Donald Trump's Syria Strike: An Unconstitutional Declaration of War

National Review ^ | April 11, 2017 | Michael Stokes Paulsen

[VitacoreVision]

By ordering last week’s Tomahawk strike on a Syrian airbase, the president usurped Congress’s exclusive power to declare war. He shouldn’t be allowed to get away with it.

Make no mistake: President Trump’s airstrikes against Syria were unconstitutional. Military action may well have been justified from a moral standpoint. The Assad regime’s war on its own people and its use of chemical weapons required a response, arguably including a retaliatory strike to deter further such attacks. Inaction, as much as action, has profound human consequences. There is a case to be made that America should have taken military action against Assad in 2013, or even as early as 2011, in order to protect innocent Syrians from their own government.

The strikes may have been justified from a strategic standpoint, too — as a means of both advancing America’s interests in the region’s security and counteracting the perception of American weakness left by President Obama’s dithering response to past Syrian chemical-weapons attacks. A feckless, feeble United States — one that retreats from declared “red lines,” abandons the region to Vladimir Putin, creates a vacuum for the rise of ISIS, and generates a massive humanitarian and refugee crisis — is good for nobody.

But from a legal standpoint, there can be no doubt that Trump’s Tomahawk strike on the Syrian regime was a violation of the U.S. Constitution.

[DoughtyOne]

We will not be able to “fix” things everywhere, and it’s not my perception that we can or should try.

If we are near the location of a “war crimes” level violation and can discourage it without the loss of life or limb of our service members, I think we should do it.

Assad’s own former general in charge of Syria’s chemical weapons stated Assad order him to use the three times in 2013. He also stated Assad would never let them go.

Assad evidently uses them from time to time. Granted it’s not tens of thousands or thousands used, but if we can move him away from using them, I don’t know how we don’t do it morally.

As for other places in the world, the circumstances would have to be quite compelling, and it would need to involve the international community for us to take action.

I don’t think the circumstances in Syria would always lend themselves to the U.S. taking actions either. If Russian ships were there, the risk would be too high.

The situation called for it, the circumstances were right, we took action.

We may not next time, but we’re doing our best to help the population.

I understand where you are coming from. I don’t disagree with you in total