As President Obama sends Congress a request to take military action against the Islamic State, an unlikely group of Republicans has emerged as his strongest defenders, pleading with colleagues to give him all the flexibility needed to pursue terrorists wherever he sees necessary.
While distrusting Mr. Obama’s executive authority on most other issues, the Republicans have mounted a strenuous campaign to try to leave all options open to the president when it comes to pursuing war, which has been raging for months but which many in the GOP say the U.S. is losing.
Sen. James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma, a frequent presidential critic, said Congress should approve “all necessary and appropriate force,” and Sen. Orrin G. Hatch of Utah, the chamber’s longest-serving Republican, said limiting what the U.S. can do in terms of geography or use of American troops could help the terrorists plan their own strategy.
Trying to give Mr. Obama more flexibility, however, is less a vote of confidence in his leadership and more a rebuke of his reluctance to do what is necessary to defeat the Islamic State.
“The reason that critics are looking into giving him a lot of flexibility is because it is actually a form of criticism,” a Senate Republican aide said. “The president himself doesn’t want flexibility; he wants people to buy into the ridiculous limitations he’s trying to set.”
Senators said they expect Mr. Obama to submit a resolution authorizing the use of military force, known as an AUMF in Capitol-speak, on Wednesday. That would end months of standoff in which Mr. Obama and Republican leaders each said it was up to the other to make the first move.
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Senate Democrats huddled with the White House’s top lawyer Tuesday to talk about the resolution, while Senate Republicans will meet Wednesday evening to talk about it.
“There is no more serious matter that ever comes before the Congress than an authorization for the use of military force, and we’re looking forward to seeing the language that the president feels like he needs,” said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Kentucky Republican.
The debate on the authorization centers on three main issues: how long the authorization will last; whether it will strictly define the places where the president can take action; and whether it will restrict the forms of military force available to the president, such as limits on ground forces.
Mr. Obama’s proposal is expected to ask for three years, and to prohibit American forces playing a major offensive combat role, though Sen. Bill Nelson, Florida Democrat, said the bill included an exception for special forces and advisors for defensive purposes.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, South Carolina Republican, said he will not support the authorization in its current state because it doesn’t allow the U.S. to attack troops fighting for Syrian President Bashar Assad.
Without that ability, Mr. Graham said Mr. Assad’s forces will wipe out members of the Free Syrian Army that the U.S. is training to combat the Islamic State, also known by the acronyms ISIL and ISIS.
“If you don’t have a strategy or an authorization that will allow us to protect the people we train to go fight ISIL on the ground from an Assad attack, then it won’t work,” he said. “It’s an unsound military strategy, I think it’s immoral.”
Sen. John McCain, Arizona Republican and chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said restricting strikes to a defined geographic area that excluded Syria would allow “Bashar Assad to butcher all he wants to, that’s crazy, that’s insane.”
He said he would like the resolution to extend beyond the Islamic State to include all groups committing acts of terror.
Democratic leaders are taking a cautious approach, saying the details they discussed with the administration in their closed-door meeting Tuesday are preliminary.
“This was the beginning, this was the opening salvo, and there’s nothing finalized yet so far as I could determine,” said Minority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat.
Republicans say giving the president more flexibility — and thereby, more responsibility — will prevent him from coming back to Congress in a year and saying that he couldn’t win the fight because his hands were tied, the GOP aide said.
“He wants to shirk responsibility where he needs to take it,” the aide said.
Giving him as many options as possible could also lead people to question the president on why he’s not using it, placing his foreign policy decisions under greater scrutiny, the aide said.
The president has been conducting an air campaign against the Islamic State since last summer, saying that he can do so under the 2001 and 2002 “war on terrorism” authorizations to President George W. Bush that allowed the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.
Some members of Congress have questioned the legality of current strikes, saying that the authorizations for more than a decade ago were never intended to apply to the current conflict. But all sides agree it would be beneficial to have a new authorization on the books to show the world that the U.S. publicly supports the war effort.
There is so far no timeline on when Congress could approve the authorization, especially as lawmakers already talk about amending the administration’s proposal.
Sen. Bob Corker, Tennessee Republican and chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, said he will put the resolution through a series of hearings, and that could be followed by hearings in the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Mr. McCain said his panel would not insist on rushing matters.
“We have to do it right,” he said.
• Jacqueline Klimas can be reached at jklimas@washingtontimes.com.
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