Iran Situation

[Benton]

(01-09-2020, 11:40 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: That's not true.

Trump has stated multiple reasons for killing Soleimani.

1. An American contractor was killed on December 27th from a rocket attack.

2. Solemani was responsible for many other deaths.

3. Solemani was planning to blow up the US embassy or aka "Imminent threat"

The first two are undoubtedly true. The 3rd reason? Who knows. But given that two out of the three are true and our embassy did in fact come under attack, I'm not so sure we can write off Trump's claim of an imminent threat.

Regardless, it's clear the killing of the American contractor factored into the decision as it's been brought up multiple times already, and it makes sense.

On December 27th the American contractor is killed.

On December 31st, four days later our embassy is attacked.

On January 3rd, three days after the embassy attack we kill Solemani.

So within a span 7 days an American died, our embassy was then attacked and then we killed Soleimani.  There doesnt need to be "one specific reason"  for why he killed Soleimani. It could have been a factor of all these things put together and then a decision was made.

The first two put the power and responsibility on Congress, who, judging by the past, most likely wouldn't have used any power and wouldn't have addressed their responsibility. That's opinion on my part based off their inability to deal with responsibilities for decades now, outside of lowering their own taxes. That's mostly unanimous, and I guess they at least are effective at that.

The third one is the issue that's being debated in Congress. From the briefing, two Republicans and several Democrats said the administration didn't show evidence of an imminent threat; some Republicans said the administration made a lengthy case for why a foreign official deserved to have military action taken against him (without addressing the imminence issue); and some Republicans said the administration made them feel the threat was imminent.

The POTUS's ability to do what he did is regulated by Congress, both by the War Powers Act and the Constitution. It's a check and balance. Generally, he can act as he did if there's an imminent threat because running it through Congress would most likely take too long to prevent a loss of life. 

If Trump's strike was retaliation for the killing of the contractor, that's outside the scope of powers he's been given. If it was to prevent the killing of another contractor (or solider, embassy worker, whoever) and it was reasonably the only way make sure of that person's safety, then it was inside.

The majority of comments from the briefing seem to be indicating it was a decision based off previous attacks combined with the likelihood there could be future attacks, and not a specific planned one. Which is a very dangerous authority to grant any POTUS.