Congress has wanted nothing to do with conflicts in an official capacity for the last 50-60 years. They want sound bytes in unofficial interviews for grandstanding and to be able to blame everyone else.
This is actually a result of those decades of congress, regardless of party in control, abdicating their constitutional duty. For a recent example, check out post 9/11 and congress.
This. A thousand times this.
Both Obama and Biden have been more than willing to sign a repeal or massive overhaul of the AUMF, but both chambers of Congress and members of both parties therein are cowards who would rather cheer or criticize in front of a camera and microphone than perform their Constitutional duties of checking the power of the Commander in Chief.
If they were willing to sign a repeal of it, nothing stopped them from simply not using it. The AUMF didn't make them start wars.
Not a war.
They have a responsibility to carry out such actions in the presence of Congressional inaction and cowardice.
As long as the AUMF exists and is in effect, it is both legally and effectively the role of the President to act under its grant of authority in accordance with its purpose.
“The law says we have to kill whoever we want! You wouldn’t us to break the law would you??”
Cool comment my dude. But, I bet you could be even more reductive and purposefully obtuse if you tried. Give it a go; I’m eager to see you progress.
Shame on me for not adding to the discussion but the caffeine still ain't hit. I just want to say for some reason that seeing a willingly obtuse clown be challenged to be even more so genuinely made me giggle for some reason. Thank you.
As long as the AUMF exists and is in effect, it is both legally and effectively the role of the President to act under its grant of authority in accordance with its purpose.
Nah, this bullet is an off the wall insane interpretation of the AUMF. They were 100% right to mock you for it. Not to mention that the AUMF is actually about September 11, and specifically textually so, not just in motivation. Did the Houthis plan, execute, or shelter those responsible? It's been a huge stretch to even use it how it's been used. It's not in any way, shape, or form a requirement to go fight other random Islamic groups, whether or not they deserve it.
I’m sorry but saying the president can, so they have to, is the most reductive thing I’ve ever seen. It’s the epitome of absolute ideology. Thinking a piece of paper absolves the genocidal actions of anyone……
Targeted killings of senior leaders in the Islamic extremist movement is hardly genocide. We have an actual fucking genocide in progress to reference and you want to sell us on the idea of drone strikes as genocide?
The attack was to support Israel in their genocide. It wasn’t an act of genocide, but you can’t deny it was an act in the aid of genocide.
No. How the fuck does a ship taking oil from an Egyptian port to Vietnam, just with an American financial stake have fuck all to do with genocide?
Just because someone claims they're fighting something does not mean they actually are. Nothing about what the Houthis are doing is actually about Israel except their words.
Given that actual US Navy ships have been getting attacked and this is largely in retaliation of that, I think it stretches the imagination a bit to say that the US started this.
From where did you get this opinion? None of the articles I've read about the US attack have mentioned an attack on the US Navy. The closest I could find in a search was missiles that landed 10 nautical miles away from a Navy ship in November. Which, at the scale of the ocean is sorta close, but it's a stretch to call it an attack in need of immediate retribution. All the direct justifications presented by the US are that this is in response to and designed to deter their attacks on commercial shipping.
The Houthi's have been launching missiles at our ships and hijacking cargo ships basically since thw October 7th attacks. This is just the first time the US has done more than a warning, which is why you're hearing about it now.
This doesn't seem to be in response to the thread. The Axios link doesn't say anything about an attack on the US Navy. The second link has a mention by Biden of "US ships" (not Navy) as targets, but the linked story only says a British navy ship may have been targeted, but they weren't sure. I'm well aware they've been attacking shipping, that's not in question and not what I'm responding to.
At the same time, we shouldn't be defeatist when it comes to ethics and holding our government branches accountable. If they are arguing in good faith, we should support efforts for more transparency and secure processes.
Remember the Republican reaction when Obama did the same thing in Libya?
Reeeeeee! 72 hours to get our approval or we'll impeach you! Reeeeeee! Not authorized! Not funded!
Then when our embassy there... in Benghazi... was attacked... it was years of "Reeeee! Why didn't you DO something??!?!?!"
After they stripped embassy security funding for it, naturally.
Is Ben Gazi the talented buttery male I hear so much about?
All part of Hillary's plan to whip up support for war.
Another terrorist group fucks around and finds out.
War is not something to glorify. It's unfortunate that the situation with Israel/Palestine, Saudis/Iran, and Houthis/US escalated to this point.
Another terrorist group fuck around and innocent people find out.
Don't think any civilian deaths have been reported so far, just 10 Houthi soldiers according to the Houthis themselves. We'll see how that shakes out as more information emerges, but we also aren't Israel - civilian casualties are something we try to avoid.
😂😂 except in the countries we invade...
Source: old enough to remember Iraq and Afghanistan as an adult and have a parent that went to Vietnam.
Yeah, I remember Iraq and Afghanistan too. I followed both very closely. Our civilian casualty ratios were far from Israel's currently claimed 50-50 (as opposed to what it actually probably is, ie 80%+ civilians).
Fuck, even in Vietnam the ratio wasn't 50 fucking 50.
The Wikipedia source on the first link doesn't say what the citation claims it does, if you follow it.
On the second, that count would require, what, 80% of civilian deaths to be caused by the US? Assuming the extrapolations it reaches are correct. For a 50-50 combatant-civilian split.
If you want to argue that as a matter of moral responsibility, fine, but the point raised above is quite clearly about military efforts to distinguish civilians from combatants in operations.
The Wikipedia source on the first link doesn’t say what the citation claims it does, if you follow it.
I followed the link to the report and it's not clear whether the 39k number is total combatant casualties, but you can just calculate from the civilian deaths where the estimate is at least 112k-122k civilian casualties out of 174k total, which is ~70%. You're acting like that 7% difference is a big gotcha.
And I don't know why you're acting like the US being responsible for 80% of casualties in Iraq is a wild idea. We massively overpowered the limited Iraqi capabilities. They had much fewer combatants and didn't even have the ability to drop bombs. The CCR isn't about a particular side though, since you'll always get into muddy questions of who was responsible for a particular death. It certainly wasn't the case that we were mostly just killing terrorists.
That's uh... For a couple decades.
A better way of looking at it would be to extrapolate an average casualty rate per month.
Using their most up to date numbers 208k through June 2020. That's about 1,000 deaths a month. If we do the same with their 2005 estimate, because casualties are massively front loaded... We get 2,000 deaths a month.
Then we need to talk about their methodology. They include local news reporting which routinely lied about casualties being fighters or civilians. For reference I remember our translator reading us an article that said our night vision goggles were X-ray vision.
And I don’t know why you’re acting like the US being responsible for 80% of casualties in Iraq is a wild idea. We massively overpowered the limited Iraqi capabilities. They had much fewer combatants and didn’t even have the ability to drop bombs.
You... do realize that 'massively overpowered' =/= 'hit as many civilians as we can', right? Accusing the US military of having a worse civilian death ratio by a significant margin in Iraq than in Vietnam or WW2 is absolutely a wild idea.
I followed the link to the report and it’s not clear whether the 39k number is total combatant casualties, but you can just calculate from the civilian deaths where the estimate is at least 112k-122k civilian casualties out of 174k total, which is ~70%. You’re acting like that 7% difference is a big gotcha.
70% civilian deaths by all sources, not 70% by Coalition forces. That's the difference.
It certainly wasn’t the case that we were mostly just killing terrorists.
Again, if we are discussing this not as a matter of moral responsibility for the war as a whole, but for "Military operations which killed civilians", we very much were killing mostly enemy combatants. Coalition forces were responsible for relatively few civilian casualties from the start, and proportionally fewer as the war went on and criticism of civilian casualties became harsher. The vast majority of civilian casualties were caused by insurgents or the security forces of the Iraqi government.
Massively overpower means you have the means and weaponry to cause significantly more collateral damage. This fantasy that the US has surgical precision with its strikes is just wishful thinking. The Pentagon document leak has specific examples of classifying civilians as enemy combatants and widespread abuse. You're motivated enough to follow sources and question casualty claims on minutiae and then just claim it was all someone else without even a passing inclination to support your statement with data.
Man, because I've argued with people like you before. Again, going back to the raw numbers, your claim would have to attribute some 80%+ of civilian casualties in the Iraq War to Coalition forces and only 20% to Insurgents and Iraqi Security Forces combined in order to reach an even 50-50 proportion of combatants and civilians killed by Coalition Forces. Is that your claim?
Massively overpower means you have the means and weaponry to cause significantly more collateral damage. This fantasy that the US has surgical precision with its strikes is just wishful thinking.
The idea of "Power is big boom" is horribly antiquated WW2 style thinking.
Having done something before should make it easier for you to find sources this time to support your minimizations. And to be clear 50-50 is TERRIBLE and means any more serious operation we initiate is likely to kill a lot of innocent people. We're not Israel, we only kill one innocent person for every enemy fighter, is not the reassuring statement you think it is.
The idea of “Power is big boom” is horribly antiquated WW2 style thinking.
You have a fantasy where precision guided bombs dropped from 10,000 feet punch cleanly through buildings to destroy terrorist heads and terrorist heads alone with no collateral damage to nearby people or buildings. Power is also having the ability to just shoot up a car because it might be getting too close to your check point, knowing that your overriding priority is maintaining control and protecting your allies and you'll never suffer consequences for being a little overeager and making an oopsie.
Were those the 10 soldiers in pirate boats attacking a merchant ship? I don’t see any reason for sympathy
They were on land, but may be believably related to the sea attacks.
USA killed plenty civilianscin Iraq and Afghanistan.
Oh look a whataboutism in the wild. Maybe this definition will help you.
Lol what a pathetic taunt.
Edit for the ultra daft downvote crew: the fact the US killed civilians is directly relevant to the blub i responded to, the one claiming the US was bettter than Israel because it did not kill civilians.
For the extra determined ignoramouses ive provided this as an example :
Mhhhmm. Didn't read the definition I see.
Your link to the definition of 'avoid'?
I avoided nothing. I addressed the issue directly.
The USA kills civilians.
Israel does at a much faster rate. A genocidal one in fact.
But that does not give any creedence to the notion the USA is innocent.
QED JFC
Now you're moving the goalpost. Dude, just admit your wrong. The US goes to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties.
have you ever seen the viral sensation "collateral murder"?
I have actually. I also saw the unedited version WikiLeaks was really hoping nobody would see.
Oh, sorry. I thought this was related to the genocide in Gaza. Completely unrelated and just trade related in the seas adjacent. Obviously we should protect profits at all costs.
I mean, considering the Houthis aren't targeting Israeli ships specifically, it's not really particularly related to the ongoing genocide in Gaza, despite the Houthi claims? It's terrorists showboating to burnish their own credentials.
Obviously we should protect profits at all costs.
... and what about the human lives threatened by literal terrorists attacking unarmed civilian ships with drones and rockets? Fuck 'em, huh? The people who will suffer from the economic disruption, fuck them too, right? Fucking poors, who cares about them? It's not like there's an ongoing global crisis with rising food prices from prior disruptions to supply lines.
Let's not blow it out of proportion. I disagree with attacking trade routes, but there have been no casualties.
However 12000+ Palestinians have died.
As a civilian, I don't want to enter a warzone or a disputed route. These people are choosing to and should be protected. However, let's not pretend it's not a one sided conflict, based on genocide, which Israeli government ministers have advocated for.
I don't own any kind f those ships, but if I did, I'd find a different route. It started with just protests against ships stopping at Israel. I wish it stayed there. How many ships can stop at Gaza with humanitarian supplies?
Let’s not blow it out of proportion. I disagree with attacking trade routes, but there have been no casualties.
Because Western military ships have been busy intercepting drones and rockets. This is just the first time we've hit back.
However 12000+ Palestinians have died.
Okay, how is that the fault of civilian ships going through international waters?
As a civilian, I don’t want to enter a warzone or a disputed route. These people are choosing to and should be protected. However, let’s not pretend it’s not a one sided conflict, based on genocide, which Israeli government ministers have advocated for.
Until the Houthis starting firing, it wasn't a warzone or a disputed route. The route isn't in Israeli territorial waters. It's nowhere near Gaza or Israel.
I don’t own any kind f those ships, but if I did, I’d find a different route.
The only other route is all the way around Africa.
As a civilian, I don’t want to enter a warzone or a disputed route. These people are choosing to and should be protected. However, let’s not pretend it’s not a one sided conflict, based on genocide, which Israeli government ministers have advocated for.
You do understand that the ship attacks we're talking about in this thread are happening 1000 miles away from Israel at the clear other end of the Red Sea, right? It's nowhere near the Gaza warzone (which borders a different sea entirely -- the Mediterranean), nor is it even "disputed" by anybody legitimate.
Literally nothing about this, except the Houthi terrorists' choice of timing, has anything to do with Israel.
It's a tough situation, but attacking civilians is not a valid way of protesting Israels' attacks on civilians.
Jesus fucking Christ, Congress is peak dysfunction.
Republicans: "Hold my MAGA hat!"
The last war declared by Congress was Korea in the early 1950s in WW2. Dark Brandon doesn't have time for this foolishness. Yemen was warned again and again. They've now entered the find out stage.
edit: brain worms
The last war by US Congress was declared in June 1942, against Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania. US Congress has not made a formal declaration of war since then.
Right but they pass laws granting authorization of military use of force, AUMF. That's the Congressional authority to declare war under the War Powers Clause of the Constitution.
If you read the annotations to that clause you will see that the framers intent, traditional interpretation, and certainly modern interpretation are in agreement that the Constitution does not foreclose executive initiated use of force in what would be considered self defense, and that would certainly include the measured and limited destruction of an enemy's ability to carry out further attacks on US interests, and would certainly cover such defensive measures when done in agreement and in concert with a broad coalition of allies.
Yes, we call those "blank checks" to the executive branch. The Germans even have a word for it. We did it with Vietnam and it did not go well. One would have thought the generation in Congress would have learned their lesson given most of them lived through that shitshow.
It goes without saying that military resources can defend themselves when fired upon, there's plenty of precedent going back well before the formation of the US. The AUMFs were not that. They were very clearly blank checks to wage literal wars anywhere the executive desired while providing the flimsiest of evidence - and Shrub did just that. See: Iraq.
Merely an overly large check. There are limits, and we need the executive branch to be able to respond to urgent threats - the War Powers Act seems to do that.
the 1973 War Powers Resolution, which further requires that presidents not only report to Congress within 48 hours when they deploy U.S. armed forces into hostilities without congressional authorization but also end U.S. participation in those hostilities within 60 to 90 days if Congress does not authorize it after the fact.
Then people here are complaining about A U Military Force but I only see such a thing specifying Iraq. Iraq can’t be pulled into every possibility yeah, I agree Congress needs to get its shit together and constrain or repeal - the Iraq conflict that was created for is done.
Meanwhile, the response to the Houthi terrorism/piracy seems exactly what these regulations provide for
There were two AUMFs. One for "terrorism" and one for Iraq.
And the "terrorism" one is actually textually targeted at the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks. It's not even itself overly broad, it's just been twisted into a global war on terror because the executives want to do that and no one stopped them.
It's not even itself overly broad, it's just been twisted into a global war on terror because the executives want to do that and no one stopped them.
Yes, therein lies the problem. It was a stupid mistake to make and those that voted for it should have known better.
They thought they would just repeal it later.
Go read the War Powers Act. Then tell me what decade long conflict the US has fought in without an AUMF since it was passed.
Go on.
In any event, no authorization from Congress is needed for this sort of strike, which was essentially just shooting back at someone shooting at us.
I'm not in disagreement, that also wasn't what my initial reply was about.
Corrected. Thanks.
Yemen has been getting bombed by Saudi Arabia with the full backing of the US for almost a decade now, creating one of the worst humanitarian crises still ongoing. You're right about the brain worms, but it's not because you goofed up the last war declared by congress. Dumb Brandon is not cool for continuing the status quo with the military industrial complex.
Ww2, Korea was never declared.
Does a formal declaration of war matter?
The Wikipedia entry for the Korean War mentions Congress allocating money for the war effort within the month after US got involved. That certainly appears to be Congressional approval.
And the US response was after a UN resolution calling for it, giving some legitimacy
Corrected. Thanks.
Yemen was warned not to block the ports of a genocidial neighbour. But they just wouldn't stop. And now the US has to bomb them. So sad.
Oh fuck off with this tired propaganda line. After Korea we did Vietnam as a "police action" and then Congress filled in the semantic loop hole with the War Powers Act. Which governs how we go to war now. If we need to fight an actual war then Congress has to pass an AUMF, Authorization to Use Military Force.
Every action since Vietnam has either fallen into the 60 day period presidents are allowed for emergencies or an AUMF. Congress has absolutely been exercising it's war powers. This stupid fucking lie gets trotted out by the far left and the far right for different uses and I'm done hearing it.
Some progressives need to put down the flowers and smoke some bad guys now and then. Conservatives need to cram their sabers up their own asses and die.
I'll take soft progressives over the other any day of the week, but demanding Congressional approval is fucking absurd right now. It'll take 8 months and be filled with unrelated laws, financial packages for Ohio and Texas, and pro-oil deregulation.
Not to mention, having foreseen exactly this problem previous representatives passed the War Powers Act. Biden absolutely has the authority to blow shit up. He can do it without any reason or other authority for 60 days. Then he has 30 days to remove American troops from that area. (Or return force levels to where they were)
So you want more executive power? .. almost like that the president can do things without Congress?
.. boom dictatorship.
There's a line, idk what it should be but it should be.
No, but have the power to make quick action against small threats via airstrike and missile strikes shouldn't need the end endless hem and haw from a bunch of clowns.
They might have a stronger case if they haven't proven to be a 'do nothing' Congress. They can't even put together a budget.
Congress signed over the rights to just do war crimes whenever you feel like it back under Reagan.
Now the President can do the thing, Congress can call a hearing to complain about it, elections happen, power changes hands, and the only people who suffer are the ones getting bombed.
It's not a war crime to return fire if fired upon.
"He bombed me back first"
Targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure, mass arrests and forced removal of native populations, and indiscriminate use of chemical weapons are all war crimes. Hell, use of cluster bombs and mines have been recognized as war crimes since the mid-90s, and yet the US is the world's largest manufacturer and distributor of both.
So, nobody should be held accountable for firing on a US Navy ship sailing in international waters?
So, nobody should be held accountable for the US eagerly aiding Israel in its quest of genocide? Also, the US has been helping Saudi Arabia bomb the Houthis for almost a decade now and have created a humanitarian crisis in Yemen.
Shooting at international shipping isn't holding anyone accountable unless you hate shipping corporations. And yeah if you shoot at the military (any military) don't be surprised when they shoot back.
It's clearly made the US take notice (since they care more about trade than people's lives), so mission accomplished. How else do you propose they do it, given the limited resources they have? Take it up with the UN, where the US vetoes any resolution against israel?
I suggest they pressure Egypt to allow all aid into Gaza no matter what Israel wants.
I suggest they donate to the IRC.
I suggest they go join the people they see as comrades and fight Israel.
I do not suggest that they declare war on the entire world's shipping. Which is responsible, in part, for delivering their own Humanitarian Aid. And transferring food and energy the world over. Furthermore effectiveness at getting attention does not equal moral. I don't get to shoot at random cars on the freeway because I don't like how the next state over handles homeless people. And they don't get shoot at random ships.
I suggest they pressure Egypt to allow all aid into Gaza no matter what Israel wants.
Shutting down the Suez traffic does this.
I suggest they donate to the IRC.
"Okay, yes, you've had an enormous impact on geopolitics with a few warning shots, but have you considered starting a GoFundMe?"
I do not suggest that they declare war on the entire world’s shipping.
Hardly the whole world. They're very clearly targeting traffic through the Red Sea. Nightmarish news for all those Israeli shipping magnets and major ports on the back end of the Mediterranean. Amazing news for ports along the southern coast of Africa. The Houthis have, with a few hundred dollars in military hardware, done what amounts to a direct cash transfer of billions of dollars from the Israeli Zionists to pro-Palestinian South Africans.
What could they possibly do that would be more effective for their allies in Gaza than this?
It's not that shutting down Suez traffic doesn't do this. It's that it's an act of war against any country moving cargo through there. It's entirely too broad.
And they haven't had an impact. Not beyond discussing it here and lining themselves up for NATO ground mission (If not a UN one). We already have a military UN mission keeping the Suez Canal open and it has been the subject of wars before. It really is that important as a logistical route. And the IRC is hardly a GoFundMe.
They could go fight the Israelis directly. Because it's not just Mediterranean. It's literally the entirety of Europe from all point east of the canal. And Europe is not going to tolerate it. The most impactful thing they get is actually the first ever foreign deployment of an EU military force.
It’s that it’s an act of war against any country moving cargo through there.
If you consider the history of Yemen and the decade-long struggle of Houthi insurgents against a Saudi backed dictatorship, eh? They've been at war with a proxy of a proxy of the US for some time now. Might as well claim the Taliban is committing an act of war against countries moving cargo through Kabul.
And they haven’t had an impact.
95% of traffic routed from the Red Sea isn't an impact?
They could go fight the Israelis directly.
They are. This is a direct attack on the Israeli economy. It is costing the state billions.
Of course someone should be held responsible. So fling a few bombs up in the air and declare anyone they land on "enemy combatants" and then we can say justice was served.
The US no longer makes leave in place mines. They are all command detonated. That was a Clinton thing. The cluster bombs... We're actually phasing them out of our arsenal. However the US maintains they're legal as long as they're not used in urban areas. Largely because Russia and China still use them and they're very effective. We'd need to get them seriously on board to actually stop making cluster munitions.
The US no longer makes leave in place mines. They are all command detonated.
We continue to use them on the Korean divide, probably the most heavily mined place on earth. And while we've definitely updated our arsenal, I would not bet my life on the reliability of these ostensibly more advanced systems.
The cluster bombs… We’re actually phasing them out of our arsenal.
Sure. By selling them to our allies.
Largely because Russia and China still use them and they’re very effective.
Well, they're cheap by tonnage, which is why the Russians love them. But they're also unreliable, which is what makes them so dangerous. They don't always detonate where they land, and that makes them function as land mines after the fact. They are only "effective" in the sense that they're explosive devices that litter a large area.
As to China, when was the last time they bombed anyone? Like, at all? To my knowledge, the Chinese haven't been involved in a war since they signed a peace deal with Vietnam in the 70s. The closest we've seen has been police actions along border territories (Xinjiang getting a bunch of jihadist spillover from Afghanistan, slap fights with Indian border guard counterparts, etc). Who have they been dropping cluster bombs on, in living memory even?
The DMZ landmines have been there for 70 years and de-mining that would come with serious risks of sniper attacks, ambushes, and nuclear war. Yeah it really ramps up that quick over there. All we need is for the Hermit King to think we're clearing breach routes and Seoul goes up. So yeah we're not removing those.
Even under the Trump administration we're sticking to "non-permanent" landmines. The most prominent and widespread of which is the command activated claymore.
Most of our allies are also getting rid of cluster bombs. And when Ukraine specifically asked for them we hesitated to sell them. The reason we did so is because of parity in that war. And while they aren't reliable enough to leave the area safe of UXO, they are extremely reliable at destroying military equipment.
China matters because they're constantly threatening military action.
So are they going to repeal the War Powers Act? Are we going back to needing a Declaration of War to deal with every pissant pirate?
Not the pirates of pissants? Have they try singing to distract them?
Houthi and the Blowfish
It would be a good start, yes.
No, it wouldn't. A straight repeal of the War Powers Act also opens us up to another Vietnam. And amending it such that any use of force requires congressional approval would put us in an international straight jacket. From defending our shipping interests to protecting allies. In the event of China deciding it would rather just take existing islands to make it's "nine dashed line" a reality, we'd be arguing about immigration instead of deploying the Navy. And we would instantly lose the trade access we have to the entirety of the SEA region.
We tried isolationism. It didn't work.
No one is saying let the planet go to hell
Yes, yes they are. Maybe not you, but there are billionaires saying exactly that.
Asking Congress is a surefire way to get nothing done.
Maybe that's a good default stance when the topic is war.
Limited war is always a tricky topic. Where do you draw the line between a full on war and making the seas safe for trade,
Luckily, the aftermath of the Vietnam War gave us an answer. The War Powers Act. Which gives the president authority to use the military in situations exactly like this. If he tries to turn it into a big thing, then it has to go in front of Congress.
Humanitarian aid and addressing the reason they are taking up arms.
The Houthis took up arms because of Iranian backing and Yemeni local politics. The Western countries aren't solving that any time soon. And they're already receiving HA.
Making the seas safe for trade = shutting down trade sanctions on a genocide
That's not what they're doing. They're firing at any ship they believe even has a Western financial stake in it. No matter where it's going or what it's carrying. It could be taking Italian tractors to Somalia to encourage local farming as part of an aid program and they would fire at it.
Isn't fighting piracy like legal for everyone? Like a private citizen or any country's military could go out there and hunt pirates. I remember that from when the somali pirates got yeeted.
The AUMF probably also actually has given him the right to do this.
No AUMF required to bonk pirates. It's the national version of self defense.
None of these representatives objected to us sinking boats involved in piracy operations. They're objecting to attacks on land against a group that is pretty close to a government. There's some point at which on-land operations turn from being defending against piracy to regime change. Which may be warranted, but should be decided by Congress.
I'm pretty sure you can attack the pirates when they get back on land too.
Not if they have one foot on home base. No backsies!
I think that's a baseball reference I'm too european to get
Ha I see why you might think so but I was referring to "neighborhood rules" for kids' games like Tag. We'd often designate a light pole or a car as "home base" and you couldn't be tagged as "It" if you were touching it.
I hope you play tag in Europe or else this didn't make sense either lol
Ah instead a game I'm either too old to remember or too woman to have played. It does sound vaguely familiar though.
Then Congress needs to add that to the War Powers Act.
There are no laws in international waters.
You underestimate the reach of US law. Also, the "Law of the Sea" clearly applies.
There are laws that govern Antarctica, Outer Space, the Moon, etc. International waters are just less regulated, but there are definitely laws.
Oh yeah the infighting is getting bad. Get ready for an absolute terrible election season for the Democrats.
I'm seeing "leftists" using the same vocabulary as Q-anon style crazy morons. The vitriol is being spat like no matter what their isn't a right answer and it's not made better by the fact that we as a country are still basically pushing for all the worse aspects of ourselves because it's what feels normal.
People are all gonna join in to help burn it down and think they will be the kings of the ashes but largest organized group is gonna be the real victor and it's for sure as hell not the self hating left.
Maybe I will be wrong and the vote against method will work again but if it does we need to make some hard turns to get things actually getting better and get some companionship happening or it will just be a bloodbath between factions that wanted their scoop of the ashes.
It's because these "leftists" are right wing trolls. Full stop. This "Genocide Joe" shit in particular is so fucking transparently a trump-style attack it's laughable. Leftist spaces on the internet are so far up their own reactionary assholes they are now actively protecting far right propagandists and calling it left unity.
Yeah I actually got banned from a "leftist" sub (r/latestagecapitalism on Reddit) because I called out a literal right wing propaganda post from a literal maga mouthpiece that was a lie.
And the mod responded with:
We don't work with the Demo-kkk-rats
Like a literal fascist response because it makes their dick hard to feel like they are standing up to the bad guys while supporting the end of democracy. Neat. Not a leftist.
It is interesting/sad just how hard Biden is sticking to the old ways of doing things even though most people seem to have moved on from that way of thinking.
*“Most people” applies only to lemmygrad, lemmy.ml and some college campuses.
Seriously - people dramatically overestimate how much has changed.
The legislative branch has been busted for so long that they literally ceded power to go to war to the executive for the good of the nation. Y'all can feel free to undo that at any time once you're not completely broken.
Last I heard, the AUMFs were still active. Assuming that was used to justify this legally.
No need. The War Powers Act 30 Day emergency powers clearly apply.
Are they suggesting to allow US Navy ships to be attacked without retaliation? It’s been going on for like 2 months now. Are they willing to have that on their voting record?
Did they send a strongly worded letter, that they later retracted, again...?
I don't think it's his actions that are the problem. I think it is WHO did them that is the problem which can be seen by the charge being led by the infamous Rashida Talib from Michigan.
Congressman Ro Khanna:
I am so glad Khanna isn't getting the Senate seat. If this was just his opinion and he was advocating for changing the War Powers Act, great. But he presents it as legal fact when it really isn't.
Implying Biden "took us into war" in Yemen? Because we've been bombing them for decades.
Have they gone to war?
Dropping bombs is an act of war, so yes. I guess the de jure, internationally recognized state of Yemen approves of the bombings, but the de facto state run by the Houthis is at war with the US.
Of course, the Houthis have committed acts of war first by violating the rights of the sea, so take that as you will.
Iran is a whole ass country, the Houthis are a rebel faction, for lack of a better term. I think this whole situation is kinda different... Matter of opinion I guess...
Houthis are the de facto government of Yemen which is important because the US is claiming the right to self defence which is only available between states.under international law. That's why for example Israel's argument of self defence is nonsense because Gaza is not a separate country.
How many countries recognize the authority of the Houthis in Yemen?
They're a rebel faction that controls most of the country, including the capital. It's different, but they're a lot closer to a government than something like Hezbollah.
The Houthis are only considered a rebel faction because the US said so. I don't exactly like them but they're basically the government of Yemen.
And? Trump assassinated a senior government official with zero authorization or provocation. This is clearly not the same thing.
Let's be clear: trump being a pile of shit doesn't give biden license to be almost as shitty.
Sure. But these are not the same actions. Defending shipping interests has been a legitimate cause for military force ever since humanity invented shipping.
But don't you get it?!
Biden's last name isnt trump, and he has a D by his name. Obviously expecting any other diffences mean you hate America...
"There is no difference between an attempt to start a war with an organized state of millions of people which has engaged in no provocation beyond international norms, and a strike against a terrorist group currently attacking civilian shipping." - Most Informed "BOTH SIDES" Fan
The Democrats (except for Biden) aren't being hypocritical here. They objected to both Trump and Biden.
Need that sweet sweet oil money.
Russia's got oil
So Israel is going to colonize Gaza, and the US is going to take Yemen?
What could possibly go wrong?
NOBODY wants Yemen. Don't sweat it. Their only natural resource is civil war. Mostly, we just are looking to destroy Iran's proxy forces.
Also, we've had operations there periodically through multiple previous administations. The Saudis own our government officials and presidents.
Not to mention, all the weapons and missiles, and planes the Saudis use are just provided by the US politicians they own.
Just keep in mind, war goals change. When we went into Iraq, we were "destroying WMDs" and "responding to 9/11", and by the time we came out, we were instead "building democracy". Violence often causes more violence, even if well-intentioned.
Biden when Americans need help:
I'm just a president I can't do anything without Congress!
Biden when far right ethnostate wants to do another genocide in the Middel East:
Fuck congress, I'm a president! Vote trump if you don't like it.
Motherfucker is 80 years old and has no idea what he's doing. We deserve better than our only two options
Oh, is that what this is about? We're attacking the Houthis in defense of Israel?
Don't be fucking daft, or disingenuous, which is worse because it displays complete moral cowardice.
We're attacking the Houthis because they're indiscriminately attacking civilian ships in one of the most valuable shipping lanes in the fucking world.
We're attacking the Houthis because they're indiscriminately attacking civilian ships in one of the most valuable shipping lanes in the fucking world.
Countries are allowed to decide what goes through their territorial waters.
You conveniently dismiss that the ships are in international waters. Besides, sinking them is an unwarranted escalation when it comes to civilian ships.
They didn't actually sink any ships.
Yeah, not for a lack of trying.
Luckily, the Houthis are not the internationally recognized government of Yemen, so this isn't relevant.
Nope. Not as a blanket statement. There are things they can regulate but we regularly conduct "freedom of navigation" patrols through the waters of certain countries just to remind them they aren't allowed to ban cargo ships sailing at a certain distance from the coastline.
So it's about money, as it always is. Going to war is always about money... I'm so tired of the U.S. being at war. We've been at war all but maybe 12 years of the U.S.'s existence. Don't believe me? It's surprising but true.
Unless your ideal is an autarkic Festung Amerika, shipping lanes kind of have to be able to operate without the civilian sailors who go through worrying about getting fucking killed.
Globalization isn't a requirement. In fact, it's completely destroying our planet and its habitability. But yeah, let's worry about the shipping lanes.
Yeah, alright, you have fun with the idea that people exchanging goods without murdering each other is what's destroying the planet. Terribly evil, globalization. Or that the collapse of shipping lanes wouldn't result in incredible human suffering.
It's called CO2 emissions, I'm sure you're aware of it. The suffering climate change is going to cause in the coming decades will dwarf anything we've ever seen, unless we see a sharp decrease in emissions to zero very very soon, ideally 20 years ago. But, the next best time to do it is right now.
Nothing you said is remotely relevant.
If you are concerned about CO2, why is allowing a bunch of shitheels to close down THE SHORTEST route for shipping in the area a step forward?
The core issue of CO2 emissions isn't "People now communicate, travel to, and trade with each other across the globe" but "Massive use of fossil fuels where they are not necessary due to corporate lobbying"
Cargo ships and planes combined emit ~5% of our CO2 output. The major offenders are elsewhere.
I'm not going to argue about this. We need to reduce our emissions to zero, that is not zero.
We’ll never reduce to zero, stop engaging in fantasy delusions. What can do is make realistic effort to curb the largest offenders, which ocean shipping isn’t a part of. If you think we’re going to go back to the age of sail and multi-year journeys for items to reach destinations then you’re high
It's not a fantasy, it's literally the only thing that will save us. Scientists have been very very clear zero emissions is the only thing that will stop climate change. I live with one for God sakes. Don't call me delusional. It's the only rational thing to do, anything else is fucking crazy bcz it's the difference between livable conditions here, and not. But don't trust me, we'll all see the consequences of our dumbest arguments in about a decade.
That is not a rational goal by any stretch of the imagination.
It's actually the only thing that's going to save us. It's not only rational, it's the only logical conclusion one can come to from the overwhelming data on climate change. If you think burning fossil fuels is more important than having a habitable planet, then you're not thinking clearly.
A planet without energy use cannot possibly be habitable.
Do explain how to get goods to and from that area without going through it. Or should that whole part of the world be cut off from global trade?
Obviously they should just triple their carbon emissions by going around Africa instead. This saves the environment!
They can go through it if they just stop supporting genocide seems pretty easy 🤷♂️
How are the merchant ships going through the Red Sea supporting genocide? Please explain.
Could you explain that one for me? Because it really seems like you’re just saying shit here. 🤷♂️
Ansar Allah, the group constituting Yemen’s de facto government, has stated it’s their legal obligation under international law to do everything in their power to prevent the genocide of Palestinians. As such, they are attempting to enforce a naval blockade of the Red Sea to any ships associated with Israel until the genocide ends.
Sure, they said they're only going to attack ships that are owned by, going to, or doing trade with Israel. There's ships going through right now.
I guess you don't know this, but there are, in fact, different limitations in what the President can do.
When it comes to military action, Congress gave the President essentially blanket authority to do anything that can be even remotely connected to "fighting terrorism", so this is not in any way a "Fuck Congress" moment. If Congress wants to withdraw that authority and actually do its job again, it can do that at literally any time.
Are you familiar with the term "Commander in Chief"?
Did you miss when Biden was (rightly) criticizing trump for going around Congress for strikes like this and Biden said no president should ever do that....
And now he's doing it?
His entire campaign is "I'm not trump", but he acts more like him everyday. And I don't expect him to turn it around after he wins the last election of his 60 year political career.
That's one hell of a false equivalent. Trump killed a senior government official of a regional powerhouse without provocation. Biden is responding to provocations against US and Allied shipping.
But you go on with your both sides bullshit.
I agree with you but that is also the legal framework we gave him to work with.
Congress has wanted nothing to do with conflicts in an official capacity for the last 50-60 years. They want sound bytes in unofficial interviews for grandstanding and to be able to blame everyone else.
This is actually a result of those decades of congress, regardless of party in control, abdicating their constitutional duty. For a recent example, check out post 9/11 and congress.
This. A thousand times this.
Both Obama and Biden have been more than willing to sign a repeal or massive overhaul of the AUMF, but both chambers of Congress and members of both parties therein are cowards who would rather cheer or criticize in front of a camera and microphone than perform their Constitutional duties of checking the power of the Commander in Chief.
If they were willing to sign a repeal of it, nothing stopped them from simply not using it. The AUMF didn't make them start wars.
“The law says we have to kill whoever we want! You wouldn’t us to break the law would you??”
Cool comment my dude. But, I bet you could be even more reductive and purposefully obtuse if you tried. Give it a go; I’m eager to see you progress.
Shame on me for not adding to the discussion but the caffeine still ain't hit. I just want to say for some reason that seeing a willingly obtuse clown be challenged to be even more so genuinely made me giggle for some reason. Thank you.
Nah, this bullet is an off the wall insane interpretation of the AUMF. They were 100% right to mock you for it. Not to mention that the AUMF is actually about September 11, and specifically textually so, not just in motivation. Did the Houthis plan, execute, or shelter those responsible? It's been a huge stretch to even use it how it's been used. It's not in any way, shape, or form a requirement to go fight other random Islamic groups, whether or not they deserve it.
I’m sorry but saying the president can, so they have to, is the most reductive thing I’ve ever seen. It’s the epitome of absolute ideology. Thinking a piece of paper absolves the genocidal actions of anyone……
Targeted killings of senior leaders in the Islamic extremist movement is hardly genocide. We have an actual fucking genocide in progress to reference and you want to sell us on the idea of drone strikes as genocide?
The attack was to support Israel in their genocide. It wasn’t an act of genocide, but you can’t deny it was an act in the aid of genocide.
No. How the fuck does a ship taking oil from an Egyptian port to Vietnam, just with an American financial stake have fuck all to do with genocide?
Just because someone claims they're fighting something does not mean they actually are. Nothing about what the Houthis are doing is actually about Israel except their words.
Given that actual US Navy ships have been getting attacked and this is largely in retaliation of that, I think it stretches the imagination a bit to say that the US started this.
From where did you get this opinion? None of the articles I've read about the US attack have mentioned an attack on the US Navy. The closest I could find in a search was missiles that landed 10 nautical miles away from a Navy ship in November. Which, at the scale of the ocean is sorta close, but it's a stretch to call it an attack in need of immediate retribution. All the direct justifications presented by the US are that this is in response to and designed to deter their attacks on commercial shipping.
Here's a report from Axios but you can find countless others
The Houthi's have been launching missiles at our ships and hijacking cargo ships basically since thw October 7th attacks. This is just the first time the US has done more than a warning, which is why you're hearing about it now.
This doesn't seem to be in response to the thread. The Axios link doesn't say anything about an attack on the US Navy. The second link has a mention by Biden of "US ships" (not Navy) as targets, but the linked story only says a British navy ship may have been targeted, but they weren't sure. I'm well aware they've been attacking shipping, that's not in question and not what I'm responding to.
At the same time, we shouldn't be defeatist when it comes to ethics and holding our government branches accountable. If they are arguing in good faith, we should support efforts for more transparency and secure processes.
Remember the Republican reaction when Obama did the same thing in Libya?
Reeeeeee! 72 hours to get our approval or we'll impeach you! Reeeeeee! Not authorized! Not funded!
Then when our embassy there... in Benghazi... was attacked... it was years of "Reeeee! Why didn't you DO something??!?!?!"
After they stripped embassy security funding for it, naturally.
Is Ben Gazi the talented buttery male I hear so much about?
All part of Hillary's plan to whip up support for war.
Another terrorist group fucks around and finds out.
War is not something to glorify. It's unfortunate that the situation with Israel/Palestine, Saudis/Iran, and Houthis/US escalated to this point.
Another terrorist group fuck around and innocent people find out.
Don't think any civilian deaths have been reported so far, just 10 Houthi soldiers according to the Houthis themselves. We'll see how that shakes out as more information emerges, but we also aren't Israel - civilian casualties are something we try to avoid.
😂😂 except in the countries we invade...
Source: old enough to remember Iraq and Afghanistan as an adult and have a parent that went to Vietnam.
Yeah, I remember Iraq and Afghanistan too. I followed both very closely. Our civilian casualty ratios were far from Israel's currently claimed 50-50 (as opposed to what it actually probably is, ie 80%+ civilians).
Fuck, even in Vietnam the ratio wasn't 50 fucking 50.
Iraq may have had a civilian casualty ratio of up to 77%. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_casualty_ratio#Iraq_War
A Pentagon leak for 2004-2009 put the number at 66,000 civilians out of 109,000 total fatalities. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_War_documents_leak#Civilian_casualties
The Wikipedia source on the first link doesn't say what the citation claims it does, if you follow it.
On the second, that count would require, what, 80% of civilian deaths to be caused by the US? Assuming the extrapolations it reaches are correct. For a 50-50 combatant-civilian split.
If you want to argue that as a matter of moral responsibility, fine, but the point raised above is quite clearly about military efforts to distinguish civilians from combatants in operations.
I followed the link to the report and it's not clear whether the 39k number is total combatant casualties, but you can just calculate from the civilian deaths where the estimate is at least 112k-122k civilian casualties out of 174k total, which is ~70%. You're acting like that 7% difference is a big gotcha.
And I don't know why you're acting like the US being responsible for 80% of casualties in Iraq is a wild idea. We massively overpowered the limited Iraqi capabilities. They had much fewer combatants and didn't even have the ability to drop bombs. The CCR isn't about a particular side though, since you'll always get into muddy questions of who was responsible for a particular death. It certainly wasn't the case that we were mostly just killing terrorists.
That's uh... For a couple decades.
A better way of looking at it would be to extrapolate an average casualty rate per month.
Using their most up to date numbers 208k through June 2020. That's about 1,000 deaths a month. If we do the same with their 2005 estimate, because casualties are massively front loaded... We get 2,000 deaths a month.
Then we need to talk about their methodology. They include local news reporting which routinely lied about casualties being fighters or civilians. For reference I remember our translator reading us an article that said our night vision goggles were X-ray vision.
You... do realize that 'massively overpowered' =/= 'hit as many civilians as we can', right? Accusing the US military of having a worse civilian death ratio by a significant margin in Iraq than in Vietnam or WW2 is absolutely a wild idea.
70% civilian deaths by all sources, not 70% by Coalition forces. That's the difference.
Again, if we are discussing this not as a matter of moral responsibility for the war as a whole, but for "Military operations which killed civilians", we very much were killing mostly enemy combatants. Coalition forces were responsible for relatively few civilian casualties from the start, and proportionally fewer as the war went on and criticism of civilian casualties became harsher. The vast majority of civilian casualties were caused by insurgents or the security forces of the Iraqi government.
Massively overpower means you have the means and weaponry to cause significantly more collateral damage. This fantasy that the US has surgical precision with its strikes is just wishful thinking. The Pentagon document leak has specific examples of classifying civilians as enemy combatants and widespread abuse. You're motivated enough to follow sources and question casualty claims on minutiae and then just claim it was all someone else without even a passing inclination to support your statement with data.
Man, because I've argued with people like you before. Again, going back to the raw numbers, your claim would have to attribute some 80%+ of civilian casualties in the Iraq War to Coalition forces and only 20% to Insurgents and Iraqi Security Forces combined in order to reach an even 50-50 proportion of combatants and civilians killed by Coalition Forces. Is that your claim?
The idea of "Power is big boom" is horribly antiquated WW2 style thinking.
Having done something before should make it easier for you to find sources this time to support your minimizations. And to be clear 50-50 is TERRIBLE and means any more serious operation we initiate is likely to kill a lot of innocent people. We're not Israel, we only kill one innocent person for every enemy fighter, is not the reassuring statement you think it is.
You have a fantasy where precision guided bombs dropped from 10,000 feet punch cleanly through buildings to destroy terrorist heads and terrorist heads alone with no collateral damage to nearby people or buildings. Power is also having the ability to just shoot up a car because it might be getting too close to your check point, knowing that your overriding priority is maintaining control and protecting your allies and you'll never suffer consequences for being a little overeager and making an oopsie.
Were those the 10 soldiers in pirate boats attacking a merchant ship? I don’t see any reason for sympathy
They were on land, but may be believably related to the sea attacks.
USA killed plenty civilianscin Iraq and Afghanistan.
Oh look a whataboutism in the wild. Maybe this definition will help you.
Lol what a pathetic taunt.
Edit for the ultra daft downvote crew: the fact the US killed civilians is directly relevant to the blub i responded to, the one claiming the US was bettter than Israel because it did not kill civilians.
For the extra determined ignoramouses ive provided this as an example :
Mhhhmm. Didn't read the definition I see.
Your link to the definition of 'avoid'?
I avoided nothing. I addressed the issue directly.
The USA kills civilians.
Israel does at a much faster rate. A genocidal one in fact.
But that does not give any creedence to the notion the USA is innocent.
QED JFC
Now you're moving the goalpost. Dude, just admit your wrong. The US goes to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties.
have you ever seen the viral sensation "collateral murder"?
I have actually. I also saw the unedited version WikiLeaks was really hoping nobody would see.
why would they hope no one saw more?
Oh, sorry. I thought this was related to the genocide in Gaza. Completely unrelated and just trade related in the seas adjacent. Obviously we should protect profits at all costs.
I mean, considering the Houthis aren't targeting Israeli ships specifically, it's not really particularly related to the ongoing genocide in Gaza, despite the Houthi claims? It's terrorists showboating to burnish their own credentials.
... and what about the human lives threatened by literal terrorists attacking unarmed civilian ships with drones and rockets? Fuck 'em, huh? The people who will suffer from the economic disruption, fuck them too, right? Fucking poors, who cares about them? It's not like there's an ongoing global crisis with rising food prices from prior disruptions to supply lines.
Let's not blow it out of proportion. I disagree with attacking trade routes, but there have been no casualties.
However 12000+ Palestinians have died.
As a civilian, I don't want to enter a warzone or a disputed route. These people are choosing to and should be protected. However, let's not pretend it's not a one sided conflict, based on genocide, which Israeli government ministers have advocated for.
I don't own any kind f those ships, but if I did, I'd find a different route. It started with just protests against ships stopping at Israel. I wish it stayed there. How many ships can stop at Gaza with humanitarian supplies?
Because Western military ships have been busy intercepting drones and rockets. This is just the first time we've hit back.
Okay, how is that the fault of civilian ships going through international waters?
Until the Houthis starting firing, it wasn't a warzone or a disputed route. The route isn't in Israeli territorial waters. It's nowhere near Gaza or Israel.
The only other route is all the way around Africa.
You do understand that the ship attacks we're talking about in this thread are happening 1000 miles away from Israel at the clear other end of the Red Sea, right? It's nowhere near the Gaza warzone (which borders a different sea entirely -- the Mediterranean), nor is it even "disputed" by anybody legitimate.
Literally nothing about this, except the Houthi terrorists' choice of timing, has anything to do with Israel.
It's a tough situation, but attacking civilians is not a valid way of protesting Israels' attacks on civilians.
Jesus fucking Christ, Congress is peak dysfunction.
Republicans: "Hold my MAGA hat!"
The last war declared by Congress was
Korea in the early 1950sin WW2. Dark Brandon doesn't have time for this foolishness. Yemen was warned again and again. They've now entered the find out stage.edit: brain worms
The last war by US Congress was declared in June 1942, against Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania. US Congress has not made a formal declaration of war since then.
Right but they pass laws granting authorization of military use of force, AUMF. That's the Congressional authority to declare war under the War Powers Clause of the Constitution.
If you read the annotations to that clause you will see that the framers intent, traditional interpretation, and certainly modern interpretation are in agreement that the Constitution does not foreclose executive initiated use of force in what would be considered self defense, and that would certainly include the measured and limited destruction of an enemy's ability to carry out further attacks on US interests, and would certainly cover such defensive measures when done in agreement and in concert with a broad coalition of allies.
Yes, we call those "blank checks" to the executive branch. The Germans even have a word for it. We did it with Vietnam and it did not go well. One would have thought the generation in Congress would have learned their lesson given most of them lived through that shitshow.
It goes without saying that military resources can defend themselves when fired upon, there's plenty of precedent going back well before the formation of the US. The AUMFs were not that. They were very clearly blank checks to wage literal wars anywhere the executive desired while providing the flimsiest of evidence - and Shrub did just that. See: Iraq.
Merely an overly large check. There are limits, and we need the executive branch to be able to respond to urgent threats - the War Powers Act seems to do that.
Then people here are complaining about A U Military Force but I only see such a thing specifying Iraq. Iraq can’t be pulled into every possibility yeah, I agree Congress needs to get its shit together and constrain or repeal - the Iraq conflict that was created for is done.
Meanwhile, the response to the Houthi terrorism/piracy seems exactly what these regulations provide for
There were two AUMFs. One for "terrorism" and one for Iraq.
And the "terrorism" one is actually textually targeted at the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks. It's not even itself overly broad, it's just been twisted into a global war on terror because the executives want to do that and no one stopped them.
Yes, therein lies the problem. It was a stupid mistake to make and those that voted for it should have known better.
They thought they would just repeal it later.
Go read the War Powers Act. Then tell me what decade long conflict the US has fought in without an AUMF since it was passed.
Go on.
In any event, no authorization from Congress is needed for this sort of strike, which was essentially just shooting back at someone shooting at us.
I'm not in disagreement, that also wasn't what my initial reply was about.
Corrected. Thanks.
Yemen has been getting bombed by Saudi Arabia with the full backing of the US for almost a decade now, creating one of the worst humanitarian crises still ongoing. You're right about the brain worms, but it's not because you goofed up the last war declared by congress. Dumb Brandon is not cool for continuing the status quo with the military industrial complex.
Ww2, Korea was never declared.
Does a formal declaration of war matter?
The Wikipedia entry for the Korean War mentions Congress allocating money for the war effort within the month after US got involved. That certainly appears to be Congressional approval.
And the US response was after a UN resolution calling for it, giving some legitimacy
Corrected. Thanks.
Yemen was warned not to block the ports of a genocidial neighbour. But they just wouldn't stop. And now the US has to bomb them. So sad.
Oh fuck off with this tired propaganda line. After Korea we did Vietnam as a "police action" and then Congress filled in the semantic loop hole with the War Powers Act. Which governs how we go to war now. If we need to fight an actual war then Congress has to pass an AUMF, Authorization to Use Military Force.
Every action since Vietnam has either fallen into the 60 day period presidents are allowed for emergencies or an AUMF. Congress has absolutely been exercising it's war powers. This stupid fucking lie gets trotted out by the far left and the far right for different uses and I'm done hearing it.
Some progressives need to put down the flowers and smoke some bad guys now and then. Conservatives need to cram their sabers up their own asses and die.
I'll take soft progressives over the other any day of the week, but demanding Congressional approval is fucking absurd right now. It'll take 8 months and be filled with unrelated laws, financial packages for Ohio and Texas, and pro-oil deregulation.
Not to mention, having foreseen exactly this problem previous representatives passed the War Powers Act. Biden absolutely has the authority to blow shit up. He can do it without any reason or other authority for 60 days. Then he has 30 days to remove American troops from that area. (Or return force levels to where they were)
So you want more executive power? .. almost like that the president can do things without Congress?
.. boom dictatorship.
There's a line, idk what it should be but it should be.
No, but have the power to make quick action against small threats via airstrike and missile strikes shouldn't need the end endless hem and haw from a bunch of clowns.
They might have a stronger case if they haven't proven to be a 'do nothing' Congress. They can't even put together a budget.
Congress signed over the rights to just do war crimes whenever you feel like it back under Reagan.
Now the President can do the thing, Congress can call a hearing to complain about it, elections happen, power changes hands, and the only people who suffer are the ones getting bombed.
It's not a war crime to return fire if fired upon.
"He bombed me back first"
Targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure, mass arrests and forced removal of native populations, and indiscriminate use of chemical weapons are all war crimes. Hell, use of cluster bombs and mines have been recognized as war crimes since the mid-90s, and yet the US is the world's largest manufacturer and distributor of both.
So, nobody should be held accountable for firing on a US Navy ship sailing in international waters?
So, nobody should be held accountable for the US eagerly aiding Israel in its quest of genocide? Also, the US has been helping Saudi Arabia bomb the Houthis for almost a decade now and have created a humanitarian crisis in Yemen.
Shooting at international shipping isn't holding anyone accountable unless you hate shipping corporations. And yeah if you shoot at the military (any military) don't be surprised when they shoot back.
It's clearly made the US take notice (since they care more about trade than people's lives), so mission accomplished. How else do you propose they do it, given the limited resources they have? Take it up with the UN, where the US vetoes any resolution against israel?
I suggest they pressure Egypt to allow all aid into Gaza no matter what Israel wants.
I suggest they donate to the IRC.
I suggest they go join the people they see as comrades and fight Israel.
I do not suggest that they declare war on the entire world's shipping. Which is responsible, in part, for delivering their own Humanitarian Aid. And transferring food and energy the world over. Furthermore effectiveness at getting attention does not equal moral. I don't get to shoot at random cars on the freeway because I don't like how the next state over handles homeless people. And they don't get shoot at random ships.
Shutting down the Suez traffic does this.
"Okay, yes, you've had an enormous impact on geopolitics with a few warning shots, but have you considered starting a GoFundMe?"
Hardly the whole world. They're very clearly targeting traffic through the Red Sea. Nightmarish news for all those Israeli shipping magnets and major ports on the back end of the Mediterranean. Amazing news for ports along the southern coast of Africa. The Houthis have, with a few hundred dollars in military hardware, done what amounts to a direct cash transfer of billions of dollars from the Israeli Zionists to pro-Palestinian South Africans.
What could they possibly do that would be more effective for their allies in Gaza than this?
It's not that shutting down Suez traffic doesn't do this. It's that it's an act of war against any country moving cargo through there. It's entirely too broad.
And they haven't had an impact. Not beyond discussing it here and lining themselves up for NATO ground mission (If not a UN one). We already have a military UN mission keeping the Suez Canal open and it has been the subject of wars before. It really is that important as a logistical route. And the IRC is hardly a GoFundMe.
They could go fight the Israelis directly. Because it's not just Mediterranean. It's literally the entirety of Europe from all point east of the canal. And Europe is not going to tolerate it. The most impactful thing they get is actually the first ever foreign deployment of an EU military force.
If you consider the history of Yemen and the decade-long struggle of Houthi insurgents against a Saudi backed dictatorship, eh? They've been at war with a proxy of a proxy of the US for some time now. Might as well claim the Taliban is committing an act of war against countries moving cargo through Kabul.
95% of traffic routed from the Red Sea isn't an impact?
They are. This is a direct attack on the Israeli economy. It is costing the state billions.
Of course someone should be held responsible. So fling a few bombs up in the air and declare anyone they land on "enemy combatants" and then we can say justice was served.
The US no longer makes leave in place mines. They are all command detonated. That was a Clinton thing. The cluster bombs... We're actually phasing them out of our arsenal. However the US maintains they're legal as long as they're not used in urban areas. Largely because Russia and China still use them and they're very effective. We'd need to get them seriously on board to actually stop making cluster munitions.
We continue to use them on the Korean divide, probably the most heavily mined place on earth. And while we've definitely updated our arsenal, I would not bet my life on the reliability of these ostensibly more advanced systems.
Sure. By selling them to our allies.
Well, they're cheap by tonnage, which is why the Russians love them. But they're also unreliable, which is what makes them so dangerous. They don't always detonate where they land, and that makes them function as land mines after the fact. They are only "effective" in the sense that they're explosive devices that litter a large area.
As to China, when was the last time they bombed anyone? Like, at all? To my knowledge, the Chinese haven't been involved in a war since they signed a peace deal with Vietnam in the 70s. The closest we've seen has been police actions along border territories (Xinjiang getting a bunch of jihadist spillover from Afghanistan, slap fights with Indian border guard counterparts, etc). Who have they been dropping cluster bombs on, in living memory even?
The DMZ landmines have been there for 70 years and de-mining that would come with serious risks of sniper attacks, ambushes, and nuclear war. Yeah it really ramps up that quick over there. All we need is for the Hermit King to think we're clearing breach routes and Seoul goes up. So yeah we're not removing those.
Even under the Trump administration we're sticking to "non-permanent" landmines. The most prominent and widespread of which is the command activated claymore.
Most of our allies are also getting rid of cluster bombs. And when Ukraine specifically asked for them we hesitated to sell them. The reason we did so is because of parity in that war. And while they aren't reliable enough to leave the area safe of UXO, they are extremely reliable at destroying military equipment.
China matters because they're constantly threatening military action.
So are they going to repeal the War Powers Act? Are we going back to needing a Declaration of War to deal with every pissant pirate?
Not the pirates of pissants? Have they try singing to distract them?
Houthi and the Blowfish
It would be a good start, yes.
No, it wouldn't. A straight repeal of the War Powers Act also opens us up to another Vietnam. And amending it such that any use of force requires congressional approval would put us in an international straight jacket. From defending our shipping interests to protecting allies. In the event of China deciding it would rather just take existing islands to make it's "nine dashed line" a reality, we'd be arguing about immigration instead of deploying the Navy. And we would instantly lose the trade access we have to the entirety of the SEA region.
We tried isolationism. It didn't work.
Yes, yes they are. Maybe not you, but there are billionaires saying exactly that.
Asking Congress is a surefire way to get nothing done.
Maybe that's a good default stance when the topic is war.
Limited war is always a tricky topic. Where do you draw the line between a full on war and making the seas safe for trade,
Luckily, the aftermath of the Vietnam War gave us an answer. The War Powers Act. Which gives the president authority to use the military in situations exactly like this. If he tries to turn it into a big thing, then it has to go in front of Congress.
Humanitarian aid and addressing the reason they are taking up arms.
The Houthis took up arms because of Iranian backing and Yemeni local politics. The Western countries aren't solving that any time soon. And they're already receiving HA.
Making the seas safe for trade = shutting down trade sanctions on a genocide
That's not what they're doing. They're firing at any ship they believe even has a Western financial stake in it. No matter where it's going or what it's carrying. It could be taking Italian tractors to Somalia to encourage local farming as part of an aid program and they would fire at it.
Isn't fighting piracy like legal for everyone? Like a private citizen or any country's military could go out there and hunt pirates. I remember that from when the somali pirates got yeeted.
The AUMF probably also actually has given him the right to do this.
No AUMF required to bonk pirates. It's the national version of self defense.
None of these representatives objected to us sinking boats involved in piracy operations. They're objecting to attacks on land against a group that is pretty close to a government. There's some point at which on-land operations turn from being defending against piracy to regime change. Which may be warranted, but should be decided by Congress.
I'm pretty sure you can attack the pirates when they get back on land too.
Not if they have one foot on home base. No backsies!
I think that's a baseball reference I'm too european to get
Ha I see why you might think so but I was referring to "neighborhood rules" for kids' games like Tag. We'd often designate a light pole or a car as "home base" and you couldn't be tagged as "It" if you were touching it.
I hope you play tag in Europe or else this didn't make sense either lol
Ah instead a game I'm either too old to remember or too woman to have played. It does sound vaguely familiar though.
Then Congress needs to add that to the War Powers Act.
There are no laws in international waters.
You underestimate the reach of US law. Also, the "Law of the Sea" clearly applies.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Convention_on_the_Law_of_the_Sea
There are laws that govern Antarctica, Outer Space, the Moon, etc. International waters are just less regulated, but there are definitely laws.
Oh yeah the infighting is getting bad. Get ready for an absolute terrible election season for the Democrats.
I'm seeing "leftists" using the same vocabulary as Q-anon style crazy morons. The vitriol is being spat like no matter what their isn't a right answer and it's not made better by the fact that we as a country are still basically pushing for all the worse aspects of ourselves because it's what feels normal.
People are all gonna join in to help burn it down and think they will be the kings of the ashes but largest organized group is gonna be the real victor and it's for sure as hell not the self hating left.
Maybe I will be wrong and the vote against method will work again but if it does we need to make some hard turns to get things actually getting better and get some companionship happening or it will just be a bloodbath between factions that wanted their scoop of the ashes.
It's because these "leftists" are right wing trolls. Full stop. This "Genocide Joe" shit in particular is so fucking transparently a trump-style attack it's laughable. Leftist spaces on the internet are so far up their own reactionary assholes they are now actively protecting far right propagandists and calling it left unity.
Yeah I actually got banned from a "leftist" sub (r/latestagecapitalism on Reddit) because I called out a literal right wing propaganda post from a literal maga mouthpiece that was a lie.
And the mod responded with:
Like a literal fascist response because it makes their dick hard to feel like they are standing up to the bad guys while supporting the end of democracy. Neat. Not a leftist.
It is interesting/sad just how hard Biden is sticking to the old ways of doing things even though most people seem to have moved on from that way of thinking.
*“Most people” applies only to lemmygrad, lemmy.ml and some college campuses.
Seriously - people dramatically overestimate how much has changed.
The legislative branch has been busted for so long that they literally ceded power to go to war to the executive for the good of the nation. Y'all can feel free to undo that at any time once you're not completely broken.
Last I heard, the AUMFs were still active. Assuming that was used to justify this legally.
No need. The War Powers Act 30 Day emergency powers clearly apply.
Are they suggesting to allow US Navy ships to be attacked without retaliation? It’s been going on for like 2 months now. Are they willing to have that on their voting record?
Did they send a strongly worded letter, that they later retracted, again...?
I don't think it's his actions that are the problem. I think it is WHO did them that is the problem which can be seen by the charge being led by the infamous Rashida Talib from Michigan.
Congressman Ro Khanna:
I am so glad Khanna isn't getting the Senate seat. If this was just his opinion and he was advocating for changing the War Powers Act, great. But he presents it as legal fact when it really isn't.
Implying Biden "took us into war" in Yemen? Because we've been bombing them for decades.
Have they gone to war?
Dropping bombs is an act of war, so yes. I guess the de jure, internationally recognized state of Yemen approves of the bombings, but the de facto state run by the Houthis is at war with the US.
Of course, the Houthis have committed acts of war first by violating the rights of the sea, so take that as you will.
Iran is a whole ass country, the Houthis are a rebel faction, for lack of a better term. I think this whole situation is kinda different... Matter of opinion I guess...
Houthis are the de facto government of Yemen which is important because the US is claiming the right to self defence which is only available between states.under international law. That's why for example Israel's argument of self defence is nonsense because Gaza is not a separate country.
How many countries recognize the authority of the Houthis in Yemen?
They're a rebel faction that controls most of the country, including the capital. It's different, but they're a lot closer to a government than something like Hezbollah.
The Houthis are only considered a rebel faction because the US said so. I don't exactly like them but they're basically the government of Yemen.
And? Trump assassinated a senior government official with zero authorization or provocation. This is clearly not the same thing.
Let's be clear: trump being a pile of shit doesn't give biden license to be almost as shitty.
Sure. But these are not the same actions. Defending shipping interests has been a legitimate cause for military force ever since humanity invented shipping.
But don't you get it?!
Biden's last name isnt trump, and he has a D by his name. Obviously expecting any other diffences mean you hate America...
"There is no difference between an attempt to start a war with an organized state of millions of people which has engaged in no provocation beyond international norms, and a strike against a terrorist group currently attacking civilian shipping." - Most Informed "BOTH SIDES" Fan
The Democrats (except for Biden) aren't being hypocritical here. They objected to both Trump and Biden.
Need that sweet sweet oil money.
Russia's got oil
So Israel is going to colonize Gaza, and the US is going to take Yemen?
What could possibly go wrong?
NOBODY wants Yemen. Don't sweat it. Their only natural resource is civil war. Mostly, we just are looking to destroy Iran's proxy forces.
Also, we've had operations there periodically through multiple previous administations. The Saudis own our government officials and presidents.
Not to mention, all the weapons and missiles, and planes the Saudis use are just provided by the US politicians they own.
Just keep in mind, war goals change. When we went into Iraq, we were "destroying WMDs" and "responding to 9/11", and by the time we came out, we were instead "building democracy". Violence often causes more violence, even if well-intentioned.
Biden when Americans need help:
Biden when far right ethnostate wants to do another genocide in the Middel East:
Motherfucker is 80 years old and has no idea what he's doing. We deserve better than our only two options
Oh, is that what this is about? We're attacking the Houthis in defense of Israel?
Don't be fucking daft, or disingenuous, which is worse because it displays complete moral cowardice.
We're attacking the Houthis because they're indiscriminately attacking civilian ships in one of the most valuable shipping lanes in the fucking world.
Countries are allowed to decide what goes through their territorial waters.
You conveniently dismiss that the ships are in international waters. Besides, sinking them is an unwarranted escalation when it comes to civilian ships.
They didn't actually sink any ships.
Yeah, not for a lack of trying.
Luckily, the Houthis are not the internationally recognized government of Yemen, so this isn't relevant.
Nope. Not as a blanket statement. There are things they can regulate but we regularly conduct "freedom of navigation" patrols through the waters of certain countries just to remind them they aren't allowed to ban cargo ships sailing at a certain distance from the coastline.
So it's about money, as it always is. Going to war is always about money... I'm so tired of the U.S. being at war. We've been at war all but maybe 12 years of the U.S.'s existence. Don't believe me? It's surprising but true.
Unless your ideal is an autarkic Festung Amerika, shipping lanes kind of have to be able to operate without the civilian sailors who go through worrying about getting fucking killed.
Globalization isn't a requirement. In fact, it's completely destroying our planet and its habitability. But yeah, let's worry about the shipping lanes.
Yeah, alright, you have fun with the idea that people exchanging goods without murdering each other is what's destroying the planet. Terribly evil, globalization. Or that the collapse of shipping lanes wouldn't result in incredible human suffering.
It's called CO2 emissions, I'm sure you're aware of it. The suffering climate change is going to cause in the coming decades will dwarf anything we've ever seen, unless we see a sharp decrease in emissions to zero very very soon, ideally 20 years ago. But, the next best time to do it is right now.
Nothing you said is remotely relevant.
If you are concerned about CO2, why is allowing a bunch of shitheels to close down THE SHORTEST route for shipping in the area a step forward?
The core issue of CO2 emissions isn't "People now communicate, travel to, and trade with each other across the globe" but "Massive use of fossil fuels where they are not necessary due to corporate lobbying"
Cargo ships and planes combined emit ~5% of our CO2 output. The major offenders are elsewhere.
I'm not going to argue about this. We need to reduce our emissions to zero, that is not zero.
We’ll never reduce to zero, stop engaging in fantasy delusions. What can do is make realistic effort to curb the largest offenders, which ocean shipping isn’t a part of. If you think we’re going to go back to the age of sail and multi-year journeys for items to reach destinations then you’re high
It's not a fantasy, it's literally the only thing that will save us. Scientists have been very very clear zero emissions is the only thing that will stop climate change. I live with one for God sakes. Don't call me delusional. It's the only rational thing to do, anything else is fucking crazy bcz it's the difference between livable conditions here, and not. But don't trust me, we'll all see the consequences of our dumbest arguments in about a decade.
That is not a rational goal by any stretch of the imagination.
It's actually the only thing that's going to save us. It's not only rational, it's the only logical conclusion one can come to from the overwhelming data on climate change. If you think burning fossil fuels is more important than having a habitable planet, then you're not thinking clearly.
A planet without energy use cannot possibly be habitable.
What, literally zero and not net zero? That's anprim bullshit.
So, you exhale CO2 when you breath.
Draw whatever conclusions from that that you like.
Yeah, and trees also exhale oxygen. What's your point?
Get off the internet then.
You’re not going to argue because you literally can’t, your back is against the wall and the only thing you have left to cling to is “buh not zero!”
Go change the world somewhere else.
They don't have to go through that area.
Do explain how to get goods to and from that area without going through it. Or should that whole part of the world be cut off from global trade?
Obviously they should just triple their carbon emissions by going around Africa instead. This saves the environment!
They can go through it if they just stop supporting genocide seems pretty easy 🤷♂️
How are the merchant ships going through the Red Sea supporting genocide? Please explain.
Could you explain that one for me? Because it really seems like you’re just saying shit here. 🤷♂️
Ansar Allah, the group constituting Yemen’s de facto government, has stated it’s their legal obligation under international law to do everything in their power to prevent the genocide of Palestinians. As such, they are attempting to enforce a naval blockade of the Red Sea to any ships associated with Israel until the genocide ends.
Sure, they said they're only going to attack ships that are owned by, going to, or doing trade with Israel. There's ships going through right now.
I guess you don't know this, but there are, in fact, different limitations in what the President can do.
When it comes to military action, Congress gave the President essentially blanket authority to do anything that can be even remotely connected to "fighting terrorism", so this is not in any way a "Fuck Congress" moment. If Congress wants to withdraw that authority and actually do its job again, it can do that at literally any time.
Are you familiar with the term "Commander in Chief"?
Did you miss when Biden was (rightly) criticizing trump for going around Congress for strikes like this and Biden said no president should ever do that....
And now he's doing it?
His entire campaign is "I'm not trump", but he acts more like him everyday. And I don't expect him to turn it around after he wins the last election of his 60 year political career.
That's one hell of a false equivalent. Trump killed a senior government official of a regional powerhouse without provocation. Biden is responding to provocations against US and Allied shipping.
But you go on with your both sides bullshit.
I agree with you but that is also the legal framework we gave him to work with.