Center on National Security Director Karen Greenberg discusses the aftermath of 9/11 in an article published by Teen Vogue.
On September 11, following the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, then-president George W. Bush addressed a grief-stricken nation. “Terrorist attacks can shake the foundations of our biggest buildings,” he said, “but they cannot touch the foundation of America.”
That would prove untrue. The days and months after 9/11 were full of rage, fear, and confusion, and what ensued was a frenzied restructuring of our legal and governmental systems in the name of national security. Many of these reforms were unlawful, immoral, and antithetical to the national values we were ostensibly trying to protect. And the unforeseen consequences of post-9/11 policy have had a long-lasting impact on Americans and foreigners, disproportionately disrupting lives in Black, brown, and Muslim communities.
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“In its untethered language,” Karen Greenberg, director of the Center on National Security at Fordham University School of Law, tells Teen Vogue, “the [Authorization for Use of Military Force] stated no geographical limits, no naming of an enemy, and no end date.” This problematically vague phrasing allowed for the expansion of armed conflict in the 21st century under the dubious justification of “fighting terror.”
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“In a way, coming back from the expansiveness of the Bush years, it was a big selling point,” says Greenberg. “Like, ‘We’re gonna do this war but do it strategically.’ However, it completely changed the legal framework. Who says who gets targeted?” She points out that the U.S. Constitution, outside of armed conflict, forbids killing Americans without due process, which is protected under the Fifth Amendment. But several Americans, including children, have been killed through drone warfare and targeted kill lists.