Editor's note: Bradley Blankenship is a Prague-based American journalist, political analyst and freelance reporter. The article reflects the author's opinions and not necessarily the views of CGTN.

Yet again, a base hosting U.S. and other allied troops was attacked by rocket fire on July 7 in Iraq. While there has been no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, a series of U.S.-launched bombings against Iranian-backed militias that are suspected of having committed similar attacks in the past in Syria and Iraq raises the question of what happens next.

If precedent is of any relevance, however, we can expect a U.S. retaliation against whoever is believed to be behind the attacks. As Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby has made clear in the past, the U.S. believes it has full legal justification to launch such attacks.

"As a matter of international law, the United States acted pursuant to its right of self-defense. The strikes were both necessary to address the threat and appropriately limited in scope. As a matter of domestic law, the President took this action pursuant to his Article II authority to protect U.S. personnel in Iraq," Kirby said after strikes launched against Iranian-backed militias in Iraq and Syria on June 27.

However, this is a flimsy argument since the U.S. and its allies are occupying these two sovereign countries illegally. This is not just a blanket condemnation of all U.S. military occupations around the globe, which is something not at all difficult to justify, but a mere observation of the fact that both Baghdad and Damascus have made clear that U.S. and U.S.-allied troops are not welcome.

For its part, Damascus has made this clear from the very beginning of the Syrian conflict that the U.S. is an occupying force and, for its part, the U.S. has made it clear that it does not accept the legitimacy of the current Syrian government nor respects the sovereignty of Syria as a state since it is currently occupying about one-third of the country's land.

Likewise, Iraqis have long protested the illegal U.S.-led invasion of their nation in 2003, which at that time drew some of the largest demonstrations in human history – not just in Iraq, but around the globe. In January 2020, the parliament in Baghdad voted 170 to 0 to expel the thousands of U.S. troops occupying Iraq in response to the assassination of top Iranian General Qasem Soleimani and Iraqi Commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, which was a blatant act of war against both Iraq and Iran. The U.S. simply ignored this vote, but the message, again, is clear: The U.S. is illegally occupying Iraq.

Under international law, a military that is illegally occupying territory does not have the right to self-defense. Thus, the U.S. claim to "self-defense" on this matter is found nowhere in international law and is clearly meant just to please liberal hawks who just need their talking points in order from the Biden administration.

I think it's quite clear that this justification is tailored to a domestic audience because certainly, Iraqi officials don't buy it. As Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi made clear, the previously mentioned U.S. strikes a "blatant and unacceptable violation of Iraqi sovereignty and Iraqi national security."

However, even for domestic onlookers, the domestic legal justifications for these so-called "self-defense" strikes are flimsy and the Biden administration must know it. That's because every president since George W. Bush, except for Biden, has cited the 2002 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) against Iraq to justify increased military presence in Iraq – and also Syria. Biden didn't cite the AUMF because Congress is right now working to repeal the law altogether, which means if he would have cited this then he might lose the legal justification to bomb these countries on a whim in mere weeks.

So Biden instead opted to vaguely cite Article II of the U.S. Constitution, which is apparently based on the notion that Biden has a right to defend U.S. troops (illegally) stationed in another country. Domestically, this wouldn't even make sense because, according to the U.S. Constitution itself, these troop deployments should be authorized by Congress. At least that's how things are supposed to work in principle but rarely do.

In conclusion, the Biden administration has no legal justification whatsoever – zero – to bomb militias in Iraq and Syria, and that would be the same case whether those militias bombed U.S. troops or not. From both a domestic and international perspective, it is totally unacceptable that whoever is the sitting U.S. president apparently has the sole right to bomb any country at any time with zero legitimate justification.

If what Biden says is true and he really just wants to protect the troops, he should bring them home. Case closed.

(If you want to contribute and have specific expertise, please contact us at opinions@cgtn.com.)