The creation of the All-Volunteer Force (AVF) in 1973 allowed U.S. presidents to deploy American military power in times and places of their own choosing with fewer concerns that the electorate would turn against their leadership. A reaction to the trauma of the Vietnam War, the AVF did away with conscription and instead relied on volunteers to serve and fight in U.S. military operations. The AVF's ranks were mostly filled with those willing to deploy and fight for their country, without the U.S. having to rely on conscription. When U.S. presidents had to use the AVF to fight in conflicts, they could expect to enjoy a higher degree of public support than those presidents who led the U.S. military during the Korean and Vietnam wars.
Drawing from casualty, financial, and public opinion statistics from 1949 through 2016, this thesis argues that with the adoption of the AVF in 1973 U.S. presidents have been better able to deploy the AVF in combat with less resistance from the American people. It examines the circumstances behind the creation of the AVF, looking second, at the deployment of the AVF from the Gulf War to the Global War on Terror to determine if U.S. presidents enjoyed popular support and were encouraged to rely on military force as the primary option in foreign policy. Finally, the study compares casualties, financial costs, and public support for conflicts relying on conscripted forces to those depending on the AVF to examine if U.S. presidents were better able to involve the U.S. in military conflicts of questionable interest with fewer worries about organized anti-war movements.
The conclusions of my research revealed that my hypothesis was wrong in that the creation of the AVF did not mean the U.S. presidency enjoyed a higher degree of support during conflicts. With the exception of the Gulf War, presidential approval when using the AVF was less than 50% in every conflict by the time military operations ended. The majority of conflicts disclosed that public approval and disapproval was based on casualties, regardless if service members were draftees or volunteers, as well as financial costs. For Korea and Vietnam, high casualties and financial costs resulted in approval levels dropping quickly while Afghanistan and Iraq took longer because casualties and spending did not escalate as quickly. As a result, I discovered that public approval and disapproval levels influenced political change. In the case of Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq, it forewarned changes in political leadership while conflicts such as Somalia, Bosnia, and Kosovo were kept short and inexpensive to prevent political opposition from organizing against the presidency. / Master of Arts / This thesis explores presidential use of military power from 1949 through 2016, examining the impact of the All-Volunteer Force (AVF). The research looks at whether the AVF is associated with U.S. presidents having more public support when using military power in various parts of the world. Prior to the AVF, conscription helped meet the personnel needs of the U.S. military; however, this system became problematic when it was used to fight conflicts that became unpopular with the American public. Not only were the loyalty and performance of the conscripts often questionable, the public also frequently placed pressure on presidents to curb U.S. military operations overseas. This thesis examines the emergence of the AVF, how presidents have deployed it, and the differences in American public support, casualties, and financial costs between the use of the conscript force and the AVF under U.S. presidents in major military conflicts from 1949 through 2016. The findings revealed very little difference in presidential use of military power whether employing the conscript force or the AVF. An examination of the nation’s major conflicts since 1949 suggests that public support was based on U.S. lives lost and monies spent, with higher levels of these categories associated with lower presidential approval and higher disapproval ratings. In conclusion, although the AVF was created to end the need for the draft to support national defense, the American public remained concerned about how U.S. presidents used the military overseas especially when engaged in distant open-ended conflicts.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VTETD/oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/94609 |
| Date | 16 October 2019 |
| Creators | Nasca, David Stephen |
| Contributors | Political Science, Hult, Karen M., Faulkner, Brandy S., Dixit, Priya |
| Publisher | Virginia Tech |
| Source Sets | Virginia Tech Theses and Dissertation |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | ETD, application/pdf |
| Rights | In Copyright, http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ |
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