“The Authorisation for the Use of Military Force Act was drafted by the Bush White House in the week after the 9/11 attacks.
At its heart is a sixty-word sentence that gives the US president the power to ‘use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organisations, or persons’ that he or she determines was behind or helped the people who carried out the attacks. It was passed into law by Congress on September 16 [2001] with only one dissenting vote [Barbara Lee, D-Calif.].
The AUMF’s scope gave the president a free hand. It has no time or geographical limits; it technically allows the president to fight a perpetual global war. It also empowers the president to go after individuals as well as nation states. …
AUMF is so broad that it allows the President to target new enemies without the usual authorisation from Congress. The scope has grown from just the Taliban and al Qaeda – AUMF is now being used to justify strikes against groups that did not exist when al Qaeda attacked the World Trade Centre and Pentagon.”
– The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, “Legality of Drone Warfare,” thebureauinvestigates.com, accessed on August 30, 2022
[The 1st of the month used for date sorting purposes only.]