Wwen wrote:
Monte wrote:
I find it interesting that people that normally place a high value on personal responsibility think that such responsibility is not essential to the soldier.
There is no glory or honor to be had in war. Don't buy into the hype. It's a good an well when you're a wealthy knight, but it's usually the peon's blood and tears spilt for the "honor" of others.
Also, would you consider civilian casualties in an unconstitutional war a war crime?
Of course he would. Monty considers almost anything a war crime. However there is no such thing as an unConstitutional war. The Constitution does not require a declaration of war for the President to order the military to engage in operations of any kind. (It does, however, require that Congress give him the money beyond what they've already voted for the military, if any is needed, which it certainly would be). That is something that the Founders really should have corrected, but they didn't.
It should be pointed out that the War Powers Act limits military actions longer than 90 days to those authorized by Congres, but the Constitutionality of that law is disputed and has never been tested in court. Personally, I feel that there ought to be a Constitutional ammendment that requires Congressional authorization for military actions other than A) defense of U.S. territory, B) rescue or defense of U.S. citizens C) actions on the high seas (i.e. international waters) not involving attacks against any nation's territory D) self-defense by U.S. forces coming directly under attack or E) actions other than the above longer than 30 days, including humanitarian operations. This would allow us to retire the obsolete concept of "declaring war", which is different from "authorizing use of force" only in emotional impact, and would eliminate any question as to whether the President needs Congressional authorization.
The President should not be limited in his ability to act when the United States or its people or forces come directly under attack, nor should Congress be allowed to dither away our strategic position in the event of a truely major war. In fact, in a truely major war most or all of Congress could be destroyed before they can do anything. We also should not tolerate interference with the free use of international waters and airspace. That said, the President should not have 90 days to get us into a mess and then put political pressure on Congress to support the troops and create Constitutional battles that could last years in court.
We need a top-down tranformation to return military power to a truely strategic option (not strategic as in nuclear exclusively, but as in element of national strategy) rather than as an option for political tactical maneuvering. We spend too much on defense for the amount of defense we're getting; we could have a better military for the same or less money with some much-needed reforms to put more limits on things like Haiti, Somalia, Bosnia, and other minor activities and to make Congress truely commit and share responsibility in things like Iraq and Afghanistan rather than voting money to "support the troops" then sitting back and pretending that whatever happens is all the administrations' fault, regardless of which party is administrating.
Login
Register
FAQ
Search
