Sun Tzu on authority to declare war (#326, Topic C)

After President Bush talked about "surge" in troop deployment in Iraq, I came across several essays on the authority to declare war in USA. Interestingly, for a topic as important as this, a story in TIME suggested that Founding Fathers never gave an unequivocal answer. Thus, I read, with great interest, an op-ed piece in the 1/31 issue of Washington Post. Responding to that piece, I submitted a letter to the editors of WP. Given my batting average on this front (about .020), I was not surprised that my submission did not appear in print. For the record, this submission is reproduced below.
Sun Tzu's Art of War (c512 BCE) begins with "War is a major affair of the State." In my translation of this classic (as The Art of Leadership by Sun Tzu, published in 2000), I provided the following annotation: "Affairs of the State are the domain of heads of state; of these, only two, deemed major, expect the head of state's personal attention: officiating in ceremonies honoring past kings and deciding whether to engage in war." After saying that "For better understanding, [war] needs to be delineated into five factors and analyzed separately," Sun Tzu offered "Direction," dealing with the decision to engage in war, as Factor 1, and "Commandership," dealing with the conduct of war, as Factor 4. He then subtly suggested that, for best results, the latter be delegated to another person. (Sun Tzu's work was intended to be read by heads of state.) America's Founding Fathers seem to have come to the same conclusion. As succintly stated by Fred Barbash, "Why Would Congress Surrender?" [Jan 31], they vested the Congress, which, collectively, represents the head of a democratic state) with the authority to "declare war" (Article I of the Constitution), while making the president the commander-in-chief in Article II.
While doing this entry, my TV in the background is tuned to C-SPAN2, showing Secretary of Defense Gates's testimony before a Senate Committee. A Republican senator from South Carolina, in his commentary, says: "We cannot have 435 commanders-in-chief or 435 secretaries of state." The implication is that the conduct of war is best given to the president -- which is not inconsistent with Article II of the Constitution. The question of who has the authority to declare war -- or its converse, to end a war -- is not addressed. Again, it is strange that an issue as important as the authority to declare/end a war is still under debate in a democracy that is more than 200 years old.