Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF)
252 Articles

Associated Forces, Material Support, and the Hidden Flaws in Ali v. Obama
As Steve previously noted over at Lawfare, on Tuesday, the D.C. Circuit affirmed the denial of yet another Guantánamo habeas petition in Ali v. Obama. Specifically, the court…

The D.C. Circuit and Guantánamo, Post-Filibuster Edition
I’ve written a lot (too much!) before about both the D.C. Circuit’s jurisprudence in post-Boumediene Guantánamo cases and the Supreme Court’s passivity in…

Key Issues in the New Senate Bill to Require White House Drone Strike Casualty Reports
This week, the Senate Intelligence Committee approved the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2014. The legislation contains an important section which would…

A New War?: The United States Involvement in Yemen’s Internal Armed Conflict [Updated]
In an op-ed in the Guardian last week, I argued that the United States appears to have become militarily directly involved in fighting a domestic insurgency in Yemen as an ally…

IHL, Transparency, and the Heyns’ UN Drones Report
In his critique of Christof Heyns’ new UN report on the right to life in the context of lethal drone strikes, Eric Jensen erects two straw men and then proceeds to knock them…

The Report of the UN Special Rapporteur for Extrajudicial Executions: Law or Advocacy?
As has already been discussed in several postings, the report of the UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Executions has been published and deserves close attention. To the…

The Problematic “Belonging To” Analogy: A Response to Goodman
[Editor’s note: Ryan Goodman replies to Professor Heller in a subsequent post.] In a recent post here at Just Security, Ryan Goodman offered a novel – and characteristically…

Al-Qaeda, the Law on Associated Forces and “Belonging to” a Party (did the new UN drones reports get it right?)
[Editor’s note: Kevin Jon Heller responds to Ryan in a Guest Post, and Ryan replies in a subsequent post. A Guest Post by UN Special Rapporteur Christof Heyns also addresses…

The President’s May 23d NDU Speech in Action: The Broader Significance of the al-Liby and Ikrima Operations [UPDATED Oct. 15]
If reported accounts thus far are accurate, the al-Liby and Ikrima capture operations last weekend are important illustrations of several things that the President and his top…

U.S. War in Pakistan (Not the One You Think)
The American public may not feel that it has had a meaningful political debate about going to war in nuclear-armed Pakistan outside the context of drone strikes or the stuff…

Al-Libi: Nine (or Fewer) Days of AUMF Detention
So reports the Associated Press: “U.S. officials say a Libyan terrorist suspect who was held aboard a U.S. warship is now in the United States.” That would mean that…

The Case of Abu Anas al-Libi: The Domestic Law Issues
It is now well-known that Abu Anas al-Libi was seized in front of his home in Tripoli on Saturday, October 5 and transported to a U.S. ship in the Mediterranean, where he is reportedly…