Executive Branch
Just Security’s expert authors provide analysis of the U.S. executive branch related to national security, rights, and the rule of law. Analysis and informational resources focus on the executive branch’s powers and their limits, and the actions of the president, administrative agencies, and federal officials.
4,713 Articles
New al-Nashiri developments . . . regarding the MV Limburg and USS COLE charges [UPDATED as of late November]
In recent days the lawyers for Abd al-Rahim Hussain al-Nashiri, the military commission defendant charged with involvement in the bombings of the USS COLE and MV Limburg, have…
Authorizing Force: A Review of Turkish, Dutch and French Action
As the number of states using military force against ISIS in Syria and Iraq have increased, a series of domestic authorizations have emerged from their national executives and…
CIA Report: Giving Rebels Weapons Without Direct Support Rarely Helps
This morning, the New York Times ran a story about an internal CIA study commissioned in the last two years that found the agency’s historic efforts to arm rebels have had a…
Executive Order 12333 and the Golden Number
I recently moderated a debate between Professor Nathan Sales of Syracuse Law, Professor Laura Donohue of Georgetown Law, Bob Litt, general counsel of the Office of the Director…
Ending the Forever War is (Still) in Reach–a.k.a. How I Read the Goldsmith-Koh Exchange
Last week, Harold Koh wrote another important intervention in his efforts to help steer the United States out of “the Forever War.” That objective is to take the country eventually…
Leon Panetta: Administration’s Reliance on 2001 AUMF to Fight ISIL is Flawed
Leon Panetta’s book, “Worthy Fights: A Memoir of Leadership in War and Peace,” was released on Tuesday. Panetta’s perspectives benefit from a career of service…
The Wrong (and Right) Lessons Re: Congressional Inaction on ISIL
Editors’ Note: The following post is the fifth installment of a new feature, “Monday Reflections,” in which a different Just Security editor will take an…
Assessing the Claim that ISIL is a Successor to Al Qaeda—Part 2 (Organizational Goals)
The key question we are asking in this (two-part) series of posts is whether Congress’ 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) applies to ISIL. More precisely, we…
Bugs, Bounties, and Blowback
Last week news broke of a major software bug—now termed “Shellshock”—in open-source software used in Linux and UNIX operating systems. Security experts have warned that…
Sustaining the War Effort: Targeting Islamic State Oil Facilities
Much of the legal analysis about the United States and its coalition partners’ airstrikes in Syria to date has concentrated on whether such strikes are lawful. The commencement…
Here’s the New U.S.-Afghanistan Bilateral Security Agreement
After much confusion over which was the final security agreement (news organizations citing it had linked to a November 2013 “predecisional” version) I’ve just…
Constitutional “Cross-Ruffing”: My New Article
About a year ago, I wrote about the Second Circuit’s decision in the Ghailani case, in which, among other things, the Court of Appeals rejected a former Guantánamo detainee’s…