Talk:Authorization for Use of Military Force

Category:VoIP terminology & concepts

I don't think that this category designation applies here at all. If nobody objects, I'll delete it in the next couple of days.

Dave314159 21:34, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

The date

The date in the header of the law is 1/3/2002. What gives? --Jfruh (talk) 22:23, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Can you provide the link? Are you mistaking this AMUF with the AMUF against Iraq? --Assawyer 22:45, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm talking about the text as it appears in this article:

Begun and held at the City of Washington on Wednesday, the third day of January, two thousand and two, a Joint Resolution:

Obviously something is screwy, as the article states that Congress passed the law on 9/18/01. Makes me wonder if there are other problems with the text. --Jfruh (talk) 22:54, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I have fixed the year. The date I beleive refers to the date which the 107th Congress convened. --Assawyer 23:14, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

"Begun and held at the City of Washington on Wednesday, the third day of January, two thousand and one, a Joint Resolution "To authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against those responsible for the recent attacks launched against the United States. " - Is it just me, or does that not make sense? How could the resolution be from before the attacks?

Who was the Nay in the House?

Crust 15:58, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Barbara Lee. I believe her rationale was not that she opposed military action in Afghanistan per se, but that the resolution offered far too sweeping powers to the executive branch without Congressional oversight. In her speech she compared it to the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. --Jfruh (talk) 17:30, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, Jfruh. I put her name in the article. For now anyway I didn't add the explanation of her vote (that seems like something that should be referenced). Crust 18:24, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

I'll try to find a source for it ... shouldn't be too hard. I'm more curious about the two Republican senators (Craig and Helms) who are cited as "present/not voting", which I assume means that they made a point of abstaining, which is kind of weird. Are the House abstentions along the same lines, or were they just members who were physically absent? --Jfruh (talk) 23:45, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Hamdan v. Rumsfeld and AUMF

Salim Ahmed Hamdan was the first detainee to be tried in such a tribunal and the proceedings were put on hold until the U.S. Supreme Court heard the appeal of Judge Robert's initial decision in favor of the Bush administration, when Judge Roberts was on the DC Court of Appeals. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court's Hamdan decision only found that the military tribunals as proposed by the Bush administration for the detainees held at Guantanamo Bay detention camp were not competent tribunals under the Geneva Convention, not that any military tribunals were "illeagal" -- as the sentence in this article implies. In fact, in the Hamdan case, Judge Stevens' majority opinion (the portion Kennedy joined) even says that the legislative branch can create the structure of tribunals that would be competent tribunals per the Geneva treaty. Simply saying the tribunals were found to be illeagal is inaccurate and provides a misleading sense of security, to those concerned about civil liberties, that there will not be some form of military tribunals in the future. This is especially a concern since the Senate is now debating new legislation introduced by Republican senators in order to try the detainees held at Guantanamo. With current makeup of the senate, these tribunals will most likely not offer anything like the protections of civilain U.S. federal courts. From the Hamdan v. Rumsfeld Wikipedia article:

The opinion next addressed the substantive issues of the case. It explicitly did not decide whether the President possessed the Constitutional power to convene military commissions like the one created to try Hamdan. Even if he possessed such power, those tribunals would either have to be sanctioned by the "laws of war," as codified by Congress in Article 15 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), or authorized by statute. As to the statutory authorization, there is nothing in the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) "even hinting" at expanding the President's war powers beyond those enumerated in Art. 15. Instead, the AUMF, the UCMJ, and the DTA "at most acknowledge" the President's authority to convene military commissions only where justified by the exigencies of war, but still operating within the laws of war.

Therefore I have changed the wording of the sentence to read: "The AUMF was unsuccessfully cited by the George W. Bush administration in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the administration's military commissions at Guantanomo Bay were were not competent tribunals."--Historypre 18:03, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Historypre, thanks for the reply. "Competent tribunal" is a technical term that I suspect many readers will not understand. You seem to think that saying that the miliary commissions at Guantanamo were illegal somehow suggests that all military commissions are illegal. I just don't imagine many readers will make that false inference. Crust 19:04, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

If I may chime in here: while I agree that "competent tribunal" is a technical term that may be puzzling, I think it may be too sweeping to say that they were simply "illegal." The decision said that they were illegal as constituted, but pointed to a route by which a similiar institution would be legal. "Competent tribunal" is a link, so those curious about the term can just click on it. Heck, I don't know why this argument is about using one term exclusively; why couldn't the text just say "...decided that the tribunals were illegal, as they are not competent tribunals under current law" or some such? --Jfruh (talk) 20:32, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Good comments, Jfruh. My only objection to "...decided that the tribunals were illegal, as they are not competent tribunals under current law" is that it is somewhat longwinded for the intro. I went with "illegal as constituted". OK with everyone? Crust 20:41, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Counter-proposal: "... ruled that the administration's military commissions at Guantanomo Bay were not competent tribunals as constituted and thus illegal."--Historypre 21:36, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

That's fine with me (maybe a little long-winded, but I'm quibbling). Crust 21:48, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Abbreviations

I'm guessing that "R" means republican and "D-CA" means "democrat from California". These abbreviations are NOT obvious to non-US folk - can they be expanded please. -- SGBailey 12:11, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Moved article to own page, changed to disambiguation page.

Hmmm, I was following the be bold concept, but I suspect now that there should have been a process seeking buy in by others (like anyone reading this) prior to my doing so. Forgive me if I've overstepped my bounds. Rather than undo the work, I will leave it as is for now and read up on the proper approach later today. In any case, you may, of course, revert, but I would ask that you consider my reasoning (I would like to see the end result be that "AUMF" and "Authorization for Use of Military Force" are a disambiguation page linking to both "Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Terrorists" and "Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002" since they are both known as the "AUMF" and both are very important resolutions that help define the world we live in (and obviously not just in the USA), yet both are related in some ways [at least according to the US administration, just kidding] and were passed in consecutive years they may be confused. I have no objections to anyone reverting, but note that I changed the following pages in various ways to make this work properly (so you can revert properly):

• AUMF - changed to redirect to Authorization for Use of Military Force
• Authorization for Use of Military Force - changed to disambiguation page
• Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Terrorists - changed from redirect to own article, which had been at "Authorization for Use of Military Force", added disambiguation links
• Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002 - did no major edits, remains redirect to Iraq Resolution
• Iraq Resolution - added disambiguation links

I don't think the results of my actions will be controversial, but I recognize now that the way I did them may be bad. Sorry for any problems or confusions. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Fitzhugh (talk • contribs) 19:04, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Removed duplicate edit --Fitzhugh 19:08, 29 September 2007 (UTC)