Commander in Chief

Reflecting the clear consensus at the Constitutional Convention that the nation's highest civilian officer should have charge of the military, the Constitution states that the president “shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States.” That is the only statement in the document about the president's war-making power. Because the precise authority of the office of commander in chief is left undefined, presidents have been able to argue that they possess any power needed to improve the nation's defenses in peacetime or to help it prevail over an enemy in wartime, without usurping the power of the other branches or violating the law.

The Constitution does not give the president complete domination over the war-making function. The power to declare war is reserved for Congress, as is the ability to raise and maintain an army. Nevertheless, presidential use of the power to order U.S. forces into combat without a congressional declaration of war increased greatly during the twentieth century. Particularly during the half-century of cold war conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union, presidents claimed the right to deploy military forces on their own initiative. Presidents also had the support of congressional resolutions authorizing them to use force, such as the Tonkin Gulf resolution which Lyndon Johnson claimed as his legal authority for carrying out the war in Vietnam.

In 1973 Congress responded to Richard Nixon's continuing prosecution of the Vietnam War by passing the War Powers Act over Nixon's veto. The most important and controversial provisions of the law outlined the situations under which presidents could commit troops, permitted Congress at any time to order the president to disengage troops involved in an undeclared war, and required the president to withdraw armed forces from a conflict within sixty to ninety days unless Congress specifically authorized its continuation. The law has failed to substantially change presidential war-making prerogatives, however. Presidents since Nixon have strongly refused to invoke the law, and only once—in speeding the removal of U.S. forces from Lebanon in 1982—has the law forced a compromise over the use of military power. In 1991 George Bush allowed a dramatic debate and vote in Congress over authorization of his use of force in the Persian Gulf without admitting that his actions were subject to the War Powers Act. In the fall of 2002, George W. Bush sought, and eventually received, congressional authorization to use military force against Saddam Hussein's regime.

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Excerpt from here : [link to www.cqpress.com]