Distant War and the Politics of Catastrophe

My earlier musing on this blog are finally turning into a book that puts war death into the history of the war powers. More particularly, I am taking as my point of departure Drew Gilpin Faust, This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War. During the Civil War, an intimacy with death and dying, and a close experience of war’s brutal after effects, would transform the United States, Faust argues, creating “a veritable ‘republic of suffering’ in the words [of] Frederick Law Olmsted.” If the experience of war death was somehow constitutive of the republic itself during the Civil War, I have been puzzling over how American identity and politics might be affected or even constituted by its comparative absence.

Initially, I thought that all the important action in the story happens after World War II, and especially after Vietnam, when three developments isolate most Americans from the direct experience of war: the absence of a draft, the rise in military contracting, and changes in war technologies. But I’ve come to understand that the entire 20th century requires rethinking as a century of distant war.

There was deep and broad-based engagement of Americans in the two world wars, but geographic distance mattered to the politics of war declaration and authorization. In essence, distant war required a politics of catastrophe, in which presidents made decisions, and then waited for a disaster of sufficient proportions to generate political support to get strong backing from Congress for what had already been decided. Catastrophe didn’t generate a decision for armed conflict, but instead facilitated political mobilization.

This easily fits the Spanish American War, with a war declaration coming on the heels of public uproar over the sinking of the battleship Maine in Havana harbor, mistakenly attributed to the Spanish. And the World War II chapter of my War Time book illustrates the way this fits WWII (though I don’t develop this argument in that book). What was surprising to me was how well it fits World War I.

The important story comes before Woodrow Wilson sought a formal war declaration, in his failed effort to get an “armed neutrality” bill through Congress (which failed not due to the policy but due to Wilson’s political missteps). The bill would have enabled Wilson to arm merchant ships that would, in certain areas, fire upon German U-boats without warning, and would have certainly launched the U.S. into the war. Amid continuing reports of sunken ships and American deaths, Wilson had announced that an “overt act” by Germany would move the United States closer to war. Wilson, his close advisers, and the press then contemplated whether particular sinkings were the “overt act” he had in mind. Ultimately the “overt act” was the sinking of the Laconia, with only three American deaths. Wilson used the incident to build political momentum. Biographer Arthur Link wrote that  “Wilson’s decision to capitalize on the incident was apparently part of his strategy for focusing public pressure on Congress.” Others were puzzled, since many more were killed in previous incidents that had not been the magic “overt act.” This illustrates an important role of catastrophe in war politics. The terrible event doesn’t always lead to a new policy. Instead, a catastrophe is needed for political reasons: to generate support for a decision already made. And catastrophe itself is defined by politics, not by the event itself. Public opinion scholar David Berinsky has written that “the facts of war do not speak for themselves.” Neither do the facts of catastrophe.

I am continuing to work this out. In the meantime, if you are in the SF Bay Area and want to see how it all turns out, my David M. Kennedy Lecture on the United States and the World, May 12 at Stanford, will be on The Politics of Distant War: 1917, 1941, 1964. You can RSVP here. I'll give a similar lecture at the University of Washington on May 21.

Cross-posted from Balkinization.

War Time discussion Saturday at Fire Dog Lake Book Salon

If you are looking for a post-shutdown change of scene, please join me online on Saturday at the Fire Dog Lake Book Salon for a discussion of my book War Time: An Idea, Its History, Its Consequences.  The discussion is hosted by Leah Bolger of Veterans for Peace.  It will be from 5 to 7 pm Eastern Time.

If you'd like to join the discussion, you can register ahead of time at Fire Dog Lake.  The discussion will be on the main page.

America at War -- April 9 on C-Span2 Book TV

2012 Tucson Festival of Books: "America at War"
To be aired Monday, April 9, at 2:00 a.m. ET

About the Program
From the 2012 Tucson Festival of Books, a panel discussion entitled, "America at War." The panelists include, William Inboden, Religion and American Foreign Policy, 1945-1960, Mary Dudziak, War Time: An Idea, Its History, Its Consequences, and Andrei Cherny, The Candy Bombers: The Untold Story of the Berlin Airlift and America's Finest Hour. The panel is moderated by Sam Kleiner, MPhil Candidate in International Studies, St. Anthony's College.

About the Authors

William Inboden is an assistant professor of public affairs at the LBJ School of Public Affairs and distinguished scholar at the Strauss Center for International Security and Law, University of Texas at Austin. He formerly served during the Bush administration as senior director for strategic planning on the National Security Council at the White House.
Buy the author's book from: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indiebound

Mary Dudziak is the author of several books, including Exporting American Dreams: Thurgood Marshall's African Journey. She is a law, history and political science professor at the University of Southern California Gould School of Law. For more information, visit mdudziak.com.
Buy the author's book from: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indiebound

Andrei Cherny is a former speechwriter and advisor to Vice President Al Gore. He is the author of The Next Deal: The Future of Public Life in the Information Age. Mr. Cherny is the former Arizona Democratic Party Chairman and is running for Congress to represent Arizona's 9th District.
Buy the author's book from: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indiebound

America at War: 21st Century Struggles -- at the Tucson Book Festival and on C-Span2

C-Span2 will have live streaming of this panel on Sunday, 1 pm Arizona time/4 pm Eastern time, at the Tucson Festival of the Book:

"America at War: 21st Century Struggles"
William Inboden, Religion and American Foreign Policy, 1945-1960
Mary Dudziak, War Time: An Idea, Its History, Its Consequences
Andrei Cherny, The Candy Bombers: The Untold Story of the Berlin Airlift and America's Finest Hour

TODAY: Book Talk at Politics and Prose, Feb. 19

Moved to the top of the blog:

I'm speaking about War ∙ Time at Politics and Prose Bookstore in Washington, D.C., on Sunday, February 19, at 5:00 p.m.  Here are the details:

Mary Dudziak - War ∙ Time
Feb 19 2012, 5:00 pm
Politics and Prose
5015 Connecticut Ave NW
Washington, D.C.  20008United States


“Wartime” was once considered exceptional—an interruption to the norm that was peacetime. But as Dudziak, USC professor of law, history, and political science, observes in her thought-provoking study, the U.S. has been involved continuously in various overseas armed conflicts for the past century. Given this new, never-ending nature of war, what are the implications for law, politics, and culture?

All our in-store events are free and open to the public.  All event titles are 20% off for members during the month in which the author appears at the store.  Click here for directions. There is ample parking available in the lot behind the store and in the surrounding neighborhood.

More details are here.

Symposium on War Time today at USC

A symposium on War Time is being held at USC Law School on January 27.  Here's the program:

FRIDAY, JANUARY 27
"WAR TIME: An Idea, Its History, Its Consequences"
Location: USC Law School, Faculty Lounge, Room 433
Time 1:00 – 5:30 followed by reception.
RSVP: Faculty Services at facserv@law.usc.edu

When is wartime? On the surface, it is a period of time in which a society is at war. But we now live in what President Obama has called "an age without surrender ceremonies," as the Administration announced an "end to conflict in Iraq," even though conflict on the ground is ongoing. It is no longer easy to distinguish between wartime and peacetime. In this inventive meditation on war, time, and the law, Mary Dudziak argues that wartime is not as discrete a time period as we like to think. Instead, America has been engaged in some form of ongoing overseas armed conflict for over a century. Meanwhile policy makers and the American public continue to view wars as exceptional events that eventually give way to normal peace times. This has two consequences. First, because war is thought to be exceptional, "wartime" remains a shorthand argument justifying extreme actions like torture and detention without trial. Second, ongoing warfare is enabled by the inattention of the American people. More disconnected than ever from the wars their nation is fighting, public disengagement leaves us without political restraints on the exercise of American war powers.

Principal Presenters:
Elaine Tyler May, Regents Professor of History and American Studies at University of Minnesota
Lynn Hunt, Professor of History, UCLA

Mark Tushnet, William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Law, Harvard Law School

Reflections by USC Faculty:
Rebecca Brown, Newton Professor of Constitutional Law, USC

Patrick James, Professor of International Relations, USC
Hilary Schor, Professor of English, Comparative Literature, Gender Studies and Law, USC

Response:

Mary Dudziak, Judge Edward J. and Ruey L. Guirado Professor of Law, History and Political Science, USC

Webcast: Ben C. Green Lecture, Case Western Reserve University Law School

I will give a public lecture on War Time:  An Idea, Its History, Its Consequences at Case Western Reserve University Law School on Tuesday, October 11, at 4:30 p.m., Eastern time.  Details are here.  It will be webcast here.

Why do we think war is temporary, when war doesn’t come to an end?

Lecture at Oberlin College, Monday, October 10, 4:30 p.m. King Hall, Room 337.

"Rumors of War" -- Justice Jackson after Nuremberg

This event at the University at Buffalo, Tuesday, October 4, commemorates the first public address Justice Robert Jackson gave after returning from his work as Chief Prosecutor at the Nuremberg trial.  I will take up the way Jackson understood law and security in the context of a changing world in the years after Nuremberg, as the categories of war and peace lost their distinction, leaving ongoing tensions and, as Jackson put it, "rumors of war."  Jackson biographer John Q. Barrett, and legal historian Eric Muller will also speak.

The 2011 edition of the James McCormick Mitchell Lecture, the UB Law School’s highest-profile lecture series, revisits a significant historical moment for UB and the world—one that has been largely overlooked.

The lecture, to begin at 2 p.m. Oct. 4 in 106 O’Brian Hall, North Campus, will examine a major address by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson given at the University of Buffalo’s centennial celebration exactly 65 years ago. Jackson, who had taken a leave of absence from the high court to serve as the chief U.S. prosecutor at the Nuremberg war crimes trial in occupied Germany that followed the Nazis’ surrender in World War II, spoke at UB immediately after he returned from that historic trial in 1946.

His speech touched on timeless themes: how a “warlike spirit” can overcome a nation; the quest for nations to work cooperatively in the cause of peace; the interrelationship of war and dictatorship; and the supremacy of law over the lawless forces of war and persecution.
The 2011 Mitchell lecture will feature three legal scholars who will discuss aspects of Jackson’s 1946 address, placing the speech in historical context and discussing its enduring implications. Mitchell lecturers will be:

• John Q. Barrett, professor of law at St. John’s University in New York City and a board member at the Robert H. Jackson Center in Jamestown, N.Y., who will discuss “Bringing Nuremberg Home: Justice Jackson’s Path Back to Buffalo, Oct. 4, 1946.” Barrett is writing a biography of Jackson.
• Eric L. Muller, professor at the University of North Carolina School of Law and a legal historian with special interest in the Japanese internment cases during the World War II era, who will discuss “Nazis, Americans and the Law as a ‘Peace Profession.’”
• Mary L. Dudziak, Judge Edward J. and Ruey L. Guirado Professor of Law, History and Political Science at the University of Southern California, who will speak on “Rumors of War.”

The event will mark another anniversary as well: the 60th year of the Mitchell lecture series, whose first installment in 1951 also featured Jackson speaking on “Wartime Security and Liberty Under Law.”