The head of the Republican-led Senate Armed Services Committee has pledged “vigorous oversight” after a Washington Post report that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave a spoken order to kill all crew members during the first U.S. strike against suspected drug smugglers in the Caribbean earlier this year.
A live drone feed showed two survivors from the original crew of 11 clinging to the wreckage of their boat following the initial missile attack on Sept. 2, The Post reported on Friday afternoon. The Special Operations commander overseeing the operation then ordered a second strike to comply with Hegseth’s directive, according to two people with direct knowledge of the operation, killing both survivors. Those people, along with five others in the original report, spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the matter’s sensitivity.
Late Friday, Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Mississippi), the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Sen. Jack Reed (D-Rhode Island), the committee’s ranking Democrat, issued a statement saying that the committee “is aware of recent news reports — and the Department of Defense’s initial response — regarding alleged follow-on strikes on suspected narcotics vessels.”
The committee, they said, “has directed inquiries to the Department, and we will be conducting vigorous oversight to determine the facts related to these circumstances.”
Following the publication of The Post’s report, Hegseth wrote on X that “these highly effective strikes are designed to be ‘lethal, kinetic strikes,’” adding: “Every trafficker we kill is affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization.”
“Our current operations in the Caribbean are lawful under both U.S. and international law, with all actions in compliance with the law of armed conflict — and approved by the best military and civilian lawyers, up and down the chain of command,” he said.
Hegseth opened his post with a swipe at “the fake news,” which he said “is delivering more fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting to discredit our incredible warriors fighting to protect the homeland.”
In some closed-door briefings to lawmakers, the Pentagon has declined to bring lawyers who could help explain the legal rationale behind the strikes. There has been extensive frustration among some members of Congress — including some Republicans — at the lack of detail provided to Capitol Hill, ranging from the intelligence to support the strikes to the identities of the people killed.
Last month, Wicker and Reed made public two letters they previously sent to the Pentagon, requesting the orders, recordings and legal rationale related to the strikes. The Defense Department, they wrote in the rare public warning, had surpassed the time required by law to provide some of the materials.
That information would have included Hegseth’s order to kill everyone in the first strike and the video of the attack.
The Trump administration has justified the attacks by arguing that the U.S. “is in a non-international armed conflict” with traffickers, while the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel said in a classified memo that U.S. military personnel engaged in lethal action in Latin America would not be exposed to future prosecution.
But some current and former U.S. officials and law-of-war experts have said that the Pentagon’s lethal campaign — which has killed more than 80 people to date — is unlawful and may expose those most directly involved to future prosecution.
The alleged traffickers pose no imminent threat of attack against the United States and are not in an “armed conflict” with the U.S., these officials and experts say.
The Joint Special Operations Command had said in briefing materials provided to the White House that the purpose of the “double-tap” strike was to sink the boat to avoid any navigation hazard to other vessels, according to one person who saw the report. Lawmakers received a similar explanation in two closed-door briefings, according to two congressional aides.
“The idea that wreckage from one small boat in a vast ocean is a hazard to marine traffic is patently absurd, and killing survivors is blatantly illegal,” Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Massachusetts) wrote in response to the report. “Mark my words: It may take some time, but Americans will be prosecuted for this, either as a war crime or outright murder.”
The U.S. military has carried out more than 20 strikes against boats in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean, according to officials and internal data seen by The Post.
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