Congress authorized both offensive military actions. Neither are declared “wars”, but the Congress, and apparently by their silence, the Scotus, has recognized that Congress can authorize ongoing offensive military actions by other than formal declarations of war.
I’m assuming they see this as an update to the “letters of marque and reprisal” that the Constitution also sees as authorizations of offensive military actions on a “less than war” basis. In this case, the congressional authorizations of the Iraq and Afghan wars were unanimous or nearly so and actually date back to Sep 19, 2001.
I think LTC Lakin is best served by an appeal to post-deployment stress and the mercy of the court. He’s been end-arounded, and I don’t see him recovering. I also don’t want to see him hurt. He’s an American hero.
On the other hand, I was a career military chaplain and not a lawyer. Jagusafr, though, was a higher-level military lawyer. I’d really trust his judgment on this one.
I believe he still is, just a Reserve one, so he has to be somewhat cautious. But then he tends to be that way irregardless.