The Attitudes of Armies Toward Revolutions

Authors

  • Author

  • Zoltan Barany

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.12816/0005259

Keywords:

Army Behavior, Syrian Army, Fate of Revolutions, Egypt

Abstract

This paper examines the variables that could affect the attitude of armies towards revolutions. These variables are numerous and diverse, and they differ depending on the nature of the armies and the societies from which they emerge, as well as the international climate in which they exist. As such, the paper argues that the fate of revolutions is determined - with rare exceptions - by the attitude of the army in terms of its bias toward the revolution or toward the existing regime confronting it. The paper also explores societal factors and their role in determining the behavior of the army and its attitude towards revolution, especially in societies characterized by ethnic, religious, and sectarian diversity. The paper looks to Syria as a clear model of the phenomenon within the context of Arab revolutions and uprisings. The paper concludes that the ease or difficulty of predicting the behavior of armies towards revolutions varies between different cases given the multiplicity of factors that could affect it.

Author Biography

  • Zoltan Barany
    1 V. I. Lenin, “Lecture on the 1905 Revolution”, Collected Works (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1964), vol. 23, p. 253. 2 Cited by D. E. H. Russell, Rebellion Revolution, and Armed Force (London: Academic Press, 1974), p. 3. 3 Stanislaw Andrzejewski, Military Organization and Society (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1954), p. 71. 4 Katherine Chorley, Armies and the Art of Revolution (London: Faber & Faber, 1943); & Russell, Rebellion Revolution, and Armed Force. 5 Chorley; Russell; & Eva Bellin, “The Robustness of Authoritarianism in the Middle East: Exceptionalism in Comparative Perspective”, Comparative Politics , vol. 36, no. 2 (2004), pp. 145-146; “Reconsidering the Robustness of Authoritarianism in the Middle East: Lessons from the Arab Spring”, Comparative Politics , vol. 44, no.2 (January 2012), pp. 130-135; Zoltan Barany, “Comparing the Arab Revolts: The Role of the Military”, Journal of Democracy , vol. 22, no.4 (October 2011), pp. 25-26; Derek Lutterbeck, “Arab Uprisings and Armed Forces: Between Openness and Resistance”, DCAF (Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces), SSR Paper 2 (2011), pp. 15-17. 6 Debora Yarsike Ball, “Ethnic Conflict, Unit Performance, and the Soviet Armed Forces", Armed Forces & Society , vol 20, no.2 (Winter 1994), pp. 239- 7 Simon Baynham, The Military and Politics in Nkrumah’s Ghana (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1988), p. 139. 8 Ibrahim Al-Marashi, “Iraq’s Security and Intelligence Network: A Guide and Analysis”, Middle East Review of International Affairs , vol. 6, no.3 (September 2002), available at: http://meria.idc.ac.il/journal/2002/issue3/ jv6n3a1.html. 9 Ernest W. Lefever, Spear & Scepter, Army, Police, and Politics in Tropical Africa (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 1970), p. 146. 10 Zoltan Barany, The Soldier and the Changing State: Building Democratic Armies in Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Americas (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2012), pp. 131-132. 11 Lutterbeck, pp. 16-17. 12 Samuel P. Huntington, The Soldier and the State (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1957), pp. 79-83. 13 Steven R. Ward, Immortal, A Military History of Iran and Its Armed Forces (Washington: Georgetown University Press, 2009), pp. 210-218. 14 Theda Skocpol, State and Social Revolutions: A Comparative Analaysis of France, Russia and China (Cambridge University Press, 1979), pp. 95-99. 15 Kurt Weyland, “The Diffusion of Revolution: ‘1848’ in Europe and Latin America”, International Organization , vol. 63, no.3 (July 2009), pp. 391-423. 16 Christina Fink, “The Moment of the Monks: Burma, 2007”, in Adam Roberts and Timothy Garton Ash, (eds.), Civil Resistance and Power Politics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), p. 361. 17 Dawit Shifaw, The Diary of Terror: Ethiopia 1974 to 1991 (Bloomington, IN: Trafford, 2012). 18 Zoltan Barany, Soldiers and Politics in Eastern Europe, 1945-1990 (London: Macmillan, 1993), pp. 155-159. 19 Fink, pp. 354-370; Mary P. Callahan, “Myanmar’s Perpetual Junta”, New Left Review , vol. 60 (November-December 2009), pp. 27-63.

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Published

2013-09-01

Issue

Vol. 1 No. 004 (2013): Issue 004

Section

Articles