Why We Fight : Political Motivations and Strategic Culture in Military Operations

States have for a long time participated in international military operations, but their reasons for contributing with military capabilities are varied. This study intends to investigate and demonstrate how military contribution is motivated in the political decision-making process to justify its necessity, and how strategic culture influences the decision. The theoretical framework is extensive, containing several identified sub-beliefs of strategic culture, and factors within a rationalist and constructivist perspective used to capture political motivations. By employing a qualitative content analysis, the empirical material examined contains official documents, such as government propositions, reports, and protocols. The investigated cases are Sweden and Denmark’s military contribution to operations in Kosovo (Operation Allied Force, KFOR) and Mali (MINUSMA, EUTM, Operation Serval/Barkhane/Task Force Takuba). The findings indicate that while both Sweden and Denmark use the full spectrum of political motivations, Sweden emphasizes constructivist motivations, and Denmark rationalist motivations. This is traced to the central discovery that strategic culture within a state, influences how political motivations are portrayed to justify the necessity of contributing to international military operations. Thus, indicating the existence of an intertwined relationship between strategic culture, political motivations in terms of both rationalist and constructivist factors, and contribution of military capabilities