Leaders, Advisers, and the Political Origins of Elite Support for War

As research on leaders matures, a next step is a better understanding of the advisers who surround them. This article explores the often-hidden politics of leader–adviser interactions, focusing on how leaders strategically manage elite cues from within their own circle that could engage otherwise dormant or permissive public opinion. Advisers can serve as cue givers when leaders contemplate the use of force, but leaders can shape which cues reach the public by accommodating advisers. This article explores this argument by combining a survey experiment with a case study of the 2009 escalation in Afghanistan, illustrating how the dynamics identified in the experiment motivate the president to bargain with advisers whose support or opposition would most influence public opinion. An important implication is that in the real world, damaging cues found in survey experiments may be diminished in volume or may not reach the public, whereas helpful cues could be magnified.