A Research Note on the Mass Support for "Tough" Military Initiatives

In the so-called "limited war," there is a persistent policy question which arises, namely what to do with respect to the formally neutral adjacent country which is in fact aiding a combatant.

Abstract

IN the so-called limited there is a persistent policy question which arises, namely what to do with respect to the formally neutral adjacent country which is in fact aiding a combatant. This question arose in the early 'fifties in Korea (in MacArthur's terms, the problem of the privileged sanctuary) and has arisen again recently in Vietnam. Broadly speaking, the policy alternatives discussed on these occasions have been either to pull out, to negotiate a settlement, or to pursue the war more aggressively through land attack or by the bombing of supply routes and bases in the neighboring country. Similar choices have been presented in other contexts, e.g., in France during the Algerian war, and are likely to be presented in future conflicts. Given both the obvious importance and recurrent character of these events, it is worthwhile inquiring as to the sources of support for these policy orientations. Until at least 1914, a general expectation, shared by intellectuals and the population at large, was that aggressive orientations in foreign affairs were characteristic of elites, of middle (of the staunch Edwardians, the Kipling readers), and also of some elements of the lower middle class who identified with a powerful nation and/ or saw some profit to be gained through imperialism. For the most part, the manual workers were seen as pacifist, largely because the socialist parties of Europe were officially committed to this position. In later times, this view still gained support, as, for example, in France during the Algerian War, where the middle and were more strongly in favor of a hard-headed conduct of the campaign and manual workers less favorable (Sondages, 1956-58). A diametrically opposed expectation is widely disseminated in the contemporary United States. Here, largely under the influence of a famous article by Seymour Martin Lipset (1959; also 1960), the expectation is that a preference for a tough posture is indicative of authoritarianism. It is seen as the orientation of an antiintellectual vigilante mentality, one tired of or suspicious of talk, an orientation which prefers direct action against the enemy. Following these assumptions, a choice of the aggression option would be expected more frequently among manual workers, among low status persons, among those with little education, and among the dispossessed and the alienated. Correspondingly, we have an alternative picture of the upper middle classes as liberal (at least in matters of civil liberties), as favorably disposed toward due process, as flexible in their outlooks, and as compromise-oriented. Given these traits, it would seem unlikely that they would be the supporters of a tough line. The evidence which follows comes from the 1952 and 1964 election studies of the Survey Research Center at the University of Michigan.' The 1952 study contained the following questions: