White House says 9/11 law lets U.S. go after al-Shabab in Somalia
Washington — The White House shed new light Monday on the legal foundations for President Barack Obama’s expansive use of U.S. military power to target extremists overseas, in a report that also offered the first confirmation that the United States now deems the al-Shabab group in Somalia to be inherently linked to al-Qaida.
In a 60-page report obtained by The Associated Press before its public release, the administration said it believes the U.S. can target al-Shabab, which seeks to establish a strict Islamic emirate, under a law Congress passed in 2001 just after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The decision reflects a deepening U.S. engagement in the fight against Islamic militants in Somalia as well as a broadening application for the law initially written to authorize the president to target al-Qaida.
Until recently, the administration had not designated al-Shabab as part of the al-Qaida conflict, which meant the U.S. was limited to targeting individual Shabab leaders that the U.S. determined were closely tied to al-Qaida. Other strikes by the U.S. in Somalia were justified as self-defense for U.S. forces helping partners such as the African Union.
The White House report offers the most comprehensive look to date at how the White House has adjusted its domestic and legal rationale behind the various conflicts the U.S. has been engaged in since Obama took office, along with criteria the Obama administration used to determine which policies applied to which conflicts.
Obama, in a foreword to the report, said his administration had tried to apply “rules, practices and policies long used in traditional warfare” to a new type of conflict embodied by extremist groups, who often “do not wear uniforms or respect geographic boundaries” and show little regard for the rules of war.
In a presidential memorandum, Obama planned to call for the report to be updated and released publicly on an annual basis.
For Obama, who ran for president aiming to rein in what he perceived as military excesses of the Bush administration, the report is an illustration of how his hopes of restoring checks on the commander in chief’s war-making powers ran into challenges posed by gridlock in Congress — and by Obama’s own inclination toward surgical strikes that don’t require a large, long-term U.S. military footprint.
At the heart of the legal infrastructure Obama has relied on is the 2001 authorization for use of military force, which authorized the U.S. to go after al-Qaida, the Taliban, and “associated forces” both inside and outside Afghanistan. The Obama administration now relies on that law to justify military action in Afghanistan, Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Libya, the report shows.
Over the years, as al-Qaida diminished as a top threat and other groups have risen, the administration’s view of what groups fell under the “associated forces” designation grew broader, drawing concerns from some constitutional and civil liberties groups that the post-9/11 law was being stretched far beyond lawmakers’ original intent. After all, when Congress approved that resolution, the Islamic State group didn’t exist, though it’s now being targeted by the U.S. in multiple countries under that legal justification.
The new designation for al-Shabab allows the U.S. to target all of the group’s members. Senior administration officials said the shift was warranted because the U.S. has collected intelligence affirming the two groups are sufficiently linked, including pledges of loyalty by al-Shabab to al-Qaida.
“In short, al-Shabab has entered the fight alongside al-Qaida and is a co-belligerent with al-Qaida in hostilities against the United States,” the report says.
The broad use of the 2001 law under Obama to justify actions in numerous countries has raised concerns about how President-elect Donald Trump might use that precedent to claim authority for even broader use of military power. During the campaign, Trump vowed an aggressive fight against ISIS and other extremist threats emanating from the Middle East.