Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Saturday was noncommittal about releasing the full video of the U.S. military’s Sept. 2 attack on a boat in the Caribbean, after President Trump said he would release whatever footage his administration had.
During an appearance at the Reagan National Defense Forum in Simi Valley, Calif., Mr. Hegseth skirted questions about a public release of the video. Lawmakers have been debating whether a second strike in the Sept. 2 attack, which killed two survivors clinging to the boat’s wreckage, was a war crime.
“We’re reviewing the process, and we’ll see,” Mr. Hegseth said of potentially releasing the video.
He appeared more hesitant to do so than the president, who said on Wednesday that he had “no problem” releasing the footage.
Mr. Hegseth suggested that part of the review process was to make sure “sources and methods” were secure as U.S. military strikes in the Caribbean continued as part of an “ongoing operation.”
On Thursday, key lawmakers viewed footage of the Sept. 2 attack that showed the front portion of the boat overturned but still afloat after the first strike, according to lawmakers and congressional staff members who watched the video or were briefed on it. Two shirtless survivors clung to the hull and tried unsuccessfully to flip it back over.
The laws of armed conflict forbid targeting enemies who have been shipwrecked and are out of the fight. The debate over the second strike intensified after the Washington Post reported in late November that Mr. Hegseth had given the Special Operations commander overseeing the attack a spoken directive to kill everyone.
When asked on Saturday whether he had given such an order, Mr. Hegseth rebuked the newspaper and said its reporting was incorrect.
“It’s just patently ridiculous,” he said. “It’s meant to create a cartoon of me and the decisions we make, and how we make them.”
As for the two survivors of the first strike, he said they “could still be in the fight” and have access to radios to link up with another boat carrying drugs.
When asked if there was a protocol for dealing with survivors, Mr. Hegseth referred to an Oct. 16 attack by the U.S. military on a semi-submersible vessel suspected of smuggling drugs in the Caribbean. Two men survived and were being returned to their home countries.
“We didn’t change our protocol,” he said. “It was just a different circumstance.”
Ashley Ahn covers breaking news for The Times from New York.
The post Hegseth Skirts Questions About Releasing Video of Sept. 2 Boat Attack appeared first on New York Times.
