[El Gato]

But the declaration of war must name a country does it not?

Where is that written? I would expect naming a transnational group would be acceptable and sufficient to delineate who we were declaring war upon.

[el_texicano]

Ok, for the sake of argument let's say you are correct in your approach. So, we declare war on al queda, but all such groups are not so named. They are foxes tied at the tail, but they are nebuously named. Al Queda would like nothing better than for the US to declare war on "Militant Islam" or something like that, they they can argue that we are declaring war on Islam. And we are not.

The point is...it is difficult to pin this threat down with a definitive name.

Secondly, these monsters are no better than pirates and to "declare war" is to elevate them to the level of legitmate combatants, which they are most definitely NOT. They are vermin, little more than mad dogs infected with the rabies of religious fanaticism. War declaration gives them the "cover" of the Geneva Convention which they do not observe anyway.