Over Proofed: Military Purges, Command Structure, and Foreign Military Intervention in Authoritarian Regimes

“Why do some authoritarian leaders who have systematically weakened their own militaries through purges still deploy those militaries abroad? This article argues that the relationship between coup-proofing and foreign military intervention is nonlinear, but in a form that prior theory has not specified: purging military officers increases the probability of foreign intervention up to a moderate threshold, then decreases it. Using the Military Purges in Dictatorships (MPD) dataset (Sudduth, 2021) with the International Military Intervention (IMI) dataset (Pickering & Kisangani, 2009; Pearson & Baumann, 1993) across 114 autocracies from 1965 to 2005, we show that officer purges predicts combat interventions abroad in a curvilinear pattern. Crucially, this effect is driven almost entirely by purges of middle-rank officers not top commanders or junior soldiers. Purging 2-3 generals or colonels in a rolling three-year window is associated with a peak probability of foreign combat deployment; purging more than that predicts declining engagement.”

Recommended citation: Ozturan, B. "Over Proofed: Military Purges, Command Structure, and Foreign Military Intervention in Authoritarian Regimes." (Under Review at Armed Forces and Society)