海角大神

I haven鈥檛 written much about the latest developments regarding Islamic State/ISIS, the conflicts in Iraq and Syria, and the seemingly steady increase in American airstrikes against Islamic State (IS) targets in northern Iraq, mostly because I can鈥檛 honestly say that I feel like I have any better handle on what we should do or what we can achieve than anyone else. On the surface, it seems fairly clear that IS is the kind of potential threat that could be a serious problem for the United States and the rest of the world in the future if it is allowed to consolidate its hold on vast stretches of Syria and Iraq, essentially writing those nations out of existence as we know them today. Nations from the Arabian Peninsula to Jordan would be potential targets, and Iran would have yet another reason to reject the idea of slowing down its military buildup and nuclear program. Additionally, we shouldn鈥檛 dismiss out of hand the threats from IS to strike the United States even if they can鈥檛 hit us right now. On the other hand, though, it鈥檚 hard to see what the United States can actually do about the situation at this point. Airstrikes alone will not dislodge IS from the territory it now holds and nobody, not the Kurds, not the Iraqis, and not the Syrians, seems to be strong enough to dislodge them on the ground. That raises the possibility that American 鈥渂oots on the ground鈥� would be needed, but that seems to be a taboo political issue on either side of the political aisle.

While we debate what, if anything, to do about IS, though, it seems to be well beyond time for Washington to debate the question of what legal authority the president has to do what he has done so far and to expand American airstrikes into Syria, as some have suggested. Most recently, the White House asserted that the airstrikes in Syria that have occurred so far fall under the president's inherent authority as commander in chief. Indeed, the administration has apparently already begun surveillance flights over Syria, a precursor to such attacks, and is saying that it has no intention of seeking congressional approval before any strikes in Syria. As Molly O鈥橳oole notes聽at聽National Journal,聽this raises the prospect of a war powers fight with Congress as we head into the midterm elections:

This isn鈥檛 the first time that we鈥檝e seen this issue come up during the Obama administration, of course. Three years ago, the president authorized American involvement in the war against the Qaddafi regime based solely on resolutions passed by the United Nations Security Council and, notwithstanding complaints to the contrary, ignored calls to seek congressional authorization for the action. Last year, as the president inched closer and closer to attacking Syria over the alleged use of chemical weapons, members of Congress from both parties called on the administration to seek congressional approval for any such action. Initially, the president resisted those calls but, eventually, he relented and announced he would ask Congress to authorize an attack, although no such vote was taken and no attack occurred. In no small part, one suspects that this was because it was becoming clear that neither the House nor the Senate were going to approve a resolution.

This time around, the president,at least initially, seems inclined to go with his initial instincts to keep this out of Congress鈥檚 hands, even though that is pretty inconsistent with the position he took as a candidate for president. In response to a聽Boston Globe聽Q & A session in December 2007, for example, the president had this to say:

Similarly, in an August 2007 speech before the AFL-CIO, the then-senator said that the American people had the right to know before military action is taken in their name, and the man who would become his vice-president said that a president who took nondefensive military action without congressional authorization would be a candidate for impeachment. As Conor Friedersdorf argues, the president would be wise to listen to his former self before expanding military action against IS:

Perhaps the most important reason that Congress needs to be consulted and to authorize any future action, though, is the fact that we seem, at the moment, to be headed down a very slippery slope. Everyone in the administration and at the Pentagon that has spoken about the attacks on IS and the threat that the organization poses has emphasized the fact that any effort to dislodge and defeat them is likely to be long and complicated. Inevitably, if we keep this up, we will be required to face the question of whether or not to commit combat troops to the effort, even in some limited numbers. If we wait until that point to get the representatives of the people involved in this process, it may well end up being too late in the sense that we will have already committed ourselves to the war against IS to such an extent that escalation becomes inevitable no matter what Congress or the American people may want. Before we get to that point, the president has a responsibility to take the matter before Congress, and Congress has a duty to consider the matter and vote on it.

Doug Mataconis appears on the Outside the Beltway blog at http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/.