United States Military War Involvement
More than three decades after the first bombs rained down on Baghdad, the United States Senate is now taking steps to repeal the 1991 and 2002 Authorizations to Use Military Force in Iraq (“AUMFs”).
Article I, Section 8 of the United States Constitution explicitly states that the United States Congress “shall have power to…To declare War.” The last time that Congress did declare war, however, was in June 1942, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed legislatively-approved declarations of war against Axis powers.
In the last 80 years, the United States has been involved in numerous military conflicts. American military involvement in these conflicts has only come after passage of joint resolutions referred to as AUMFs. These joint resolutions, approved by the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate, authorize the President of the United States to use “all necessary and appropriate force” to achieve a certain specific, and clearly defined, military goal.
Senator Tim Kaine (D-Virginia) and Senator Todd Young (R-Indiana) introduced the bill. Senator Kaine even said that “the repeal of these authorizations is long, long overdue.” On March 21, 2023, the United States Senate voted 67-28 to begin debate on a bill undoing the 1991 AUMF and the 2002 AUMF. The bill received bipartisan support.
The 1991 AUMF authorized President George H.W. Bush to dispatch the United States’s military to the Persian Gulf after Iraq’s unprovoked invasion and occupation of neighboring Kuwait. The 2002 AUMF authorized President George W. Bush to use the United States’s military against Iraq. This time, however, the AUMF was a means to defend the United States against Iraqi aggression and hostility, and to enforce United Nations Security Council resolutions which sought to prevent then-Iraqi President Saddam Hussein from developing weapons of mass destruction.
Following final passage of the bill in the Democrat-controlled Senate, the legislative measure would go to the Republican controlled House. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-California) has stated that he does not object to the bill. In an interview, he said, “I don’t have a problem repealing that.”
The repeal of the two AUMFs would be largely symbolic. Today, the United States military has over 2,500 American soldiers in Iraq. These troops do not conduct much activity in Iraq based on legal authorities provided by either of the 1991 or 2002 AUMFs. Instead, they seek to train the Iraqi military.
The only occasions in the last handful of years in which the 2002 AUMF has been invoked to justify U.S. military action has been when the U.S. military has retaliated against Iranian-supported extremist militias that have fired rockets at bases housing American soldiers.
That being said, through the repeal of the two AUMFs, congressional leaders are hoping to wrestle away control on the war-making decisions from the executive branch. President Joe Biden has expressed support for the bill and wants to work with Congress to replace “outdated authorizations for the use of military force” with “a narrow and specific framework more appropriate to protecting Americans from modern terrorist threats.