Post by W.O.M.I on Jan 29, 2007 20:43:00 GMT -5
As to the Joint Authorization not being the same thing as a formal declaration of war, you're absolutely right. It wasn't the same thing.
Nor was it intended to be.
Had President Bush gone to Congress and asked for a formal declaration of war against Iraq, he would have tacitly admitted that the War on Terror and the war in Iraq were two separate things when they are not. The War on Terror is the name given to the overall conflict, while the efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq (and elsewhere I'm sure) are different battlefronts, in much the same way that the effort in Europe and the effort in the Pacific were different fronts in World War 2.
You can argue that Bush should have asked Congress for a declaration of war in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, but that begs a very significant question be asked:
Declare war against whom?
Al Qeida? Nope. At least as the process has been implemented for the past 220+ years, a formal declaration of war can be made only against another sovereign nation and prosecuted against that sovereign nation's armed forces. Al Qeida wasn't and isn't a sovereign nation, nor are they a sovereign nation's armed forces. They were basically 'guests' of a sovereign country- Afghanistan's Taliban government- but they were not the Taliban's 'official' army.
Afghanistan? Nope, and for the same reason- al Qeida was not their official military force.
Islamofascism? Nope because, again, the Jihadists aren't their own nation and do not have a formal military.
Against the Jihadists themselves? Nope for two reasons: one, you find Jihadists in practically every country in the world (except for Iraq before we were there or so the Left tells us), so we'd have to declare war against, well, everybody....including ourselves, and, two, the Jihadists would claim that the efort was a resumption of the Crusades with the goal of eradicating Islam the world over. While there are those who would say "Great idea!", I don't support such an ideological genocide because I refuse to lump all Muslims into the extremist category.
The only example in US history that has really any similarities to the situation we find ourselves in now is our war against the Barbary Pirates in the early 1800s. The Pirates were a loose coalition of north African pashas who used their navies (in the form of privateers operating with the de facto permission of the leaders) to interdict commerce in the Mediterranian and eastern Atlantic, exacting a toll to allow the passage of our merchant ships or boarding them, taking the cargo and sinking them (and impressing our merchant sailors into virtual slavery).
But even that example falls apart because the Pirates were the official government of their nations and the privateers they employed constituted their 'official' armed forces or, at least, their naval forces. So the tenets of a formal declaration of war were met.
Again though, those conditions are NOT met in our current war on the Jihadists, so I can't see the relevance of advocating this particular "woulda, shoulda, coulda".
Nor was it intended to be.
Had President Bush gone to Congress and asked for a formal declaration of war against Iraq, he would have tacitly admitted that the War on Terror and the war in Iraq were two separate things when they are not. The War on Terror is the name given to the overall conflict, while the efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq (and elsewhere I'm sure) are different battlefronts, in much the same way that the effort in Europe and the effort in the Pacific were different fronts in World War 2.
You can argue that Bush should have asked Congress for a declaration of war in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, but that begs a very significant question be asked:
Declare war against whom?
Al Qeida? Nope. At least as the process has been implemented for the past 220+ years, a formal declaration of war can be made only against another sovereign nation and prosecuted against that sovereign nation's armed forces. Al Qeida wasn't and isn't a sovereign nation, nor are they a sovereign nation's armed forces. They were basically 'guests' of a sovereign country- Afghanistan's Taliban government- but they were not the Taliban's 'official' army.
Afghanistan? Nope, and for the same reason- al Qeida was not their official military force.
Islamofascism? Nope because, again, the Jihadists aren't their own nation and do not have a formal military.
Against the Jihadists themselves? Nope for two reasons: one, you find Jihadists in practically every country in the world (except for Iraq before we were there or so the Left tells us), so we'd have to declare war against, well, everybody....including ourselves, and, two, the Jihadists would claim that the efort was a resumption of the Crusades with the goal of eradicating Islam the world over. While there are those who would say "Great idea!", I don't support such an ideological genocide because I refuse to lump all Muslims into the extremist category.
The only example in US history that has really any similarities to the situation we find ourselves in now is our war against the Barbary Pirates in the early 1800s. The Pirates were a loose coalition of north African pashas who used their navies (in the form of privateers operating with the de facto permission of the leaders) to interdict commerce in the Mediterranian and eastern Atlantic, exacting a toll to allow the passage of our merchant ships or boarding them, taking the cargo and sinking them (and impressing our merchant sailors into virtual slavery).
But even that example falls apart because the Pirates were the official government of their nations and the privateers they employed constituted their 'official' armed forces or, at least, their naval forces. So the tenets of a formal declaration of war were met.
Again though, those conditions are NOT met in our current war on the Jihadists, so I can't see the relevance of advocating this particular "woulda, shoulda, coulda".