Lawfare Podcast: Civ-Mil Relations—Where Are We Now and How Did We Get Here?

Episode Date: December 23, 2025
Host: Lauren Voss
Guests: Corey Shockey (American Enterprise Institute), Carrie Lee (German Marshall Fund)

Overview

This episode launches a series on the shifting dynamics of civil-military (civ-mil) relations in the United States, particularly in the context of recent domestic military deployments and executive actions. Host Lauren Voss, joined by experts Corey Shockey and Carrie Lee, explores why the military has become the government's go-to problem solver—not just in foreign wars, but in domestic crises—and the consequences of this trend for democratic institutions, legal frameworks, and public trust.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Foundations of Civil-Military Relations

• Two Test Frameworks (Shockey):
  • Can the president fire any military officer? “The answer to that is clearly yes…They pack their office and become civilians.” (Corey Shockey, [04:00])
  • Will the military carry out policies they advise against? Despite reservations, “it's their job to take the objectives and the resources they’re given and do the best they can.” ([04:49])
• Three-Principle Model (Lee):
  • Civilian Control: Military’s subordination to democratically elected leaders.
  • Military-Society Legitimacy: Public trust in the military’s role and competence.
  • Military Professionalism: The profession’s internal code of ethics and self-policing.
  • “A legitimate military is most likely to happen in a democracy. Legitimacy is essential for...society to place trust in it.” (Carrie Lee, [05:24])

2. What's Different About Today?

• Conflicting Principles and Successive Crises
  • “You have real conflicts between these principles that are erupting in...crises.” (Lee, [08:07])
  • Public trust in the military is splitting along partisan lines, coupled with eroding trust in expertise and institutions.
• Civilian Political Norm-Breaking
  • “You have a civilian administration that really doesn’t, and sort of openly disrespects a lot of very important civ-mil norms.” (Lee, [10:08])
  • Examples: political rallies at military bases, partisan speeches by civilian leaders, attempts to politicize the military.

3. Historical Parallels & Legislative Context

• Historical Example: 1866-67 Constitutional Crisis
  • “You had a very aggressive President and a very aggressive Congress disputing each other's authorities and trying to pull the military into the middle of it.” (Shockey, [16:57])
• Statutory Restrictions
  • Insurrection Act of 1807 and Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 sharply limit presidential authority for domestic deployments.
  • Recent administrations “have not met” the conditions to satisfy these statutes, yet have undertaken domestic deployments. ([13:33])

4. Who Bears Responsibility for the Current Crisis?

• Not a Civil-Military Crisis, but a Civil-Civil Crisis
  • “It’s a civil-civil crisis where Congress is failing to use the Article 1 authorities...to balance aggressive presidential policy actions.” (Shockey, [13:33])
  • “The military can't fix that...it puts a burden on our military to be the solution to a problem that is neither of their making nor...an acceptable role.” ([14:27])
• Shouldering Responsibility: Both the executive branch and Congress, across parties, are found at fault for politicizing the military and failing to assert checks and balances.

5. Responding to Unlawful or Unethical Orders

• Chain of Legal Advice and Responsibility
  • Military commanders have legal advisors, but must ultimately bear responsibility for their actions:
    • “That advice is not binding...does not supersede the Secretary of Defense’s legal counsel.” (Shockey, [22:51])
    • Refusing an order is a court-martialable offense, with the burden of proof on the officer.
  • The bias in the system is toward compliance: “You do not want the lowly lieutenant or captain going point-counterpoint...on whether the President has the constitutional authority to launch nuclear weapons.” (Lee, [25:32])
• Documenting Dissent
  • Short of disobeying, officers should “write everything down, document everything...so that when people do go looking...there is a written and documented record...” (Lee, [25:32])
  • Options besides disobedience: resignation, retiring early, whistleblowing—each rare and costly.

6. Obeying Lawful but Unethical Orders

• The Gray Zone

  • “There is only an obligation to disobey orders that are patently unlawful.” (Lee, [37:08])
  • When orders are lawful but ethically troubling, options include complying in a way consistent with one’s conscience, resigning, or whistleblowing.

• Memorable Hypothetical:

  • Deploying military domestically under the Insurrection Act and facing orders to use force on protesters could “profoundly damage the legitimacy of the American military.” (Lee, [40:30])

• Corey’s Rebuttal: “It is almost unimaginable to me that an American officer would obey an order to fire on their fellow Americans.” ([43:14])

  • Harder cases involve “cultural” issues—like firing senior female commanders—which may be lawful but violate military values.

7. Norms, Partisanship, and the ‘Unprincipled Principle’

• Destabilizing Effects
  • “The senior civilians are behaving in an unprincipled way, and it destabilizes the system...making the military have to figure out how to deploy to American cities...when Congress is inactive.” (Shockey, [49:06])
• Congressional Oversight as a Solution
  • “Senate Armed Services Committee...chose to dock Secretary Hegseth’s travel budget until he produced evidence on the strikes in the Caribbean.” ([50:32])

8. Signals to Watch Moving Forward

• Key “Canaries in the Coal Mine”:
  • “Who gets hired into the positions [vacated by fired officers]? How openly partisan are these officers?” (Lee, [54:23])
  • Will the president comply with court orders regarding military deployments?
  • Recruitment and retention rates, especially of women and minorities. (Shockey, [57:32])
  • Congress’s willingness to assert its constitutional authority on military policy and budgeting.
• Overall Trend: “The solution here is in the civilian realm...the military can't save us from this problem and we shouldn't want them to.” (Shockey, [59:42])

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “It’s a civil-civil crisis where Congress is failing to use the Article 1 authorities that the Constitution expects to balance aggressive presidential policy actions like the ones President Trump is taking.”
  — Corey Shockey, [13:33]

• “You have real conflicts between [civil-military] principles that are erupting in...crises. And so it’s very rare for you to have this kind of succession of issues in civil military relations.”
  — Carrie Lee, [08:07]

• “A legitimate military is most likely to happen in a democracy. Legitimacy is essential for a functioning profession because society has to place trust in it…”
  — Carrie Lee, [05:24]

• “It is almost unimaginable to me that an American officer would obey an order to fire on their fellow Americans.”
  — Corey Shockey, [43:14]

• “The problem of the unprincipled principle seems to me one of the biggest challenges in civil military relations right now. But again, the fix lies in the civilian realm.”
  — Corey Shockey, [50:01]

Timestamps for Key Segments

• [01:33] – Opening framing of the civ-mil challenge (Shockey)
• [04:00] – ‘Two tests’ for civil-military relations (Shockey)
• [05:24] – Three-principle model (Lee)
• [08:07] – Why the current moment is uniquely fraught (Lee)
• [13:33] – Legal and constitutional underpinnings of domestic military deployment (Shockey)
• [22:51] – What if a military leader is unsure about the legality of an order? (Shockey)
• [25:32] – Systemic bias toward compliance and the costs of noncompliance (Lee)
• [37:08] – The “gray zone” of lawful but unethical orders (Lee)
• [43:14] – Firing on American citizens: Harder questions (Shockey)
• [49:06] – The challenge of the ‘unprincipled principle’ and civilian norm-breaking (Shockey)
• [54:23] – What to watch in the near future: signals and indicators (Lee & Shockey)
• [59:42] – Concluding thoughts: solutions must come from civilians (Shockey)

Conclusion

This episode provides a serious, nuanced look at civil-military relations in a time of mounting domestic and political crisis. The experts stress that while the military appears to be under strain and its legitimacy and professionalism at risk, the root crisis is one of civilian governance and institutional failure—primarily in Congress’s abdication of oversight and the executive’s norm-breaking. The military, they argue, cannot and should not be expected to fix fundamentally civilian failures, and close attention must be paid to appointments, legal compliance, and the preservation of both legal and normative frameworks guiding American democracy.