Political Soldiers: Sources of Iraq War Veteran Support and Opposition to War.

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to examine the sources of divergent political understandings, focusing on veterans of the Iraq war who emerged from the conflict as pro- or anti-war activists. Despite coming from similar class, cultural, and social backgrounds, and also entering the military with comparably sympathetic views toward the war, some veterans emerged as committed pro-war activists while others became anti-war activists. The question is why? Specifically, what was it about the experience of military life and combat in particular that led to such divergent political understandings? Challenging the conventional focus of political sociology, which explores how parties, socially embedded interests, and ideology shape politics, this study investigates the role of agency in contributing to divergent political understandings of warfare. Probing the experiences of veterans, I conducted in-depth interviews with activists from both camps: 40 members of Iraq Veterans Against the War, the leading anti-war veterans organization, and 28 members of Vets For Freedom, the major pro-war veterans organization. The analysis reveals how prior expectations about the military interacted with each recruit’s experience of military life, from basic training to deployment in the field, and active participation in combat. Soldiers who ultimately turned against the war began doing so after their idealistic views of the military were shattered by practices that they regarded as inconsistent with their vision of service. With their faith in the military shaken, anti-war veterans experienced a major rethinking of their military service upon entering combat where they were ordered to carry out acts they regarded as unjustified, counter-productive, or ethically questionable. In contrast, soldiers who remained pro-war were never so profoundly disillusioned by their exposure to military life, and went to war without any serious reservations, allowing them to employ an interpretive frame that justified and reinforced their pro-war views. In sum, this study integrates and empirically grounds recent theoretical work on events, experience, and framing, producing a promising new perspective about the sources of political beliefs.