| > Why not? "Why not?" as a philosphical question is a bit esoteric for me. "Why not?" in the straight forward sense is easier- they simply do not appear a prerequisite for ordering a nuclear strike in the linked Nuclear Operations (2020) procedures. > The Constitution "vests in the Congress the power to declare war" Sure - but that's been bypassed a good many times to date hasn't it? Congress can declare war - but they don't appear to be neccessary for war to be declared, it seems a sitting POTUS can do that with an executive order. In any case what is specifically being discussed here is that order to launch a nuclear strike, not an order to "start a war" and all that entails (spinning up additional arms production, etc.). > Not what first strike means [2]. (You're describing launch on warning, The full quote included predicated on having accurate justification [ such as ] (knowledge of incoming missiles) etc. meaning a POTUS can hand wave or invent any number of reasons in addition to being fooled by false alarms and issue an order to launch missiles. More importantly .. none of that really matters, these operation procedures were written with the expectation that time would be critical and that the POTUS would be a rational judge of the appropriate actions and thus vested with the power to simply issue an order sans any pesky chain of required justification when the clock was supposedly ticking. Once the order is issued it requires someone to bell the cat and actually mutiny to stop the ordered launch .. questioning whether the order was justified isn't on the cards. I did originally link to a long form three part look into all these scenarios for a reason, there's much reference there to expert commentary on the ins and outs of the US chain of command for nuclear launch. |
Nobody argued the Congress needs to be consulted for a nuclear strike today. This entire conversation is around a proposal which, by definition, isn't present reality.
> that's been bypassed a good many times to date hasn't it
What are you thinking of? The modern trend has been the Congress giving the President broad war powers [1].
> what is specifically being discussed here is that order to launch a nuclear strike, not an order to "start a war"
There is no situation where a nuclear first strike doesn't start a war. It would very likely end the era of America being the master of alliances and trigger a global rebalancing against Washington.
> meaning a POTUS can hand wave or invent any number of reasons in addition to being fooled by false alarms and issue an order to launch missiles
Sure. And any President since the founding of the republic has had the capacity to break any number of laws restricting their power. (Many times, they have.) That doesn't make those laws or the Constitution worthless.
Between the President and the silos are a number of people. The current rules mean there is no legitimate reason for anyone in that chain to question a first strike order. That changes if you have a procedure the President is blowing off. (It's also better than SecDef making it up as they go [2].)
I'm not particularly concerned about a U.S. President blowing an aneurysm and nuking Canada. I am concerned about Russia and Pakistan. Having a procedure for first use here lets us push for multi-party first-use authorisation elsewhere.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authorization_for_Use_of_Milit...
[2] https://www.nbcnews.com/news/military/milley-acted-prevent-t...