Lyle Denniston Quotes NSN on Obama’s ISIL AUMF

Constitution Check: Is the President actually giving up some of his war powers?

By Lyle Denniston
February 17, 2015 | Yahoo News

President Obama has won significant praise, from scholars, pundits and some politicians, for his action last week in recommending limits on a new move to wage military action against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. He proposed a three-year time limit on that authority, and a lack of permission for extensive use of U.S. ground troops against ISIL. He also asked Congress explicitly to repeal a 2002 resolution that had authorized the U.S. military invasion of Iraq.

As the President conceded, however, he explicitly declined to ask for repeal of the 9/11 authorization – the warmaking power that Congress had authorized against the Al Qaeda and Taliban terrorist networks in 2001.   And that is the specific resolution upon which the President has claimed authority, since August 2014, to justify some 2,300 strikes by U.S. air forces against ISIL in Iraq and Syria. Indeed, with that authority on the books, the President and his aides have insisted that he actually did not need a new ISIL-specific grant of power, although they made clear they think it would be better for the country if the commitment were a shared one.

“The proposed ISIL AUMF does not restrict using the 2001 Authorization to bypass the limits set in an Islamic State-specific law. The Administration has already claimed that the 2001 AUMF gives them the necessary authority to engage in armed conflict against the Islamic State.”

– The National Security Network, a national defense advocacy group, in an online commentary on February 11, responding to the President’s proposal.

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Photo Credit: DoD photo by D. Myles Cullen/Released, 10/14/14