How Clausewitzian is Bismarck's diplomacy: the literature analysis. Part I

Chapter I. Clausewitz and responses to it

By Josef Schneider, 1966. "Tafelrunde im von-der-Leyenschen Hof"

Carl von Clausewitz is well-known for their contribution to the study of warfare. However, political scholars ascribe more importance to their political approach to war. For instance, Howard (1969) points out that the principal idea of the Clausewitz’s entire work is that a war is a political instrument and a continuation of politics (Howard and Paret, 1976, p.87). Thus, this chapter covers a political contribution of Clausewitz’s theory to the strategic studies. Chapter explains the principles of a theory based on the reflections by social scientists. Each of the following articles helps to construct a meaningful model of Clausewitz’s political framework.

Smith’s article (1990) deserves some consideration first. The author attempts to capture the evasive political values and meanings which Clausewitz’s has relied to create a theory. The whole study is dedicated to answering the question: “What kind of political framework did Clausewitz have in mind when he argued that war was part of politics?”. Author explores political concepts and presents their interpretation of the meaning which Clausewitz has attributed to each.

In section on foreign policy, Smith (1990) works to identify the main political ideas of Clausewitz’s work. For instance, Smith (1990) elaborates that the most important duty of a state is to defend itself against the enemies from the outside; he supports it with a quote from Clausewitz’s letter (9 September 1824, cited in Ritter, 1972, no.275). At the same time, Smith (1990, p.44) argues, to Clausewitz the state is similar to a living organism, which needs to engage in activities in order to perpetuate itself.

A state also needs to maintain its honour and dignity just as it needs to continue its existence. In support of the argument Smith (1990, p.44) refers to Clausewitz’s writing about Prussia’s disastrous defeat in 1806, which reads that Prussia should have preferred to be eliminated rather than be humiliated in the war against Napoleon (Rothfels, 1922, p.4). This letter makes an impression that Prussia has bowed down to France and abandoned the pursuit of “glory and interests” (Clausewitz, 2014, p.240). 

However, Parkinson (2002, pp.45-48) writes that Friedrich Wilhelm in fact demonstrates a strong determination to defend Prussia’s territories; he plans a war soon after learning about Napoleon’s determination to weaken Prussia and expropriate its land. Moreover, Parkinson (2002, pp.48-50) explains that Clausewitz is quite pleased with Friedrich’s spirit to fight at the time. Clausewitz is full of optimism, although the pace of military mobilisation in 1806 has been unsatisfyingly slow for him. Hence, contrary to Clausewitz’s misleading words on the war of 1806, Prussia has decided to defend its dignity and Clausewitz approves it later, on the contrary to the impression constructed by Smith (1990).

Definitely Smith’s argument (1990) is unreliable, because it does not take into account Clausewitz’s elaboration about political objectives. It states that state’s priorities tend to change over time (Cozette, 2010, p.440). Although Clausewitz, similarly to Morgenthau, assigns extreme importance to the objective of survival (Nielsen, 2007, p.215), scholars diverge on the issue of importance of other objectives. For instance, both Aron (1983, pp.101-102) and Nielsen (2007, pp.215-216) do not approve of Rapoport (1968, p.22), who claims that Clausewitz has advocated the pursuit of power. Cozette (2010, p.440) is right to conclude that Clausewitz deliberately does not seek to define state’s ultimate political objectives in order to maintain flexibility.

On the other hand, Smith (1990) makes a compelling argument about the nature of state’s engagement in international relations. State’s behaviour is dictated by rationalist considerations. Clausewitz asserts that each state has a right to pursue its interests and behave to its own advantage, even if it means to disregard the interests of other states (Clausewitz, 2014, p.239).  Nonetheless, Smith (1990) among others, noted by Fearon (1995, p.380), does not expand on Clausewitz’s puzzle of war.

Instead, Stoler (2005), opens this issue in the controversy of the high costs and unpredictability of war, set against the potential benefit from waging a war (Stoler, 2005). Nonetheless, Smith’s interpretation of Clausewitz (1990) is consistent with the rules of rationalism, holding the risks and costs of war urge policy-makers to prioritise negotiations over violence; if the option to negotiate cannot be used to achieve political objective the war can become a viable option (Fearon, 1995).

Furthermore, Smith (1990) is the only author who expands on the role of alliances in Clausewitz’s framework, compared to Stoler (2005) and others. 

While Corn (September 2006, p.8) wonders why Clausewitz has not extensively covered the topic of alliances, Smith (1990) makes an effort to explain Clausewitz’s implicit message in relation to it. For example, Clausewitz implies that the interests of states and people are connected within the complex web of relations, which helps to balance the sets of interests against one another (Howard and Paret, 1976, p.373). Clausewitz means that the total set of relationships “serves” to uphold the order of the system as a whole, as long as states use reason in their conduct of policy-making (Smith, 1990, p.49). Similarly, the contributions of Ranke and Treitschke (Holbraad, 1970, p.87) find that Clausewitz thinks the balance of power is maintained by the system of clashing interests.

Also, Smith (1990) interprets the ideas of Clausewitz’s in the form of “war as the continuation of politics”. The principle is that war is a tool of a policy and this notion holds the ultimate significance to this paper.  Smith (1990, p.55) conveys that a military victory which becomes a political aim no longer serves a policy objective (Howard and Paret, 1976, p.605). Consequently, any such war loses its meaning (ibid). Thus, given the unpredictable and uncontrollable nature of war it is a statesman’s duty to be diligent at policy-making, and checking whether military decisions serve state’s interests (Smith, 1990, p.55). However, Smith’s account (1990) does not provide an analysis of Clausewitz, contrary to Stoler (2005), who addresses the dual nature of war in the policy-making.

Stoler’s work (2005) enhances the discussion of Clausewitz’s political framework and addresses the diplomatic aspects of war. The author proposes to use Clausewitz’s work as a manual for an aspiring diplomat of war. For instance, Stoler (2005, p.7) explains, the state which is set on the path of war has to alienate the enemy. Author refers to the books On War to expand on it. In the writings Clausewitz shows that alienation serves to reduce the state’s military and political by other states (Howard and Paret, 1976, p.35). Additionally, Stoler (2005, p.7) cites Clausewitz, a state has to maximise an international support, sign alliance treaties or obtain the assurances of other actors’ neutrality. This is an example of Clausewitz’s thinking blurring the boundary between a political and military thinking. Clausewitz focuses on achieving a military victory using the actions with “direct political repercussions”, such as the neutralising of alliance, the swaying of other state’s position in one’s favour, and so on (Howard and Paret, 1976, p.35). Also, Clausewitz’s political game reminds of Machiavelli’s well-known piece The Prince (Marriott, 1908), which advocates the gaining of other state’s respect and support for the cause.

Furthermore, Clausewitz holds two different perspectives on war. A war is an “act of policy” and a “political instrument” at the same time (Howard and Paret, 1976), because war is capable of compelling the adversary to do what one deems desirable. On the other hand, says Stoler (2005, p.6), the essence of war – a pure violence - interferes with a rationalist conduct of war; it significantly undermines the act of war as a policy instrument. As a result, the dual nature of war is expressed in the form of a mitigated rational perspective, which uses limited war to achieve political ends. Clausewitz sets this perspective in a contrast to the view that the war is too hard to control, and that its nature is just pure violence and absolute destruction.

Thus, Stoler (2005) highlights two conclusions of this model of war. Firstly, policy-makers need to adopt an extra set of measures to control the violence and limit it to the pursuit of political goal only. Secondly, political considerations ought to dominate over the military ones, because war is intended to serve political interests (Howard and Paret, 1976, pp.87-89). Hence, Stoler (2005) derives an elegant perspective on Clausewitz’s war as a policy tool. However, Stoler (2005, p.7) points out one weakness of Clausewitz’s model. Clausewitz fails to give a solution to the paradox of violence. The paradox is that violence can be used to achieve a policy end, but it is a quite unreliable policy tool, and probably not the best one too.

This judgement is valid, and Clausewitz recognises how unsteady the war as an instrument is. For that reason, Clausewitz gives policy-makers several tips to avoid an absolute war: ensure the unceasing dominance of policy over military operations, discard of the belief that a policy-maker can confidently predict the course and outcome of war (Howard and Paret, 1976, p.87). The first advice reinforces the idea that war is a policy tool and implies that policy-makers definitely need to interact closely with the military. Clausewitz finds it disappointing when politicians make orders to the military that overwrite all the previous efforts to achieve an objective (Howard and Paret, 1976, p.608). Thus, Clausewitz recommends statesmen to acquire a decent understanding of military policy and establish communication with the military (Howard, 1983, p.38).

Another point Clausewitz makes is that an analysis of war’s potential must always account for one “ultimate objective” of all wars, which is a lasting peace (Howard and Paret, 1976, p.159). Despite all the attention Clausewitz pays to the conduct of war, Clausewitz is the proponent of peace. For instance, Aron (1987, p.119) argues, for Clausewitz’s, politics should never be the continuation of war; politics can only achieve its objectives both in peace and war, meaning war is not considered as the essential element of international relations. Furthermore, Aron (1976, p.258) notes that Clausewitz does not see a war being the lasting feature of states’ relations; once the war stops it does not recover to be fought for the same objectives.

Cozette (2010, p.440) agrees and holds that the balance of power is built on a system of conflicting interests, but these conflicts are mostly non-violent. In addition, Clausewitz notes, the accurate estimation of war’s development is possible if one is able to conduct a “methodical examination” and possesses “the intuition of a genius” (Howard and Paret, 1976, p. 586). Consequently, Howard (1983, p.14) assumes that Clausewitz views the dangers of war as an opportunity for the talented policy-maker and used to their advantage.

Moreover, Stoler (2005) makes it clear that a political conduct of war inevitably experiences the impacts of violence. The violence is a natural part of war and it leaves politics in the uncomfortable space with ambiguous strategic potential and the scares of possible developments (Frazer and Hutchings, 2011, p.68). Thus, it is important to examine the ways in which politics interacts violence in order to clarify Clausewitz’s position on the utilisation of war.