Barack Obama wants to fire cruise missiles at Syria. As president of the nation whose military possesses the most lethal firepower of any society in history, he obviously has the ability to start this war — his sixth major front, after Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, Libya and Pakistan — if he wants to. But does he have the legal right?
The answer
is no.
Not if the basic architecture of the Constitution, the
separation of powers, remains in force. Not if the Founding
Fathers’ originalist intent, and their understanding of English
at the time, means anything. Not if America’s treaty
obligations, which after ratification carry the full force of
U.S. law, are more than pieces of paper...
Attacking
Syria without legal basis would have broad implications, and not
just for the Syrians who will lose their lives, limbs and
sanity.
Back here
in what neofascist politicians and media mouthpieces call the
Homeland, we Americans are watching our top officials and
boldface notables brush off the basic legal underpinnings of the
political culture with impunity...
Obama and
the other warmongers are counting on ignorance and confusion to
make their case, but the rules of war are clear.
Attacking
Syria would be illegal...
Obama has
no “inherent right” to attack Syria or any other country.
Under the
Constitution, Congress could do it. But the U.S. is also subject
to treaty obligations that clearly block it from attacking Syria
under present circumstances.
The
Kellogg-Briand Pact of 1928, which the U.S. Senate ratified by
an 85-1 vote,
bans
all acts of military aggression. Many of the Nazi leaders
executed and imprisoned at Nuremberg were convicted for
violating this Pact. It remains in force as international law.
The U.N.
Charter
mandates that all U.N. member states “refrain in their
international relations from the threat or use of force against
the territorial integrity or political independence of any
state.”
The U.N. Charter does not make exceptions for the three
principal arguments Obama makes in favor of attacking Syria:
punishment (for using chemical weapons),
preemption (it’ll send a message to other possible future
chemical weapons users, such as Iran and North Korea) and
deterrence (it will deter Assad from attacking Jordan or
Israel).
To the contrary, the Fourth Geneva Convention
outlaws “collective punishment” in which civilians are
targeted to suffer for the offenses of their government....
Now Obama
can argue — and others will — that Geneva, Kellogg-Briand, the
U.N. Charter, and even the U.S. Constitution are quaint,
outdated relics, written by naive men whose 20th
century attempts to outlaw war are irrelevant today. If that’s
what they think, then they should convince us to amend or annul
them.
As long as
these laws remain in force, and as long as Obama and other
members of America’s ruling class continue to ignore them, an
ugly day of reckoning draws closer.
P.S. to
Mr. Obama: Please, Sire, may we miserable subjects of your
Benevolent Self kindly see proof that the Syrian government (and
not the rebels) carried out that poison gas attack the other
day?
How about some evidence?
Anything?
Ted
Rall’s website is www.tedrall.com
. Go there to join the Ted Rall Subscription Service and receive
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