Iraq War Illegal?

[johnc]

I got in a heated arguement with someone over the weekend regarding this topic. The basic arguement comes down to this: "The Iraq war is illegal because there was no declaration of war and it did not receive the support of the United Nations."

 

Regarding the declaration of war arguement:

 

Many times, the United States has engaged in extended military engagements that, while not formally declared wars, were explicitly authorized by Congress, short of a formal declaration of war. These military engagements and process by which Congress authorized them are prefectly legal under our Constitution and have been tested via Supreme Court challenges every time - and passed.

 

Some examples:

 

Quasi-War against France in 1798

First Barbary War against the Barbary States in 1801

Second Barbary War against the Barbary States in 1815

Paraguayian Raid against Paraguay in 1859

Russian Civil War Intervention against Russia in 1918

Protection of Lbanon against Muslim rebels in 1959

Vietnam War against the National Liberation front in 1964

Restoration of Lebanon against Muslin extremists in 1982

Operation Just Casue agains the Panama Defense Force in 1989

Persian Gulf War against Iraq in 1991

War on Terrorism against the Taliban in 2001

Second Iraq War agaisnt Irag in 2003

 

The current Iraq war was authorized by Congress (H.J.Resolution 114) and passed with a vote of 296-133 in the House and 77-23 in the Senate. We are LEGALLY at war.

 

http://hybridz.org/nuke/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&t=36859

 

Regarding the requirement that, because the US is a signatory to the UN Charter, it cannot fight a war unless the US authorizes the use of force:

 

...treaties are nothing but legislative acts and differ from other legislative acts only in that they require the consent of a foreign government - this according to none other than Thomas Jefferson. Furthermore, every time the issue of the authority of treaties vis-a-vis the Constitution has come before the US Supreme Court, the Court has always held the Constitution to be superior. For example, in the case of Reid v. Covert, 354 U.S. 1 (1957). The Court ruled:

 

No agreement with a foreign nation can confer on Congress or any other branch of the Government power which is free from the restraints of the Constitution. . . .

 

This court has regularly and uniformly recognized the supremacy of the constitution over a treaty.

 

Hence, the Congress can negate a treaty in part or whole at any time by subsequent legislation. That being so, the legality of a war is derived not from a war's conformity to a treaty du jour, but solely from whether the Congress authorizes it.

 

This the Congress did, regarding Iraq, in October 2002. No other instrumentality of legality is needed, or indeed even possible, without obviating two centuries of American law and practice.

 

Berkeley Law Professor John C. Yoo wrote in 1999 in "Kosovo, War Powers, and the Multilateral Future,"

 

As demonstrated by the Clinton administration’s bombing of Serbian targets without U.N. sanction, international law places no constraints upon the President’s exercise of his Commander-in-Chief or executive war powers. The constitutional text and structure seems to indicate that the executive branch enjoys the constitutional freedom to exercise its foreign affairs powers consistent with, or in conflict with , international norms.

 

http://www.donaldsensing.com/2004/10/american-legitimacy-and-un.html

 

The Iraq War is LEGAL by all definitions of the US Constitution and by Legistlative Act.

[datsunlover]

Ok.. its Legal.. If someone gets in your car and steals it, and then crashes it because the brakes are bad, LEGALY the car theif can sue you. And he can win. It's legal... does it make it "right"? Hmm...

[JMortensen]

I just read an AP article on Yahoo news I think it was that 50% of Democratic voters believe that their vote will not be counted correctly. In light of this astounding statistic, I'm not surprised that they believe the war is illegal. Seems to me if you tell a Democrat anything long enough they'll believe it.

Kinda like

"the govt should provide healthcare for every citizen" or

"when people are disadvantaged the govt has a responsibility to fix it" or

"raising taxes helps poor people" or

"corporations are evil"

[Pop N Wood]

F the UN.

 

I have never understood the concept of a war being "legal".

 

War by its very nature implies a break down in social order. It is (or should be) a fight for survival. The Geneva convention isn't so much a set of rules as a gentleman's agreement that we won't do these nasty things if you don't.

 

And who the hell enforces the law anyway? What authority stands above the US constitution? Laws are only laws if the people agree to be governed by them.

[blueovalz]

War has been about power all through history, not legalities. It's just that we (he) felt big enough to pick on tiny Iraq to wage it. Stalin was doing the same thing or worse when he was in power, but we didn't feel quite as big back then because he had the same size bat we did. And later we had MIRVs pointed at us for over 20 years we didn't feel so big and mighty then either. You can go all over the world (and history) and look at examples of the same treatment of peoples by their so-called "leaders", but we didn't interfere (maybe we were wrong, but I don't think so). I would go so far as to say that most of OUR problems in and around the world are caused by our own meddling in other's business instead of taking care of our own problems here at home.

[JKDGabe]

The Supreme Court has reversed itself many times and I imagine it will happen a few more times.

 

If we did it because Saddam was a bad guy why did we put him in power in the first place? Because he wasn't bad back then? Perhaps the same thing is happening to our leaders... power corrupts. And why aren't we in Sudan? There's plenty of atrocities there...

 

You can't give a republic/democracy to people for the same reason welfare doesn't help people. When enough people are ready they will take it. The best thing we could have done is made sure everybody there had a shotgun. That would have made the killing worse you say? Nope, there's plenty of weapons there to begin with, but when even the peons have them (and are fed up enough to use them) the tyrants and their goons will quickly realize it's not worth it.

[Synlubes]

I would go so far as to say that most of OUR problems in and around the world are caused by our own meddling in other's business instead of taking care of our own problems here at home.

 

I agree we have problems at home that DO need attention, but we can not walk blindly either.

 

+ or - ???

[JKDGabe]

How do you suppose we fix that?

I think you answered it already...

The un-employeed would rather collect welfare and aid assistance than do hard manual work...

So get rid of welfare. Obviously you can't cut 'em off cold as there would be riots. Really wouldn't be fair as they're not prepared to support themselves but give 'em a few months warning while we boot the illegals. I'm not against immigration, just the illegal kind. I do feel like we need a constitutional amendment to say that the kids of anybody who got here illegally aren't citizens. Some of the first white colonists in this country had the same lazy attitude but they were the rich ones... remember how they took care of that problem?

[Dan Baldwin]

: Then in the next breath he said he admired him because he had a set of nutts on him!

 

Go figure... He is a democrat!

 

 

I can't for the life of me figure out why W has this "bad-ass" image. I mean, here's a guy who went out of his way to join the Guard to avoid Vietnam (can't blame him for that), who then distracts the entire military from the task at hand (finding and bringing to justice our attackers) to dedicate the majority of our military efforts (ironically INCLUDING GUARD TROOPS!) in an obscenely costly, needless, and counterproductive war in Iraq.

 

It doesn't take "nutts" to send other people's kids out to fight/kill/die in an unbelievably poorly thought-out war in Iraq. It does take a fair amount of willful obstinate stupidity and a complete disregard for morality, ethics, common sense, and the sacrifices it requires of OTHERS.

 

Where were W's "nutts" when we needed a full-scale invasion of Afghanistan/Pakistan border region?

 

9/11 was his EXCUSE to get us into his pet project of invading Iraq. Unfortunately the administration had NO IDEA what they were getting us into, only seeing the rosiest possible outcome (troops being greeted with flowers and such). IDIOTS.

[mark]

Me: Honey I'm going to Vegas for the weekend. I've got a few hookers lined up. should be fun.

 

Her: I've jsut sent you Z to the crusher, have fun.

 

 

Just because it is legal does not mean it is right.

 

Dan, great post.

 

Mark

[Dan Baldwin]

We have more resources running around the mountains of Pakestan and Afghanistan than you' date=' and most of America know.

 

Nothing has been taken away from that search for those people)[/quote']

 

140,000 troops in Iraq is 140,000 troops that can't be in Afghanistan/Pakistan. But ignoring that for the moment, even if Iraq DIDN'T distract from the search for OBL/Al Queada, it was STILL an incredibly dumb move, based not on sober analysis of facts and possible outcomes, but solely on what the administration WANTED to do.

 

These guys (current admin.) are UNBELIEVABLY incompetent assholes.

[johnc]

It doesn't take "nutts" to send other people's kids out to fight/kill/die ...

 

Tell that to Eisenhower, Lincoln, Roosevelt, Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, Nixon, Clinton, Ford, Truman, Bush Sr., Reagan, Wilson, and almost every officer in our military.

 

It does take some big nutts to order someone into a mission that will result in death. To infer that Bush did this out of some kind of bravado or macho with no regard to the casualties is an irrational, emotional arguement.

[Guest Z-rific]

Mike, I'd be careful calling other people close-minded. You know, the whole "glass houses" thing.

 

Some of the best advice I ever got was "The wisest man is the one who realizes how little he knows."

[mark]

Even Pat Robertson was astounded by Bush's arrogance toward this war. For those who don't know Pat Robertson, just do a google search. He basically represents the conservative Christain vote. Robertson wqrned Bush that he should level with the public on the possiblity that this war could go badly. Here is the story. Yes, I know it's CNN but anyway

http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/10/19/robertson.bush.iraq/

[Guest Z-rific]

Mike, I'd be careful calling other people close-minded. You know, the whole "glass houses" thing.

 

Some of the best advice I ever got was "The wisest man is the one who realizes how little he knows."

[Dan Baldwin]

It doesn't take "nutts" to send other people's kids out to fight/kill/die ...

It does take some big nutts to order someone into a mission that will result in death. To infer that Bush did this out of some kind of bravado or macho with no regard to the casualties is an irrational, emotional arguement.

 

W's "nutts" weren't big enough to get him into Vietnam, but they were plenty big enough to cavalierly send today's military into a war in Iraq without a reasonable plan.

 

Criminally incompetent idiocy.

[JMortensen]

Regardless of who wins today,

 

I JUST HOPE THERE IS A GODDAMN MARGIN!!!

 

All of this posturing for lawsuits makes me want to smack someone.

[Dan Baldwin]

I stand by my post, and others related to this topic... The data is out there... DO A SEARCH...

 

The "data" is indeed out there. Hell, it's been in plain sight. What is sadly lacking is competent objective reportage in the media (EVERYTHING is reduced to red vs. blue), and the ability to add 2 + 2 in the general populace.

 

, indeed.

[Kevin Shasteen]

Regardless of your stance on 9/11 - the nexus of this thread revolves around the issues of legalistic vernacular distinctions of Legal -vs- Lawful: what is a State, what is Authority, where does authority come from and what are the relationships between Legal, Lawful, State, and Authority.

 

I have made reference between these legal (not common) vernacular in past threads regarding police tickets. The same issues involved in police tickets and their presumed right to cite someone are the exact same issues involved in governemnts proclaimed right to war against another sovereign Nation.

 

The difference between the sovereign Nations when a cop decides to cite someone is "Police Officer (state) -vs- Sovereign Individual/14th Amendment citizen (Nation). In the US the individual is their own Sovereign State/state. The Sovereign Individual would be their own State wheras the 14 Amendment citizen would be their own state separate of the local municipality but legally connected/controlled, under the authority, of the US Washington DC/Feds.

 

The Nation outside of the unified States United (America) would be their own Sovereign Nation States. So the same principles apply in Nation -vs- America that applies to the individual American -vs- US/State. The real question is what is a State and what is Law.

 

All injurious claims can be boiled down to two forms of complaints: tort or contract disputes. So, before forming your opinion on the Iraqi war being legal or illegal - you would have to decide if there is evidence of an injured complaining party that has the lawful right to ATTACK Iraq based on its injury sustained by the wanton & reckless behaviour of the attackor (Iraq).

 

All complaints can be boiled down to one simple equation:

 

Duty Owed + Duty Breached + Injury Incurred + Rightful Indemnification = Legal/Lawful Outcome

 

With the Geneva Convention all Civilized Nations (members) agreed to never war against one another again. As a result "Legally" there have never been any wars since - there have only been "Police Actions" to be regulated by the defunct League of Nations/now UN: hence my suggestions of the importance of understanding the real battle here, which is "Internationalism (Globalism) -vs- Nationalism.

 

In law you have Positive Law and you have Color of Law - which isnt real law it is only rules/regulations and in America you and I, as Americans are not bound by color of law rules and regulations: unless you have willfully, intentionally, knowingly signed into contracts agreeing to be bound by said color of law - this is known as authority/jurisdiction.

 

Positive Law is, "You can swing your fist as hard as you like as long as you dont hit someone's nose". While Color of Law is, "You can not swing your fist because we have rules/regulations stating you can not swing your fist".

 

The principal distinctions between the terms lawful and legal is that the former contemplates the substance of law, the latter only the form of law. To sqy that it is legal implies that is done or performed in accordance with the forms and usages of law, or in a technical manner. In this sense illegal approaches the meaning of invalid. For example, a contract or will, executed w/o the required formalitities, might be said to be invalid or illegal, but could not be described as unlawful. Further, the word lawful more clearly implies an ethical content than does legal. The latter goes no further than to denote compliance, with postitive, technical, or formal rules.

 

Therefor, a Nation State that acts in some manner would fall under three categories:

 

1) Positive,

2) Technical

3) Former rules

 

So again - in order to truly determine if the Iraqi war was is illegal: we would first have to define what forum the war (Police Action) falls into and who is the athority that rules over said forum (UN).

 

If you dont like the UN then you should hang/horse whip the congressional reps that got us in the UN....BY CONTRACT!

 

The real battle is Internationalism -vs- Nationalism.

 

Did any of this make sense:?:

 

Kevin,

[JKDGabe]

The real battle is Internationalism -vs- Nationalism.

 

Yup. And despite Bush's posturing he's an internationalist. It's just that he wants to be in control...