A War Declaration?

It’s nice to see the Wall Street Journal’s Walter Russell Mead come in with a column asking “Why Not Declare War?” It’s a timely question and well put as President Trump weighs whether to send at least some ground troops into Iran. To send in ground troops would up the ante in the conflict and increase the chances of our forces being confronted at home by an anti-war movement such as eventually forced America to abandon Vietnam to the communists.We first wrestled with this question in the early 1990s, when President George H.W. Bush was considering whether to go to Congress for legislation against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, which had just invaded Kuwait. We were then editing the Forward newspaper, which issued an editorial called “Declare the War.” The Forward sought such a declaration so that our GIs wouldn’t get stranded in some desert should Congress falter in its support.In the event, Congress failed to declare the war but instead enacted an authorization to use force. It was different from, say, America’s famed war declaration against Japan. That parchment said that the president was not only “authorized” but “directed” to use the “entire” naval and military forces of the United States to secure victory in Japan. Congress itself pledged to war with Japan “all the resources of the country.” No wonder we won the conflict.In respect of Vietnam, the Congress stopped short of a war declaration. Our side eventually won the military contest. By 1973, the last of our GIs were brought home. In the end, though, America and South Vietnam were defeated by Congress, which was controlled by a Democratic Party in thrall to the peace movement. It voted to end all military support for Free Vietnam, whose forces retreated and the country was lost to the communists.In Iraq, where we also failed to use a war declaration, the Democrats — President Obama was in office — again abandoned the fight, as did the Democrats in Afghanistan after President Biden acceded to the White House. Those three events recall the formulation that one is an incident, two is a coincidence, and three is a trend. The record of authorizations to use force, without a war declaration, is not a trend of success.So why not try a declaration in respect of Iran? Declarations of war, Mr. Mead notes, “unlock vast presidential powers.” He marks that during World War I President Wilson “jailed war critics, put enemy aliens under tight constraints, and prohibited the dissemination of antiwar materials through the mail.” President Franklin Roosevelt, Mr. Mead notes, “interned Japanese-Americans, censored the press and essentially took over the American economy.”Not all the wartime powers of our presidents are palatable. Nor are they unlimited, per Mr. Mead, but he calls “of special interest to Mr. Trump” the prospect that a declaration “would activate the Trading with the Enemy Act,” allowing “broad authority over international trade that the Supreme Court recently denied him under another statute.” Declarations, he adds, give presidents “authority over communications and transportation systems.”Mr. Mead reviews the record. “President Truman did not seek a declaration of war to respond to North Korea’s invasion of the South. The Tonkin Gulf Resolution, which authorized LBJ’s Vietnam escalation, fell well short of a declaration of war. Similarly, President George W. Bush fought terror under an Authorization for Use of Military Force.” Quoth Mr. Mead: “In hindsight, one can wonder if these choices were wise.”No Congress, Mr. Mead notes, has “rejected a presidential request for a war declaration.” Yet “we have never had a president quite like Mr. Trump.” Just now Mr. Mead reckons that an “overwhelming majority” of Democrats would likely oppose granting Mr. Trump war powers. Yet, the sage adds, politics can change and even small shifts in public opinion could enable Mr. Trump to get a declaration of war through Congress. Words to bear in mind.

A War Declaration?

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