How the Threat (and the Coup) Collapsed: The Politicization of the Soviet Military

How the Threat (and the Coup)Collapsed The Politicization of the Soviet Military Stephen M.Meyer T h e notion of a ”POliticized ” military most often evokes images of cigar-chomping men in uniforms issuing ultimatums to cowering civilian politicians. The failed Soviet coup of August 1991vividly reinforced that image-at least initially. Defense Minister Dmitri Yazov was one of the eight members of the Emergency Committee that ousted Gorbachev. A handful of other senior military officers participated in the planning and execution of the coup, including Chief of the Ground Forces General of the Army V.I. Varennikov. Platoons of tanks and armored personnel carriers were seen on Moscow’s streets following the Committee’s declaration seizing power. Yet within 24 hours of the Emergency Committee’s initial declaration, it was already apparent that the great bulk of the military establishment had chosen to stand aloof. Some units even declared their allegiance to the opposition. After three days the coup collapsed. But there can be little doubt that had the military establishment actively supported the putsch the outcome would have been far different. For many, the Red Army’s failure to support the short-lived hardline regime is puzzling, especially in the light of a conventional wisdom that portrays the Soviet military establishment as a monolithic institution uniformly indoctrinated with communist ideology. From a purely selfish institutional perspective, it had much to gain from a return to strong central control and communist authority. Ironically, the solution to the puzzle is found in Marxist-Leninist theory, which asserts that the military establishment of a country inevitably reflects the contradictions and conflicts inherent in its parent society. Whatever Marx and Lenin may have gotten wrong, this clearly is one theoretical point they got right. By the eve of the coup the Soviet military was already an institution Stephen M . Meyer is a Professor in the Department of Political Science at the Massachusetts lnstitute of Technology and a member of its Center for lnternational Studies. The author wishes to acknowledge the support of the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Carnegie Corporation. The author also wishes to thank Brian Taylor, Matthew Partan, and Kevin OPrey for their comments on earlier drafts of this article. Infernatiuizd Security, Winter 1991192 (Vol. 16, No. 3) 0 1991 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College and of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 5 International Security l6:3 I 6 in deep crisis. Rent by political, economic, and social turmoil, it was hurtling down the path of politicization, a perfect mirror of Soviet society.’ This article examines the sources and implications of the institutional politicization of the Soviet military, a process that neither began nor ended with the collapse of the August coup.*It argues that the impact of Soviet domestic politics on the military establishment has been far greater than that of the military on domestic politics. Fears that a resurgent military was increasingly dominating Soviet policy in the months prior to the coup were misguided. Politicization created the illusion of increased military institutional influence in Soviet policy-making and politics by increasing the visibility and outspokenness of men in uniform. However, upon examining the actual pattern of military-military and civil-military relations, it is evident that the process of politicization was neither a vehicle for, nor an indicator of, the rising institutional power of the Soviet military establishment. Instead politicization fractured the ranks of the former Red Army along multiple and cross-cutting lines. It exacerbated divisions among the troops, split the troops from the officer corps, and splintered the officer corps along generational lines between junior, middle, and senior officer^.^ In the process troop discipline, officer morale, unit cohesion, training, and readiness suffered severely. Politicization in effect reversed several decades of effort at institutional maturation and profes~ionalization.~ This implies that the key to understanding the evolution of Soviet military power in the years ahead lies in an analysis of the political and social revolution underway in that country and its impact on the military establishment. 1. Due to the tumultuous state of Soviet politics, I continue to use the terms ”Soviet,” ”Soviet Union,” ”state,” and ”union” to refer to the aggregate country...