Military Aid, Regime Vulnerability and the Escalation of Political Violence

Abstract

This article offers an explanation for the failures of US military assistance programs in some countries. The author argues that the effects of military aid are conditional upon the vulnerability of the recipient regime. Power consolidation by an insecure leader often provokes violent opposition. However, because military aid strengthens the security forces of the recipient state, it generates a moral hazard that encourages exclusionary power consolidation, with the expectation that continued military aid will help manage violent blowback. Using proxies for regime vulnerability and an instrument for US military aid, the study shows that military aid increases anti-regime violence in new regimes (particularly new democracies) and in all personalist regimes. In contrast, military assistance has no effect on violence in established, non-personalist regimes. The article develops a novel theory of how regime characteristics condition responses to external military support, and identifies a distinct mechanism through which military aid increases domestic political violence.

Paying Them to Hate US: The Effect of U.S. Military Aid on Anti-American Terrorism, 1968-2018

“…In Figure 4 or isolationist/internationalist policy-makers and the political influence of the American military-industrial complex which may lobby for military aid to bolster foreign sales (e.g., Albouy, 2013;Boutton, 2021).…”

“…Furthermore, we create two additional dependent variables from the GTD dataset that are equal to unity when a country-year pair sees at least one terrorist attack (by domestic, transnational or unknown actors against domestic or transnational targets) or at least one domestic terrorist attack (i.e., a terrorist attack by domestic actors against domestic targets). This is to assess whether aid produces destabilizing effects beyond anti-American violence, e.g., as proposed by Boutton (2021). For instance, U.S. aid may produce grievances (e.g., corruption) that may not only lead to anti-American violence, but also terrorism that is directed against the local government itself (Boutton, 2021).…”

Tracking the rise of United States foreign military training: IMTAD-USA, a new dataset and research agenda

“…The dataset can provide both a macro-level take on these questions and guide case selection for micro-level analysis. Research could, in particular, apply these data to other dependent variables, such as repression ( Sullivan, Blanken & Rice, 2020 ) and instability ( Boutton, 2021 ).…”

“…Another data source is the Security Assistance Monitor (SAM), which researchers have used to explore military aid (Boutton, 2021 Training correlates with other forms of US assistance but is significantly distinct. Comparing IMTAD-USA to USAID (2020) data, but excluding Iraq and Afghanistan, there is a correlation between training expenditures 4 and total economic aid (0.334) and with total military aid (0.290).…”

“…Another data source is the Security Assistance Monitor (SAM), which researchers have used to explore military aid ( Boutton, 2021 ). 2 Covering training and arms transfers, SAM’s training component also uses FMTR data.…”