frazwJan 4

Why does the US military obey an order to go to war despite Congress not having given their consent?

https://lemmy.world/post/41136002

Why does the US military obey an order to go to war despite Congress not having given their consent? - Lemmy.World

Sorry for the political question, but I’ve been hearing all the time that only Congress can declare war and therefore authorise the invasion of another country. Therefore, when the military receives orders to invade e.g. Venezuela, from the executive branch, not from Congress, why is the order followed, or why is there no corroboration of the order? It feels like there is an assumption of propriety, that the military assumes the executive branch followed proper procedural norms. Are the military exposed to prosecution for war crimes as a result of following such an order?

Show threadHildegarde

I don’t think this was illegal under US law. Congress gave the president the power to unilaterally deploy the military pretty much anywhere during george bush’s war in Iraq. Congress has to review the deployment afterwards and can stop it from continuing. Congress gave bush, and every subsequent president the power to do exactly what happened.

The US doesn’t do formal declarations of war anymore. WWII was the last time that happened. Congress authorized military operations without formal declarations many times since. Presidents to this day have been continuing to use the 2001 antiterrorism authorization to strike wherever they want. Obama and Biden did it too, they just didn’t do anything as brazen as kidnapping a president.

The military planned the strikes. You can’t kidnap a head of state in a single evening without a laying a lot of groundwork. The US has a history of backing coups in South America, and they’ve been building a case for war against Venezuela for over a decade. This was within standard practice for the US military.

This, and most of trumps other actions should be illegal. But those who made and enforced the laws since the start of the millennium have all been collaborators.

Jan 4 at 6:51pmWeb