Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation

Congress Asserts Its War Powers at Last

by John Isaacs [contact information]

Published by Topeka Capital-Journal on April 6, 2007

In the space of five days, both the House and Senate have cast historic votes to set a timetable for the withdrawal of most American military forces from Iraq.

It took 15 years and more than 58,000 American deaths before Congress acted to pull the plug on the disastrous Vietnam War.

This time, slightly more than four years after President George W. Bush launched the invasion, the legislative branch has asserted its authority over war powers and war funding to move toward the end game in Iraq.

Congress is finally catching up to the American people, who have soured on the war. The anti-war coalition now includes more than 60 percent of the public, both houses of Congress, the Iraqi people and most of the rest of the world - including our previously loyal ally, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, who recently charged that the American occupation of Iraq was illegal.

The margins in Congress were narrow; the House voted, 218 to 212, to set a timetable for withdrawal and the Senate agreed, 50 to 48. These votes came after impassioned debates. The House bill includes a deadline for withdrawal of August 2008. The Senate bill sets a goal that troops be redeployed by March 2008.

Three momentous events moved the Congress to prod President Bush to change his war policy.

The first was the November 2006 midterm elections, where disillusionment with the war was the biggest factor in American voters' choice of a Democratic majority in Congress.

The second was the president's announcement in January that, rather than begin winding down the war, he would escalate it by sending more than 20,000 additional American soldiers to Iraq.

The third was President Bush's request for $93 billion more to pay for the wars. After congressional approval of these funds, total appropriations for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will approach $600 billion - nine times more than the $50 billion the administration originally estimated the war in Iraq would cost.

The anti-war legislation was opposed by many on the left and the right:

On the left, some activists objected to approving a single additional dime for continuing the war in Iraq. These objections, however, ignored political realities: There are not sufficient votes in Congress to cut off funding for the war. Congress elected to assert its authority by approving a withdrawal deadline instead.

In 1942, Lieutenant Colonel Jimmy Doolittle led the first American bombing attack on the Japanese homeland. The military results were negligible; the political and psychological impact was immense.

Similarly, while Congress may not have stopped the war, it has dramatically ratcheted up the political pressure on President Bush to reverse his disastrous direction in Iraq.

On the right, many war supporters objected to Congress' intervention in the war. Yet Congress has weighed in many times when American forces have served overseas, most recently during the Clinton administration when it acted to put a brake on the American involvement in Haiti, Somalia and Kosovo - withdrawal initiatives were supported by many Republicans who now object to Congress assuming its constitutional role.

After a House-Senate conference committee meets to iron out differences in their versions of the Supplemental Appropriations bill, the measure goes to the president.

President Bush has promised to veto any timetable for withdrawal, declaring on March 28: "I believe the consequences of failure in Iraq affect the security of the United States of America."

The United States has already suffered the consequences of the numerous failures of the Bush administration: the failure to tell the truth about why we went to war in the first place; the failure to plan for the war's aftermath; and the failure of its design for building a stable and popular Iraqi government.

The ultimate price has been paid by more than 3,200 American soldiers who have lost their lives, with nearly 24,000 wounded.

The price has been also been paid by the undermining of America's respect throughout the world.

These irretrievable losses in blood and treasure make it clear that Congress acting forcefully to end the war in Iraq is just what this country needs if we are to rebuild our international reputation and reclaim our rightful place as a country that leads by example.