy occupation and to occupied populations accepting the extended presence of a foreign power.7 I explain why some occupations last long enough to succeed whereas others end prematurely and why some occupations, such as the U.S. occupations of Haiti and the Dominican Republic in the early twentieth century, fail despite their protracted nature. The crux of my argument is that military occupations usually succeed only if 5. Minxin Pei and Sara Kasper, Lessons from the Past: The American Record of Nation Building (Wash- ington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2003). 6. For a warning against drawing the wrong lessons from the post–World War II Germany case, see Douglas Porch, “Occupational Hazards,” National Interest, No. 72 (Summer 2003), pp. 35– 47. 7. James Dobbins, John G. McGinn, Keith Crane, Seth G. Jones, Rollie Lal, Andrew Rathmell, Ra- chel Schwanger, and Anga Timilsina, America’s Role in Nation-Building: From Germany to Iraq (Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND, 2003). Occupational Hazards 51 they are lengthy, but lengthy occupations elicit nationalist reactions that im- pede success. Further, lengthy occupation produces anxiety in impatient occu- pying powers that would rather withdraw than stay. To succeed, therefore, occupiers must both maintain their own interest in a long occupation and con- vince an occupied population to accept extended control by a foreign power. More often than not, occupiers either fail to achieve those goals, or they achieve them only at a high cost. Three factors, however, can make a successful occupation possible. The ªrst factor is a recognition by the occupied population of the need for occupation. Thus, occupation is more likely to succeed in societies that have been deci- mated by war and require help in rebuilding. The second factor is the percep- tion by the occupying power and the occupied population of a common threat to the occupied territory. If the survival of the occupied country is threatened, then the occupying power will want to protect a country that it has already in- vested resources in and considers geopolitically signiªcant, and the occupied population will value the protection offered to it. The third factor involves credibility. Occupation is likely to generate less opposition when the occupy- ing power makes a credible guarantee that it will withdraw and return control to an indigenous government in a timely manner. When these three conditions are present, occupying powers will face less resistance both in the occupied territory and at home; they will be given more time to accomplish their occu- pation goals, and, therefore, will be more likely to succeed. Absent these three conditions, occupying powers will face the dilemma of either evacuating pre- maturely and increasing the probability that later reintervention will be neces- sary or sustaining the occupation at an unacceptable cost. My conclusions with regard to the contemporary occupation of Iraq are not sanguine. Whereas war-weary Germans and Japanese recognized the need for an occupation to help them rebuild, a signiªcant portion of the Iraqi people have never welcomed the U.S.-led occupation as necessary. Further, the com- mon analogy between the occupations of Germany and Japan and the occupa- tion of Iraq usually undervalues the central role that the Soviet threat played in allowing those occupations to succeed. Whereas Germans, Japanese, and Americans mostly agreed on the compelling nature of the Soviet threat, there is no similar threat that will enable Iraqis and the U.S.-led coalition to coalesce around common occupation goals. Finally, the Bush administration has had difªculty convincing signiªcant segments of the Iraqi population that it in- tends to return control to a truly independent, indigenous government that will represent their interests, not those of the United States. The article has four sections. First, I deªne the concept of military occupa- International Security 29:1 52 tion, identify the relevant universe of cases, and establish metrics for success and failure. Second, I present my explanation for occupation success and fail- ure. Third, I explain the dilemma that failing occupying powers face. Finally, I conclude with a discussion of the implications of the argument for the current