The White House has threatened to veto the authorization unless the worst provisions are deleted.
It's threating to veto an authorization bill that, even if it's adopted, won't actually spend any money.
Rather than veto defense authorization bills that limited his ability to transfer inmates, he has signed them, while raising questions about whether they intruded on his constitutional authority.
"If the president vetoes intelligence authorization, he will be voting in favor of waterboarding," Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York declared at a news conference.
In 1999, it vetoed U.N. authorization of military action to force the withdrawal of Yugoslav forces from Kosovo, leaving NATO to intervene to halt Slobodan Milosevic's repression of the province's ethnic Albanians — over the Kremlin's vehement objections.
Russia, while not a member of NATO, has said it would veto any such authorization.
The White House is so concerned about the changes that it has threatened to veto the defense authorization legislation if they are included.
WASHINGTON — President Obama will not veto a military authorization bill that contains several disputed provisions about the treatment of terrorism prisoners, the White House announced Wednesday, signaling a likely end to a political battle over detainees and executive power.
Mr. Lavrov said Russia would use its position on the United Nations Security Council to veto any United Nations authorization of military strikes against the government of President Bashar al-Assad of Syria.
Less than two weeks ago, the president threatened to veto a defense authorization bill now working its way through Congress unless lawmakers canceled funding to develop an alternative engine for the F-35 warplane, which Gates has deemed unnecessary.
Civil liberties, human rights and religious groups are now urging Mr. Obama to veto the military authorization bill for the 2013 fiscal year if it contains any language that denies the executive branch the authority to transfer Guantánamo detainees for repatriation or settlement in foreign countries or for prosecution in a federal criminal court.
