Criteria for inclusion on these lists |
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1. Under Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution, Congress holds the exclusive power to declare war. The United States has only officially declared war five times in the War of 1812, the Mexican–American War, the Spanish–American War, World War I, and World War II. These declarations cover a total of 11 separate instances against specific nations. [3] [4] This would exclude American Civil War, the Vietnam War or the War in Afghanistan, in addition to many other conflicts out of these lists. To display a wider sense of the scope of U.S. involvement in "wars", these lists focus on any military conflicts involving the United States military regardless of size. |
2. There are several related articles that cover other forms of violence, such as Attacks on the United States, List of rebellions in the United States, List of massacres in the United States, and list of Family feuds in the United States. List of conflicts in the United States covers any type of violent action in the U.S., ranging from isolated homicide, to wars that would meet the criteria for inclusion in this article series. |
3. These lists do not focus on small-scale rebellions, single terror attacks, riots, assassinations, labor wars, state wars, feuds, range wars, or gang wars, as much as military conflicts involving the United States military (U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, U.S. Marine Corps, U.S. Airforce, U.S. Coast Guard (when acting in a military capacity), U.S. Space Force, the United States Intelligence Agencies (when acting in a military capacity; for instance, the Special Activities Center), the United States Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, NOAA Commissioned Officer Corps, Merchant Marines, and U.S. private military companies. |
4. These lists may include operations against piracy, if it involves the United States military, but generally should cover a whole operation and not a single action or battle, unless that particular operation was wide but only consisted of one major battle. For example, Operation Ocean Shield included several conflicts such as the Dai Hong Dan incident and the Maersk Alabama hijacking. Operation Ocean Shield can be included, because it is part of a wider conflict, but the Dai Hong Dan incident and the Maersk Alabama hijacking would not. Similarly, the Aegean Sea anti-piracy operations of the United States had several battles, but only one more thoroughly reported (Battle of Doro Passage). These operations would be included, but not the Battle of Doro Passage. An exception to the rule of single battles is if a conflict is a punitive action or hostage rescue mission and marks a single operation that only involved one battle, such as the Battle of Ty-ho Bay. |
5. List of 17th-century wars involving the Thirteen Colonies and List of 18th-century wars involving the Thirteen Colonies both serve as a historical prequel, in that they focus on the colonies and territories that would later make up the United States. As such, the criteria will be similar and different in several respects. [Note 2] |
6. These lists do not include conflicts where the United States was involved only in providing military aid (weapons, ammunition, vehicles and other equipment), humanitarian aid, financial assistance or diplomatic support to other parties (e.g., Bangladesh Liberation War, Calderonista invasion of Costa Rica, Haitian conflict, Nepalese Civil War, or Western Sahara War). |