There are few jobs that carry as much weight as that of the President of the United States of America. Due to this, it stands to reason that the office should possess enough power and responsibility to effectively see to the completion of its tasks. That said, there’s a place for pointing out that this office might currently hold far too much power in certain areas.

According to Article II, Section 2 of the United States Constitution, "The president shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States when called into the actual Service of the United States." What this translates to in essence is that the leader of the Free Nation reserves the right (and authority) to repel any action that would constitute an attack on the American people.

On the surface, this sounds all well and good. To many, such authority might even be considered the bare minimum, considering what was at stake. However, several events would quickly prove that no one, not even the president of the United States, deserves to have power of such magnitude.

The most notable proof of this (and the incident that ultimately birthed the War Powers Resolution) was the news that unbeknownst to both members of Congress and the general public, President Richard Nixon had been conducting bombing session after bombing session in Cambodia. When word of this fact broke, public angst was high and the lapses in congressional oversight were clear.

Ultimately, this led to the War Powers Resolution or War Powers Act being passed rather speedily through both the #House of Representatives and #Senate, despite the veto of the U.S. President.

The edicts of the War Powers Act were simple. The President can decide to deploy the troops into military action but he must, by law, give proper notice of this development to the Congress within 48 hours of doing so. In the same vein, this policy stipulated that the U.S. military was forbidden from staying in a state of conflict for a period of more than 60 days. However, depending on the circumstances, it allowed that the president had the liberty to extend that stay by an extra 30 days. After this duration had lapsed, #POTUS had to seek authorization from Congress. Alternatively, the president could make a formal declaration of war.

Under ideal circumstances, one would think that the above would’ve been more than enough to curtail the ability of the U.S. president to war on other nations. However, this has proven to not be the case.

Somehow, it would seem that president after president has found ways to work around this Resolution and initiate military action almost at will. This is particularly interesting when you consider the fact that, so far, about 130 reports have been submitted to Congress due to the War Power Act. Yet, only one of these has clearly stated that military personnel had been introduced into imminent danger or hostile situations.

In saying the above, carefully consider the fact that, since the War Power Act was passed in 1973, the U.S. has been involved in conflict to varying degrees.

Case in point, more recently, the The Trump Administration initiated a deadly drone attack that claimed the life of Qasem Soleimani, the Iranian General. They only reported this action 24 hours after the act. The report in question was filled with so much information vacuum that the House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi and the Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell had to hold several debriefing sessions to wade through it.

The Trump Administration claimed that the attack didn’t violate the War Powers Act in any way. Rather, they opined that it was based on the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) resolution of 2002. Keep in mind that, depending on how it’s worded and phrased, the AUMF act can, in theory, be used to initiate endless conflicts with other nations.

All of which brings us back to the fact that, as it is, the War Powers Resolution just has too many loopholes to be relied upon so extensively. It has been conclusively proven that its legalities can be manipulated by less scrupulous leaders to achieve only God knows what aims.

The bitter truth is that this Resolution affords any president too much power. It needs to be reevaluated and revised extensively. This is the only way to ensure that what is supposed to be a leash on presidential military power doesn’t end up serving as an enabler.