i ntroduction 19during World War II. Supportive though the Court was in such cases,
it either ratifi ed actions presidents had already taken and would con-
tinue no matter how the Court ruled (Lincoln), or dealt with matters
peripheral to core presidential war powers (Wilson and Roosevelt).
On rare occasions judicial intervention has curbed war-related exec-
utive authority. For example, responding to President Bush’s post-9/11
military and antiterrorist campaigns, the courts have upheld certain due
process rights of persons classifi ed by the administration as enemy com-
batants or suspected terrorists. But these decisions have not addressed
the core war-making powers of the chief executive.
Another potential informal restraint on a president is the military
establishment itself, which at times has been in a position to exercise
considerable sway. By the end of the Vietnam War, American military
commanders had come to believe that civilians could not be trusted
with decisions about whether and how to fight a war. As Bacevich
recounts, the self-confi dence of the military revived after its Vietnam-
era nadir, aided by the one-sided triumph over Saddam Hussein’s over-
matched legions in the Gulf War. Th at victory brought new prestige to
military commanders, particularly to General Colin Powell, chairman
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In the years after the 1991 war, he espoused
his own doctrine on the conditions for military action, calling for a
commitment to overwhelming force and a clear exit strategy from any
confl ict. But as I discuss in Chapter 5 , subsequent events showed the
ascendance of the military to be short-lived. Under George W. Bush
and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld—who marginalized Army
Chief of Staff General Eric Shinseki after he questioned the administra-
tion’s Iraq “cakewalk” expectations in the run-up to invasion—the voice
of the uniformed leadership was curbed sharply.
Th e absence of eff ective institutional checks within the government
on presidential military initiative leads us to look outside for possible
constraints. When contemplating major military operations, presidents
always consider how the public will react. Popular dissent has been
recurrent in many American wars. As a conflict continues with no
victory in sight and as casualties mount, the political risk to the pres-
ident and his party increases. Stalemates in Korea and Vietnam helped
the opposition win the White House in 1952 and 1968, respectively.
Even military triumph carries no assurance of future political success,