Comment on Who decides when the US goes to "war"
cobysev@lemmy.world 6 months agoTechnically only Congress can authorize a war. However, the president can and often will undertake “peacekeeping efforts” or “counterinsurgency operations” or “targeted strikes” without congressional approval.
I served in the US military during the Iraq War. Everyone refers to it as a war, but within the military, it was officially called the Iraq Campaign, as it was a military campaign sanctioned by the president. We couldn’t officially call it a war because Congress didn’t approve a war in the Middle East.
Technically, the last war Congress approved was WWII. The Korean War, the Vietnam War, even our first foray into Iraq with the Gulf War… none of these are official wars. Just the president deciding to step in and get involved in foreign conflicts.
Just the president deciding to step in and get involved in foreign conflicts.
From 1973 onward, no. While the first Gulf War, the invasion of Afghanistan, and the 2003 invasion of Iraq were not declared as wars, they were all authorized in votes by Congress.
I mean, my point still stands. They weren’t officially declared wars, and they were the president deciding to get involved in foreign affairs. The only difference is that Congress decided to vote on our involvement from 1973 onwards.
So our latest presidents have been more generous about sharing the decision instead of steamrolling ahead on their own. Probably a better move politically; he won’t take the full blame if the decision isn’t popular, like Vietnam.
You’re kind of drifting a little bit. I responding to “just the president deciding”- the “just” doing some heavy lifting to frame it as a unilateral decision without the involvement of Congress.
The only difference is that Congress decided to vote on our involvement from 1973 onwards.
That is basically completely the opposite from “just” the President deciding. It is involving an entire other branch in the decision. It’s not something to handwave away.
So our latest presidents have been more generous about sharing the decision instead of steamrolling ahead on their own. Probably a better move politically; he won’t take the full blame if the decision isn’t popular, like Vietnam.
They haven’t been “more generous”, they’ve been legally restrained by the War Powers Act, a piece of legislation passed by Congress.
They weren’t officially declared wars
You are right, they weren’t, but I don’t know the meaningful difference or point to be made when actions were still required to be authorized by Congress. As an aside, if you were in Iraq, you very likely received a GWOT service medal. GWOT standing for Global War On Terrorism. While Iraq operations were not in and of themselves individually declared a war, the use of the term GWOT by the US Government runs counter to the idea that people were “not allowed” to call it a war, when a medal awarded officially by the military uses the word.
Man, you sound just like my wife. Always arguing semantics when the overall point I’m making is pretty clear. ;) Now it’s my turn to point out the (ridiculous) semantics of the GWOT.
The Global War on Terrorism was a (rather ignorant) blanket statement made by then-president George W. Bush Jr., implying the concept of fighting terrorism across the globe. It had nothing to do with the Iraq War; it actually predates that campaign. It was a direct response to 9/11, with the Iraq War being the first active military campaign justified under it. We’ve been awarded the two GWOT medals for various military campaigns around the globe. I earned the expeditionary medal from a humanitarian deployment to Africa, of all places, and earned the service medal while stationed in Japan. And they’re still being awarded today, even though we’ve completely pulled out of Iraq and Afghanistan.
Despite using the word “war” in the medal’s name, the concept behind it was akin to the “War on Drugs.” It’s not an actual war against a particular nation or people; it’s a war on a concept. How can you fight a concept?!
Terrorism is a very vague word that applies to any situation in which someone uses fear and/or intimidation to get their way. We’ve definitely used that specific definition to justify stepping into situations we had no reason to be involved in. Like Iraq.
Much like the War on Drugs, I’m sure we’ll eventually see that there’s no possible way to win against the concept of terrorism, and we’ll silently phase it out. Heck, we’ve been ordered as of 2021 to start restricting the award of the GWOT-Service medal, so we’re already beginning to phase it out. It was a stupid statement, made by a stupid president who constantly flubbed his words, and shouldn’t be taken at face value.
To your other point, yes, I used the word “just” when referring to the president’s decision. The reason being, it is solely his decision, as the highest ranking leader of the Department of Defense (DoD), to implement the military in “campaigns” across the globe. He does not need anyone’s permission to deploy us.
However, you are correct that the War Powers Act restricts how he uses the military. He can send us out on a whim, but without that approval by Congress, he’d have to pull us back within 30 days. And he’s not allowed to actively order us into hostile situations without approval by Congress.
If we encounter hostilities while out on various campaigns, though, we’re authorized to respond appropriately to the situation via the Rules of Engagement (RoE). Kind of a loophole, which I have definitely seen used before. “Oops, we just happened to be passing through on a patrol and terrorists jumped out of nowhere and opened fire on us! We ended the initial threat, but quick, approve our sustained operations in the area so we can identify and neutralize lingering threats!”
Also, the public referred to the Iraq War as such, and news agencies latched onto the term, so politicians started using it too. And our Public Affairs office instructed military officials who were authorized to speak officially to the public to use common lingo.
But as military members, operating in an official capacity, we were required to use the “correct terminology” in our discussion and documentation, so as not to give off the wrong impression on official records. Which is why we were expected to use Iraq Campaign instead of Iraq War in our official lingo. Future generations will see our official records documented during the Iraq War, and the DoD prefers it’s framed in a certain way, so it doesn’t seem like we were intentionally encouraging a war in the region. As much of a failure as that campaign was, and as paper-thin our excuse was for deploying there, we don’t want people to also think we were just war-hungry terrorists or something. Right?? 9_9
Apologies if my semantics are not 100% accurate; I usually don’t have to deep dive into the specifics about these things with civilians, so I tend to “handwave away” the details, as you put it. I’m sorry if was a bit loose with my verbiage.
Aux@lemmy.world 6 months ago
“Special Military Operation”, lol.
rottingleaf@lemmy.zip 6 months ago
Those people in the unconstitutional and unregulated organization called “president’s administration” in Russia (which de facto took over all the important functionality from parliament, the federal council etc since around 1996) sometimes consider themselves very smart and sensitive of irony. They are also very superstitious.
Well, like people capable only of stealing and petty intrigues and achieving something at 10x the normal cost usually are.
I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that this was their inspiration.
(While V and Z likely just meant “east” and “west”, since В and З when carelessly drawn can be mixed up more easily, if the left part gets covered in mud or something.)