Is the U.S. Military at War with the Houthis and Iran-Backed Militias? The Answer Is Complicated.

Yet Jonathan Lord, a senior fellow and director of the Middle East security program at the Center for a New American Security think tank, told Military.com on Friday that thinking about the term in its political sense is more instructive.

In the political realm, being at war would require authorization from Congress, according to the War Powers Resolution of 1973. The law was passed in the waning years of the Vietnam War -- over President Richard Nixon's veto -- as a way to check the president's power to commit U.S. troops to combat.

One of the key provisions of the law mandates the president notify Congress within 48 hours of hostilities, and that sets off a 60-day count, at the end of which Congress has to authorize further military action.

That request doesn't always go over well. Congress can be reluctant, and disagreement can derail such efforts.

"The way presidents have kind of skirted that issue is that they simply re-notify every time forces enter into hostilities ... resetting the 60-day clock," Lord said. "More likely than not, every time U.S. forces engage the Houthis ... there will probably be a specific and separate notification of that event."

"Has the executive branch basically found the cheat code to avoid [war]?" Lord asked, rhetorically. "It seems so."

Lord noted that the Houthis and various Iranian-backed militias that the Pentagon says are behind the multitude of attacks also benefit from a lack of declared, recognized conflict.

"All of Iran's proxies, and partners, have really attempted to slowly boil the frog in a way that prevents the U.S. or Israel from being backed into a corner or to have to make a dramatic choice," Lord said.

The result is the current situation -- a kind of chess game in which each of the players is able to achieve some of their goals and please their respective constituencies while avoiding all-out conflict. But it also results in the ambiguous, vague language that everyday Americans struggle to parse and understand.

"There's this slow, steady separation between civilian and military worlds that has benefited policymakers," Lord said. "If most Americans can't feel or identify the cost of being at war, they have a freer hand."

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