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Secrecy and security: U.S.-orchestrated regime change during the Cold War

Posted on:2014-08-17Degree:Ph.DType:Dissertation
University:The University of ChicagoCandidate:O'Rourke, Lindsey AFull Text:PDF
GTID:1456390005985670Subject:Political science
Abstract/Summary:
This dissertation analyzes the causes, conduct and consequences of regime change. In contrast to the existing literature on regime change, which focuses on war, I argue that states prefer to conduct regime change operations covertly -- by assassinating a foreign leader, sponsoring a coup d'etat, manipulating electoral results or covertly aiding dissident groups. As such, I find that the existing literature overlooks the vast majority of cases and misconstrues the basic causes of regime change. Building upon extensive archival research at the National Archives, National Security Archives and several Presidential Libraries, I have created an original dataset of all American regime changes during the Cold War. This dataset shows that the U.S. intervened covertly ten times more often than it intervened overtly -- 63 covert missions versus 6 overt.;My dissertation then asks three questions: First, what motivates states to attempt regime change? Second, why do states conduct these operations covertly or overtly? Third, how successful are these missions in achieving their foreign policy goals?;I first argue that states pursue regime change primarily for strategic reasons, and I introduce a typology of causes: Offensive Operations seek to overthrow a current military rival or rival alliance. Preventive Operations aim to stop a state from taking certain actions -- like building nuclear weapons or joining a rival alliance -- that may threaten them in the future. Hegemonic Operations seek to maintain a hierarchical relationship between the intervening state and target government. Lastly, Humanitarian Operations attempt to settle civil and interstate conflicts that result in humanitarian disasters.;After identifying the potential set of cases for regime change, I next ask why states intervene covertly or overtly. I show that states prefer covert conduct because its entailed "plausible deniability" deflects blame onto others. As such, covert conduct lowers operational costs, allows states to break norms of justified intervention and decreases the probability that the two states will go to war. At the same time, however, I find that covert operations are less likely to actually overthrow the target government compared to overt missions. Nonetheless, policymakers seem to believe that if the costs of intervening covertly are very low, they might as well attempt an operation even if it is unlikely to succeed. The result is many more covert missions.;Yet, I argue that this line of reasoning is premised on an assumption that the operation will remain covert. I find, however, that most covert regime changes fail to remain covert due to recurrent errors made in their planning as well as a fundamental limit to how large an operation can become while remaining a secret. As a result, I conclude that states have been overly optimistic about the utility of covert regime change.;I test my argument in three case studies: 1) Offensive operations in Albania, Ukraine and Yugoslavia during the late 1940s and early 1950s, 2) Preventive operations in North and South Vietnam in the run up to the Vietnam War, and 3) Hegemonic operations in the Dominican Republic between 1960 and 1968. These case studies allow me to complete a comparative historical analysis of different U.S. experiences with regime change. Process tracing and congruence testing help create a strategic narrative regarding the structural forces and strategic decisions that influenced U.S. behavior.
Keywords/Search Tags:Regime change, War, Conduct, Operations, Covert, States
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