Politics and the General in Supreme Command: Law reform and Averting Unjust War By Richard Adams – Book review

I had a particular interest in reviewing this book, so I’d better put my cards on the table up front.

Back in 2013 my work Lethality in Combat was published, and last year it was re-issued, slightly revised, as The Truth of War (Big Sky, Australia). In that book I argued that the reality of the battlefield was little understood by the general public. It was more brutal than often depicted in “fact”; fiction and documentary, and often that was due to necessity.

For example, in a house-clearing operation, incoming troops often shoot a wounded enemy again, in case he was not dead and therefore presented a danger. Fighter pilots in WWII often shot at enemy under parachutes, their reasoning being if they did not he would be up shooting at them and their mates the next morning. I deliberately did not touch on moralities and legalities in that book, analysing instead what soldiers did as necessary for survival.

The WWII autobiography written by US Marine Studs Terkel The Good War was a book I used for source material in my own work. The title is significant: every soldier wants the approval of his society, and WWII for the Allies gave its military forces much of that. Few wars are like that.

In every war, I argued, soldiers make decisions, and take actions, that to many appear morally reprehensible – but are militarily necessary. Shooting unsuspecting pilots from behind; massacring prisoners because there is no-one in an advancing force to guard them; attacking a civilian who appears to be taking up arms – and seconds later is revealed as not – all of these are what many would label reprehensible actions.

Richard Adams’ book is not concerned with such lower level tactical actions, and the argument for and against them here, but the theme relates. His work is concerned with much higher levels of military forces – that of the supreme uniformed commander, and of ethical and legal implications of such command.

Adams’ main complaint is that “the Chief of the Defence Force must comply with any directions of the Minister.” He wants to reform the convention, that “when politicians decide on a course of action, the general in supreme command obeys without question.” He wants “reform, so the general has the right in law to refuse direction which is lawful, but awful.”

It’s an interesting argument. Underlying all of this, of course, is what happened at Nuremburg, after World War II. The war crimes trials there showed that:

The conscience of the world, speaking with the voice of the International Military Tribunal, declared that orders contrary to the principles of conscience and morality, orders that violate the essential imperatives on which human society is based and negate the basic rules without which men cannot live together – such orders constitute no defence, legal or moral.

One argument that Adams anticipates is that why is his concept of reform necessary? After all, can’t a general, faced with a morally reprehensible demand, simply resign? He argues that it is unreasonable to make resignation the only option, while noting in passing that “no Australian general has resigned on a matter of principle.” The general has a lifetime of commitment and service behind him, as well as “a vast salary, and a remarkable official residence.”

At this point the work approaches some excitement for the reader: what will the future hold in such cases? Has it not actually been the case behind closed doors that such commanders “comply, resigned or be relieved”? Is this not going to be the case in a future society which has adopted the Adams’ argument for reform? He argues that the “law should offer the general a right to refuse so resignation or non-conformity with law are not the only morally acceptable courses of action.”

Dr Adams has some interesting arguments from military history to illustrate his case. He looks at Admiral Fisher threatening twice to resign, and then finally doing so, over the WWI Gallipoli campaign. The United States Navy’s Admiral Leahy’s misgivings over the 1945 atomic bomb attacks is discussed. (Here I must place my own interests on the record again: I wrote Atomic Salvation, the sub-title of which gives its argument away: “how the atomic bomb attacks saved the lives of 30 million people.”) He analyses the case of General MacArthur in the Korean War, and how he was removed from his command. I found these sections most interesting and in fact would have liked to see them longer.

Politics and the General is not a work to be taken up lightly for ten minutes of entertaining reading. Albeit short at 163 pages, it is not illustrated; it is copiously footnoted, and will reward rather an hour or so of thoughtful study at a time. Approached this way, the reader will be most impressed. It will be appreciated the most by anyone connected with ethics and/or the law as they intersect with the military, and anyone who is connected with such a course at an organisational level will find this book most valuable, as would its argument introduced to classes and seminars.

The work finishes on a note of asking, or even demanding, that a general should be legally able to refuse an unethical command. Adams examines this further – what happens when that is done? Is the general merely replaced, and replaced again, until one is found who obeys the politician’s order? In that way this book may be a Part I which asks for a Part II – something which is to be wished for – although he does posit a solution which might be acceptable…one can visualise a series of general refusing an unconscionable war until the army in question runs out of such officers.

I found this an interesting book. The author is an interesting man. A commander in the Royal Australian Navy, he has doctorates from both the University of Western Australia, and the University of NSW. He was a Fullbright scholar to Yale University, and a visiting research fellow to the Changing Character of War programme at the University of Oxford. He presents a compelling case, and this is a compelling book that should be read by all who study in the area, or are interested in, the ever-developing field of military ethics or military law. Thoroughly recommended.

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Dr Tom Lewis is a military historian. He served as an ADF officer in Baghdad in the Iraq War at the height of its intensity. His latest works are Bombers North, an analysis of WWII operations out of northern Australia, and Cyclone Warriors, the Armed Forces in Cyclone Tracy.