Libya

I see our military actions in Libya are drawing fire.

I am agnostic about the wisdom of what NATO is doing there. But I believe the president's actions are legal.

Have we forgotten "the shores of Tripoli" in the Marine Corps Hymn? That refers to a war we waged against the so-called Barbary Pirates from 1801 to 1805 under President Thomas Jefferson. We didn't declare war.

Throughout our history, the Navy and Marine Corps fought in foreign conflicts, including our "Quasi War" with France under President Adams, without a declaration of war. Our founders were quite suspicious of a standing army, but harbored no similar prejudices against the Navy and its associated Marines. The Constitution, for example, prohibits appropriations for the army longer than two years, but has no similar limitation for naval appropriations.

This historical and legal foundation became muddled by the creation of the Department of Defense in 1947.

Why we felt the need for DOD is a mystery. We had just triumphed in the greatest military conflict in history, with our original structure of a Department of the Navy and a War Department (the army). Unification was a solution in search of a problem.

There's nothing we are doing in Libya right now that can't be handled by what we used to call the "Navy/Marine Corps Team."

Keep the army in their garrisons until we need them and then call up the militia and declare war. It worked well for a long time. And put the Air Force back in the Army, where it belongs.