Iraq Unravels

[brihard]

Are we starting a pool yet on how long til Esper is asked for his resignation? He has now publicly contradicted Trump twice in a week and a half.

 

[dapaterson]

Are we starting a pool yet on how long til Esper is asked for his resignation? He has now publicly contradicted Trump twice in a week and a half.

Two contradictions cancel each other out, so it's all good.

 

[Brad Sallows]

>Quite frankly, if there had been clear and convincing evidence that Iran had, through Souleimani, been waging hostile attacks against the US

If Iran attacked US targets (acts of war), why would it matter which military targets are selected for responses?  For example, would the administration have been forbidden from responding to the missile attacks on land targets by sinking an Iranian patrol boat?

What does a non-hostile attack look like?

 

[brihard]

>Quite frankly, if there had been clear and convincing evidence that Iran had, through Souleimani, been waging hostile attacks against the US

If Iran attacked US targets (acts of war), why would it matter which military targets are selected for responses?  For example, would the administration have been forbidden from responding to the missile attacks on land targets by sinking an Iranian patrol boat?

What does a non-hostile attack look like?

I think you missed his point. It’s less about how America would have struck back, and more about the power to declare war being reserved for Congress. Even military conflicts that fall short of declared war are supposed to receive congressional approval.

 

[Brad Sallows]

The point depends on whether Iran has attacked the US - which it has.  It could just as easily have been "they shot down a drone; we killed some officers".

Congress could tighten the rules and clarify, if Congress were willing to take responsibility for responses to acts of war and then explain decisions to voters.

I have no regard for the possibility that the supporters of the past two administrations, having crossed lines when it suited them, will behave differently when they are back in control.  This is all just a temporary hissy fit for political advantage.

 

[FJAG]

The point depends on whether Iran has attacked the US - which it has.  It could just as easily have been "they shot down a drone; we killed some officers".

Congress could tighten the rules and clarify, if Congress were willing to take responsibility for responses to acts of war and then explain decisions to voters.

I have no regard for the possibility that the supporters of the past two administrations, having crossed lines when it suited them, will behave differently when they are back in control.  This is all just a temporary hissy fit for political advantage.

Therein lies the point Brad. The US Constitution was written at a time when nation states fought nation states and the creator's of the US Constitution, knowing that war is a national commitment, decided in their infinite wisdom to put the war fighting power into the hands of Congress.

Since 9/11 there have been both wars (Afghanistan and Iraq) both receiving Congressional endorsement and terrorist activities carried out by stateless entities. The fact that many of these stateless entities were the proxy forces of actual nation-states has been a more-or-less open secret but no one was particularly enamored with the idea of going after the principals involved with an actual declaration of war.

To the best of my knowledge, no actual Iranian forces were ever used to kill Americans. Instead Iran guided and supplied proxy forces with this. The same can be said, however, for western nations who have been covertly and overtly training and supplying proxy forces in various campaigns. In doing so both sides have stayed out of directly declaring hostilities or taking military actions on a nation state to nation state basis (not just the last two decades but pretty much since WW2)

This is where the hit on Souleimani is different. It is a direct action by one nation state against a senior officer of another nation state and no longer a proxy fight. It's clearly and undisputably an act of war and therefore should clearly be a Congressional matter not an executive one.

The problem here is that this is neither "temporary" nor a "hissy fit". What is happening is an attempt by the executive to create a new normal method of instigating hostilities in contravention to the US Constitution.

I find it somewhat ironic that the same people who espouse the US Constitution for everything from gun ownership rights to religious freedom and freedom to not make wedding cakes for gays, are now cheering the executive on in doing an end run on Congress's constitutional power to declare or limit the nation's entry into war with another country.

:cheers:

 

[brihard]

Congress could tighten the rules and clarify, if Congress were willing to take responsibility for responses to acts of war and then explain decisions to voters.

They did, in a joint resolution, bipartisan, by both houses of Congress, overriding a presidential veto.

https://www.loc.gov/law/help/usconlaw/war-powers.php

 

[Brad Sallows]

Don't bother trying to move the goalposts.  Iranians have, in the recent past, attacked Americans and American property, including military.  A death need not be involved.

If Congress were serious about its powers, it would exercise them, and could have exercised them at any time relevant in the decades prior to the current administration's tenure.  Taking responsibility means more than just pointing to the War Powers Resolution.

What people did in the past is a likely indicator of what they will do in the future.  When the next Democratic and non-Trump Republican administrations take over, we'll find out how whether there is any commitment beneath all the righteous bleating on either side.  Until then, more generals dead seems to equal fewer soldiers dead.

 

[Brad Sallows]

>I find it somewhat ironic that the same people ... are now cheering the executive on in doing an end run on Congress's constitutional power to declare or limit the nation's entry into war with another country.

So would I, if it were uniformly true, which it manifestly is not.  Plenty of conservative constitutionalists would like to see Congress properly involved, and have written to that effect over the past few days.  Few are dumb enough to want to prevent the executive from doing anything while one party in a split Congress chooses to sit on its hands.  The administration has not sought a war - straw man, that - but has applied a limited and practical solution to a real problem; Congress still has complete authority to declare one, I suppose.

The irony I enjoy is the chorus of people at one time deploring the administration's dis-involvement in Syria, land of ephemeral red lines, and now deploring the administration's rather firm red line which resulted in no additional involvement required.

 

[The Bread Guy]

This doesn't sound good ...

• “Iraqi Powerful Cleric Calls for Massive Protests Against US Troops” (Voice of America)
• “From Iran, Sadr calls for ‘million-man’ march against US presence in Iraq” (Kurdish media)

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Therein lies the point Brad. The US Constitution was written at a time when nation states fought nation states and the creator's of the US Constitution, knowing that war is a national commitment, decided in their infinite wisdom to put the war fighting power into the hands of Congress.

Since 9/11 there have been both wars (Afghanistan and Iraq) both receiving Congressional endorsement and terrorist activities carried out by stateless entities. The fact that many of these stateless entities were the proxy forces of actual nation-states has been a more-or-less open secret but no one was particularly enamored with the idea of going after the principals involved with an actual declaration of war.

To the best of my knowledge, no actual Iranian forces were ever used to kill Americans. Instead Iran guided and supplied proxy forces with this. The same can be said, however, for western nations who have been covertly and overtly training and supplying proxy forces in various campaigns. In doing so both sides have stayed out of directly declaring hostilities or taking military actions on a nation state to nation state basis (not just the last two decades but pretty much since WW2)

This is where the hit on Souleimani is different. It is a direct action by one nation state against a senior officer of another nation state and no longer a proxy fight. It's clearly and undisputably an act of war and therefore should clearly be a Congressional matter not an executive one.

The problem here is that this is neither "temporary" nor a "hissy fit". What is happening is an attempt by the executive to create a new normal method of instigating hostilities in contravention to the US Constitution.

I find it somewhat ironic that the same people who espouse the US Constitution for everything from gun ownership rights to religious freedom and freedom to not make wedding cakes for gays, are now cheering the executive on in doing an end run on Congress's constitutional power to declare or limit the nation's entry into war with another country.

:cheers:

Is the Quds force an actual military or a paramilitary proxy organisation?

Was said General in Iraq with the knowledge and the permission of the Iraqi government?

 

[tomahawk6]

Is the Quds force an actual military or a paramilitary proxy organisation?

Was said General in Iraq with the knowledge and the permission of the Iraqi government?

Obama made use of drone strikes even once targeting a US citizen which did not hardly merit much if any talk of war powers. Trump acted no differently in targeting an enemy target. Not much was said about why this guy was even in Iraq ?

 

[FJAG]

Is the Quds force an actual military or a paramilitary proxy organisation?

Was said General in Iraq with the knowledge and the permission of the Iraqi government?

The Quds Force is an active arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps which itself is a branch of the Iranian Armed Forces. It's akin to both special operations forces or CIA which advises, equips and trains (and possibly participates with)  foreign military and paramilitary forces.

This from Wikipedia:

Adil Abdul-Mahdi, Prime Minister of Iraq, said he was scheduled to meet Soleimani on the day the attack happened, with the purpose of Soleimani's trip being that Soleimani was delivering Iran's response to a previous message from Saudi Arabia which Iraq had relayed.[100] Abdul-Mahdi also said that before the drone strike, Trump had called him to request that Abdul-Mahdi mediate the conflict between the U.S. and Iran.[101][102]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Baghdad_International_Airport_airstrike#Soleimani's_trip_to_Iraq

https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20200106-pm-irans-soleimani-was-in-iraq-to-discuss-relations-with-saudi/

:cheers:

 

[PPCLI Guy]

Obama made use of drone strikes even once targeting a US citizen which did not hardly merit much if any talk of war powers. Trump acted no differently in targeting an enemy target. Not much was said about why this guy wan in Iraq ?

"This guy" is an official of Iran, which is a legitimate state.

Why does Comd CENTCOM visit Iraq?  Because he has troops there? Because Iraq is an ally? Because he must conduct defence diplomacy? And all because he is an official of the US Government.

 

[Cloud Cover]

Yes, Iran is a legitimate state. So was Nazi Germany- the leadership of both countries came to power by application of deadly force and maintained power through the use of domestic terror and repression, to put it mildly.
His purpose in Iraq was perhaps to fight ISIS but probably more important to militarily subvert CENTCOM and fight a continuing war against an arch enemy on third party territory.

 

[PPCLI Guy]

Yes, Iran is a legitimate state. So was Nazi Germany- the leadership of both countries came to power by application of deadly force and maintained power through the use of domestic terror and repression, to put it mildly.
His purpose in Iraq was perhaps to fight ISIS but probably more important to militarily subvert CENTCOM and fight a continuing war against an arch enemy on third party territory.

The part that I have bolded descibes the actions of the West from the perspective of Iran....

We (the West) can't ascribe to an International Rules Based Order - and benefit from that order for the entire post WWII period of history -  and then decide that those rules don't apply to us, without penalty.  That penalty is in fact the erosion or collapse of the IRBO, which will benefit the two key players who chafe under its restrictions - China and Russia.

Another way to say it is that a state is not illegitimate merely by virtue of not sharing your values, your end-states, or is in fact an adversary.  Equally, an adversary or enemy does not automatically become a terrorist in order to justify extra-judicial responses.

I feel like this discussion may be missing those nuances.

 

[Cloud Cover]

The actions of CENTCOM are carried out under lawful authority, a status of forces agreement and other @nuances that are entirely absent from the actions of Iran, which I might add is probably the most heavily sanctioned country ion earth.
I have difficulty believing that the Obama administration would have taken many of the actions that it did without a proper justification under international law let alone domestic law. Giving the dead terrorist a rank when he was alive does not ( or should not) be a justification and shield for him to be in country for every purpose for which he was there.  To be very clear, I’m not defending the actions of Trump and manner and reason in which he makes decisions, but at some point the target was going to be deleted by a sitting US President.

 

[Brad Sallows]

>"This guy" is an official of Iran, which is a legitimate state.

Yes, so what?  The international order might become more stable, not less, when military action becomes customary against those executing unlawful actions while hiding in the gaps in the international order.  Treat them as unlawful combatants who are legitimate targets of anyone affected by their operations.

 

[QV]

"This guy" is an official of Iran, which is a legitimate state.

Why does Comd CENTCOM visit Iraq?  Because he has troops there? Because Iraq is an ally? Because he must conduct defence diplomacy? And all because he is an official of the US Government.

Do you not think Iran through it's proxies would not take out Comd CENTCOM if they could?

 

[Good2Golf]

They may have already assessed that the US system is more ‘fault tolerant’ and that loss of a COCOM such as COMCENTCOM would have far less operational and tactical influence than the US attack on COMIRGCQUDS, and not worth the huge blowback.