I always thought the 2002 AUMF was an obvious basis for air strikes against the Islamic State, easily in Iraq and possibly (given the right circumstances) in Syria.  Today Charlie Savage reports that “th...

In late August, I suggested several possible theories the Administration might invoke to argue that the use of force against ISIS in Syria is consistent with international law. In the wake of President O...

Secretary of State Kerry said yesterday: We're engaged in a major counterterrorism operation [against the Islamic State], and it's going to be a long-term counterterrorism operation.  I think war is the ...

The War Powers Resolution's strongest impact?

Late last week, the Department of Justice released two memos authored by Lawfare's own Jack Goldsmith back when he was the head of the Office of Legal Counsel ("OLC") in the Bush Administration. The memo...

Proceeding in lockstep with a general chill in relations brought about by the Ukraine crisis, the United States and the Russian Federation are currently at odds over compliance with international arms tr...

The Foreign Intelligence Court of Review ("FISCR") issued this order today. It concerns the FISC's 2008 opinion in In Re Directives, an appeal brought by Yahoo! and regarding directives for warrantless e...

On this day of remembrance, the three prior Secretaries of the Department of Homeland Security have issued a joint letter calling on Congress to reorganize itself and streamline oversight of DHS.  I can ...

That is the topic of my essay at Time.com in reaction to the announcement yesterday that the Obama administration believes the 2001 AUMF authorizes force against the Islamic State today.  The essay begin...

Like Bobby, Wells, and Ben, I, too, was surprised to discover that the Obama Administration's legal theory (for the moment) appears to be that the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) can be targe...

Like my colleagues Ben and Wells, I'm astonished to learn this evening that the Obama administration, having previously justified 140+ airstrikes against IS in Iraq on Article II grounds alone (at least ...

What Ben said. I certainly can see why the executive branch would want to adopt a reading as aggressive as this one: it nips some War Powers Resolution questions in the bud, and helps to make it more l...

Here's President Obama coyly not asking Congress to dance---that is, as I put it in my post earlier today, "signal[ing] that [he] would like to dance with Congress—saying [he] will consult with her, that...

The UN Report blog has posted a draft of the United States resolution to the UN Security Council on foreign terrorist fighters (FTFs) that was teased in yesterday a Reuters story. We'll have an analysis...

Interested in the legal and policy architecture relating to the high seas interdiction of ships possibly bearing WMD material? Me too! The Proliferation Security Initiative, was a somewhat hot topic abou...