Powerful Republican Turns on Pentagon Pete’s ‘Kill’ Orders
Adam Downer
Sat, November 29, 2025
Anna Rose Layden / Stringer, FELIX LEON / Getty Images
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s alleged order to “kill” everyone aboard a suspected Venezuelan drug boat is slated to face intense oversight by the Republican-led Senate Armed Services Committee.
SASC chair Sen. Roger Wicker, a Mississippi Republican, and SASC member Sen. Jack Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat, released a joint statement Friday promising “vigorous oversight” into the facts regarding a Sept. 2 drug boat strike in which the U.S. killed everyone aboard a suspected narcotics vessel, then killed the two survivors of its first attack with another missile.
Roger Wicker (left) and Jack Reed (right) promised
“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 in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility," reads the statement.
“The Committee has directed inquiries to the Department, and we will be conducting vigorous oversight to determine the facts related to these circumstances.”
The SASC's statement promising
On Friday, the Washington Post reported that on Sept. 2, Pete Hegseth ordered that the U.S. military kill everyone on board a boat suspected of carrying narcotics off the coast of Trinidad.
A missile struck the vessel and killed nine of the eleven people aboard the ship. When the Special Operations commander overseeing the attack realized there were two survivors in the water, he fired a second shot to comply with Hegseth’s order, killing the remaining survivors.
The order may amount to a war crime—and therefore punishable by a fine, imprisonment, or death, per the U.S.’s definition of war crimes, which can apply to U.S. nationals and armed service members.
Todd Huntley, a former military lawyer, told the Post that the attack “amounts to murder,” because Venezuela and the U.S. are not in an armed conflict.
The order to kill everyone on board “would in essence be an order to show no quarter, which would be a war crime,” he said.
US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth insisted the orders were legal and the Washington Post was putting out
Hegseth, 45, brushed off the report as “fake news,” saying on X, “As usual, the fake news is delivering more fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting to discredit our incredible warriors fighting to protect the homeland.”
He also defended the legality of the attack by saying, “Every trafficker we kill is affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization,” and, “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."
Sean Parnell, a Pentagon spokesman and Senior Adviser, said on Friday, “We told the Washington Post that this entire narrative was false yesterday. These people just fabricate anonymously sourced stories out of whole cloth. Fake News is the enemy of the people.”
The protocol for future suspected drug boat strikes was altered after the Sept. 2 attack, and the military was instructed to detain any survivors.
Though the attacks have garnered bipartisan frustration, it’s unclear what the Senate Armed Services Committee could do if it concludes Hegseth’s strikes were illegal.
le104
In the weeks following the attack, President Trump, 79, attempted to retroactively insulate those responsible from legal consequences by informing Congress that the U.S. was in a “non-international armed conflict” with “designated terrorist organizations,” and therefore those who killed suspected narcotics traffickers would be exempt from criminal prosecution.
“That’s one of the problems with the law of armed conflict — the state using force is judge, jury, and executioner,” said Huntley.
Adam Downer
Sat, November 29, 2025
DAILY BEAST
Anna Rose Layden / Stringer, FELIX LEON / Getty Images
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s alleged order to “kill” everyone aboard a suspected Venezuelan drug boat is slated to face intense oversight by the Republican-led Senate Armed Services Committee.
SASC chair Sen. Roger Wicker, a Mississippi Republican, and SASC member Sen. Jack Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat, released a joint statement Friday promising “vigorous oversight” into the facts regarding a Sept. 2 drug boat strike in which the U.S. killed everyone aboard a suspected narcotics vessel, then killed the two survivors of its first attack with another missile.
Roger Wicker (left) and Jack Reed (right) promised
“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 in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility," reads the statement.
“The Committee has directed inquiries to the Department, and we will be conducting vigorous oversight to determine the facts related to these circumstances.”
The SASC's statement promising
On Friday, the Washington Post reported that on Sept. 2, Pete Hegseth ordered that the U.S. military kill everyone on board a boat suspected of carrying narcotics off the coast of Trinidad.
A missile struck the vessel and killed nine of the eleven people aboard the ship. When the Special Operations commander overseeing the attack realized there were two survivors in the water, he fired a second shot to comply with Hegseth’s order, killing the remaining survivors.
The order may amount to a war crime—and therefore punishable by a fine, imprisonment, or death, per the U.S.’s definition of war crimes, which can apply to U.S. nationals and armed service members.
Todd Huntley, a former military lawyer, told the Post that the attack “amounts to murder,” because Venezuela and the U.S. are not in an armed conflict.
The order to kill everyone on board “would in essence be an order to show no quarter, which would be a war crime,” he said.
US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth insisted the orders were legal and the Washington Post was putting out
Hegseth, 45, brushed off the report as “fake news,” saying on X, “As usual, the fake news is delivering more fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting to discredit our incredible warriors fighting to protect the homeland.”
He also defended the legality of the attack by saying, “Every trafficker we kill is affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization,” and, “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."
Sean Parnell, a Pentagon spokesman and Senior Adviser, said on Friday, “We told the Washington Post that this entire narrative was false yesterday. These people just fabricate anonymously sourced stories out of whole cloth. Fake News is the enemy of the people.”
The protocol for future suspected drug boat strikes was altered after the Sept. 2 attack, and the military was instructed to detain any survivors.
Though the attacks have garnered bipartisan frustration, it’s unclear what the Senate Armed Services Committee could do if it concludes Hegseth’s strikes were illegal.
le104
In the weeks following the attack, President Trump, 79, attempted to retroactively insulate those responsible from legal consequences by informing Congress that the U.S. was in a “non-international armed conflict” with “designated terrorist organizations,” and therefore those who killed suspected narcotics traffickers would be exempt from criminal prosecution.
“That’s one of the problems with the law of armed conflict — the state using force is judge, jury, and executioner,” said Huntley.
‘Kill Everybody’: Hegseth Reportedly Ordered SEAL Team 6 to Leave No Survivors After Caribbean Boat Strike
Ahmad Austin Jr.
Fri, November 28, 2025
(Ricardo Hernandez/AP photo/screenshot)
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reportedly ordered SEAL Team 6 to kill every individual aboard a suspected drug-trafficking boat.
In a Friday report from The Washington Post, sources described the scene and aftermath of the Trump administration’s first Caribbean airstrike in September.
Those with knowledge of the inner workings of the operation claimed Hegseth explicitly told the SEAL Team to leave no survivors. The Washington Post report continued:
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave a spoken directive, according to two people with direct knowledge of the operation. “The order was to kill everybody,” one of them said.
A missile screamed off the coast of Trinidad, striking the vessel and igniting a blaze from bow to stern. For minutes, commanders watched the boat burning on a live drone feed. As the smoke cleared, they got a jolt: Two survivors were clinging to the smoldering wreck.
Not long after the two survivors came into view, the Special Operations commander overseeing the attack reportedly ordered a second strike. The two men, sources said, were “blown apart in the water.”
As noted in the report, Trump posted a short video of the strike shortly after. The video notably excluded the follow-up strike. That, according to one source, could have dramatically changed public opinion. The report continued:
In one Oct. 16 strike in the Atlantic Ocean that killed two, another two men were captured and repatriated to Colombia and Ecuador. In a series of strikes on four boats in the eastern Pacific on Oct. 27 that killed 14 men, one apparent survivor was left to the Mexican Coast Guard to retrieve. The body was never found.
If the video of the blast that killed the two survivors on Sept. 2 were made public, people would be horrified, said one person who watched the live feed.
The Washington Post also reached out to the Pentagon for comment on the story. In a statement, Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell claimed the “entire narrative is completely false” and that the missions to eliminate suspected drug boats “have been a resounding success.”
The post ‘Kill Everybody’: Hegseth Reportedly Ordered SEAL Team 6 to Leave No Survivors After Caribbean Boat Strike first appeared on Mediaite.
Kaine says reported second Venezuela strike could be "a war crime if it's true"
Kaia Hubbard
Sun, November 30, 2025
Washington — Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia said Sunday that a reported U.S. follow-on strike on an alleged drug boat earlier this year "rises to the level of a war crime if it's true."
"If that reporting is true, it's a clear violation of the DoD's own laws of war, as well as international laws about the way you treat people who are in that circumstance," Kaine said on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan."
The Washington Post reported Friday that in the U.S.' first strike on a suspected drug smuggling boat in the Caribbean in September, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave a verbal order to leave no survivors. A follow-on strike was ordered to comply with the instructions, killing two survivors in the water, the Post reported. Hegseth called the reporting "fabricated, inflammatory and derogatory," claiming the operations in the Caribbean are "lawful under both U.S. and international law."
CBS News has not independently confirmed the Washington Post's reporting.
Targeting civilians or members of the armed forces who are wounded is prohibited under the Geneva Conventions, which also require the wounded to be "collected and cared for." A group of former military lawyers outlined in an assessment Saturday that the reported second strike would be a violation of international or domestic law. And the leaders of the House and Senate Armed Services committees pledged to investigate the reported follow-on strike.
Since the first strike on Sept. 2, the U.S. has carried out close to two dozen boat strikes in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean. Kaine outlined to CBS News' chief White House correspondent Nancy Cordes that lawmakers have been seeking answers to a number of questions about the strikes, including seeking evidence that "the folks on board were really narco traffickers," the question of why to strike rather than interdict, and the legal rationale for the strikes.
"We had to pry with a crowbar after weeks and weeks out of the administration, the supposed legal rationale for the strikes at international waters," Kaine said. "It was very shoddy."
The Virginia Democrat said "it's time for Congress to rein in a president who is deciding to wage war on his own say-so, which is not what the Constitution allowed."
Kaine has twice tried to pass war powers resolutions aimed at preventing the president from conducting strikes against Venezuela, earning support from two Republicans.
"That was before all of these assets have amassed around Venezuela, and before President Trump said that the airspace needs to be closed," Kaine said.
Mr. Trump posted on Truth Social Saturday that Venezuela's airspace should be considered "CLOSED IN ITS ENTIRETY." The post comes as the administration has increased pressure on Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, with signs that military action, including possible ground action, could be imminent.
Kaine said if there's ground action, the numbers in the Senate would change. And he noted that he would move "immediately" on a war powers resolution "should there be military action."
"The circumstances have changed in the months since we had that vote," Kaine said. "We think the escalating pace and some of the recent revelations — so, for example, the recent revelation about the kill everyone order apparently dictated by Secretary Hegseth — we do believe that we will get more support for these motions when they are refiled."
Rep. Mike Turner, an Ohio Republican who sits on the Armed Services Committee and previously led the House Intelligence Committee, also appeared on "Face the Nation" Sunday. He said "Congress does not have information" that the reported follow-on strike occurred.
"If that occurred, that would be very serious, and I agree that that would be an illegal act," Turner added.
Andy McCarthy Torpedoes Pete Hegseth’s Response to Blockbuster WaPo Report in Scathing Column: If True, It’s ‘At Best, a War Crime’
Joe DePaolo
Sun, November 30, 2025
Ahmad Austin Jr.
Fri, November 28, 2025
MEDIAITE
(Ricardo Hernandez/AP photo/screenshot)
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reportedly ordered SEAL Team 6 to kill every individual aboard a suspected drug-trafficking boat.
In a Friday report from The Washington Post, sources described the scene and aftermath of the Trump administration’s first Caribbean airstrike in September.
Those with knowledge of the inner workings of the operation claimed Hegseth explicitly told the SEAL Team to leave no survivors. The Washington Post report continued:
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave a spoken directive, according to two people with direct knowledge of the operation. “The order was to kill everybody,” one of them said.
A missile screamed off the coast of Trinidad, striking the vessel and igniting a blaze from bow to stern. For minutes, commanders watched the boat burning on a live drone feed. As the smoke cleared, they got a jolt: Two survivors were clinging to the smoldering wreck.
Not long after the two survivors came into view, the Special Operations commander overseeing the attack reportedly ordered a second strike. The two men, sources said, were “blown apart in the water.”
As noted in the report, Trump posted a short video of the strike shortly after. The video notably excluded the follow-up strike. That, according to one source, could have dramatically changed public opinion. The report continued:
In one Oct. 16 strike in the Atlantic Ocean that killed two, another two men were captured and repatriated to Colombia and Ecuador. In a series of strikes on four boats in the eastern Pacific on Oct. 27 that killed 14 men, one apparent survivor was left to the Mexican Coast Guard to retrieve. The body was never found.
If the video of the blast that killed the two survivors on Sept. 2 were made public, people would be horrified, said one person who watched the live feed.
The Washington Post also reached out to the Pentagon for comment on the story. In a statement, Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell claimed the “entire narrative is completely false” and that the missions to eliminate suspected drug boats “have been a resounding success.”
The post ‘Kill Everybody’: Hegseth Reportedly Ordered SEAL Team 6 to Leave No Survivors After Caribbean Boat Strike first appeared on Mediaite.
Kaine says reported second Venezuela strike could be "a war crime if it's true"
Kaia Hubbard
Sun, November 30, 2025
Washington — Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia said Sunday that a reported U.S. follow-on strike on an alleged drug boat earlier this year "rises to the level of a war crime if it's true."
"If that reporting is true, it's a clear violation of the DoD's own laws of war, as well as international laws about the way you treat people who are in that circumstance," Kaine said on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan."
The Washington Post reported Friday that in the U.S.' first strike on a suspected drug smuggling boat in the Caribbean in September, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave a verbal order to leave no survivors. A follow-on strike was ordered to comply with the instructions, killing two survivors in the water, the Post reported. Hegseth called the reporting "fabricated, inflammatory and derogatory," claiming the operations in the Caribbean are "lawful under both U.S. and international law."
CBS News has not independently confirmed the Washington Post's reporting.
Targeting civilians or members of the armed forces who are wounded is prohibited under the Geneva Conventions, which also require the wounded to be "collected and cared for." A group of former military lawyers outlined in an assessment Saturday that the reported second strike would be a violation of international or domestic law. And the leaders of the House and Senate Armed Services committees pledged to investigate the reported follow-on strike.
Since the first strike on Sept. 2, the U.S. has carried out close to two dozen boat strikes in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean. Kaine outlined to CBS News' chief White House correspondent Nancy Cordes that lawmakers have been seeking answers to a number of questions about the strikes, including seeking evidence that "the folks on board were really narco traffickers," the question of why to strike rather than interdict, and the legal rationale for the strikes.
"We had to pry with a crowbar after weeks and weeks out of the administration, the supposed legal rationale for the strikes at international waters," Kaine said. "It was very shoddy."
The Virginia Democrat said "it's time for Congress to rein in a president who is deciding to wage war on his own say-so, which is not what the Constitution allowed."
Kaine has twice tried to pass war powers resolutions aimed at preventing the president from conducting strikes against Venezuela, earning support from two Republicans.
"That was before all of these assets have amassed around Venezuela, and before President Trump said that the airspace needs to be closed," Kaine said.
Mr. Trump posted on Truth Social Saturday that Venezuela's airspace should be considered "CLOSED IN ITS ENTIRETY." The post comes as the administration has increased pressure on Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, with signs that military action, including possible ground action, could be imminent.
Kaine said if there's ground action, the numbers in the Senate would change. And he noted that he would move "immediately" on a war powers resolution "should there be military action."
"The circumstances have changed in the months since we had that vote," Kaine said. "We think the escalating pace and some of the recent revelations — so, for example, the recent revelation about the kill everyone order apparently dictated by Secretary Hegseth — we do believe that we will get more support for these motions when they are refiled."
Rep. Mike Turner, an Ohio Republican who sits on the Armed Services Committee and previously led the House Intelligence Committee, also appeared on "Face the Nation" Sunday. He said "Congress does not have information" that the reported follow-on strike occurred.
"If that occurred, that would be very serious, and I agree that that would be an illegal act," Turner added.
Joe DePaolo
Sun, November 30, 2025
MEDIATE
Screenshot
Conservative legal commentator Andy McCarthy torpedoed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s response to the blockbuster report which stated the secretary ordered the killing of everyone on board a suspected drug boat in the Caribbean in September.
In a scathing National Review column published late Saturday, McCarthy — who also serves as a Fox News contributor — made clear that he believes the events, as laid out in the Washington Post report, are patently illegal.
“If this happened as described in the Post report, it was, at best, a war crime under federal law,” McCarthy wrote. “I say ‘at best’ because, as regular readers know, I believe the attacks on these suspected drug boats — without congressional authorization, under circumstances in which the boat operators pose no military threat to the United States, and given that narcotics trafficking is defined in federal law as a crime rather than as terrorist activity, much less an act of war — are lawless and therefore that the killings are not legitimate under the law or armed conflict.”
The Post reported that a second strike was ordered to take out two survivors who were clinging for life to the damaged ship. McCarthy said that giving the administration the benefit of the doubt wouldn’t change his view of that reported second strike.
“Even if you buy the untenable claim that they are combatants, it is a war crime to intentionally kill combatants who have been rendered unable to fight,” McCarthy wrote. “It is not permitted, under the laws and customs of honorable warfare, to order that no quarter be given — to apply lethal force to those who surrender or who are injured, shipwrecked, or otherwise unable to fight.”
Hegseth, on X Friday, delivered a lengthy rebuttal to the Post report. But McCarthy notes that Hegseth “doesn’t actually rebut any assertion in the report.” McCarthy highlighted Hegseth saying, “As we’ve said from the beginning, and in every statement, these highly effective strikes are specifically intended to be ‘lethal, kinetic strikes. The declared intent is to stop lethal drugs, destroy narco-boats, and kill the narco-terrorists who are poisoning the American people.”
“Neither Hegseth’s statement nor the explanation attributed to [operation commander Admiral Frank M. ‘Mitch’] Bradley… makes legal sense,” McCarthy wrote.
He added, “This is a very serious matter. The administration’s defense can’t be that ‘we killed them because our plan is to use lethal force.'”
Screenshot
Conservative legal commentator Andy McCarthy torpedoed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s response to the blockbuster report which stated the secretary ordered the killing of everyone on board a suspected drug boat in the Caribbean in September.
In a scathing National Review column published late Saturday, McCarthy — who also serves as a Fox News contributor — made clear that he believes the events, as laid out in the Washington Post report, are patently illegal.
“If this happened as described in the Post report, it was, at best, a war crime under federal law,” McCarthy wrote. “I say ‘at best’ because, as regular readers know, I believe the attacks on these suspected drug boats — without congressional authorization, under circumstances in which the boat operators pose no military threat to the United States, and given that narcotics trafficking is defined in federal law as a crime rather than as terrorist activity, much less an act of war — are lawless and therefore that the killings are not legitimate under the law or armed conflict.”
The Post reported that a second strike was ordered to take out two survivors who were clinging for life to the damaged ship. McCarthy said that giving the administration the benefit of the doubt wouldn’t change his view of that reported second strike.
“Even if you buy the untenable claim that they are combatants, it is a war crime to intentionally kill combatants who have been rendered unable to fight,” McCarthy wrote. “It is not permitted, under the laws and customs of honorable warfare, to order that no quarter be given — to apply lethal force to those who surrender or who are injured, shipwrecked, or otherwise unable to fight.”
Hegseth, on X Friday, delivered a lengthy rebuttal to the Post report. But McCarthy notes that Hegseth “doesn’t actually rebut any assertion in the report.” McCarthy highlighted Hegseth saying, “As we’ve said from the beginning, and in every statement, these highly effective strikes are specifically intended to be ‘lethal, kinetic strikes. The declared intent is to stop lethal drugs, destroy narco-boats, and kill the narco-terrorists who are poisoning the American people.”
“Neither Hegseth’s statement nor the explanation attributed to [operation commander Admiral Frank M. ‘Mitch’] Bradley… makes legal sense,” McCarthy wrote.
He added, “This is a very serious matter. The administration’s defense can’t be that ‘we killed them because our plan is to use lethal force.'”
GOP senators to join Democrats in investigating Pete Hegseth ‘kill everybody’ allegations
Mike Bedigan
GOP senators to join Democrats in investigating Pete Hegseth ‘kill everybody’ allegations
Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience.Generate Key Takeaways
Senators from both sides of the political aisle will join forces to investigate allegations that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered there to be no survivors in U.S. airstrikes on alleged drug-running boats.
GOP Senator Roger Wicker, Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Democratic Senator Jack Reed announced the decision in a joint statement Saturday.
"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 in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility,” the statement read.
“The Committee has directed inquiries to the Department, and we will be conducting vigorous oversight to determine the facts related to these circumstances.”
It comes following a report from The Washington Post, which alleged that Hegseth had ordered military personnel to “kill everybody” on board a vessel in the Caribbean, suspected of carrying drugs, on September 2.
A first missile strike left two survivors, but a Special Operations commander overseeing the attack ordered a second strike to comply with Hegseth’s instructions to “kill everybody,” according to the Post, which cited officials with direct knowledge of the operation.
The two men were then “blown apart in the water,” according to the report.
Wicker and Reed’s statement is a significant development following weeks and now months of intense scrutiny around the administration’s siege of what it describes as “narco-terrorists.”
The attack on September 2 was the first of more than a dozen attacks on alleged drug-running boats that have killed more than 80 people over the last three months.
International investigators and members of Congress have since questioned the legality of the operations, alleging that the Trump administration’s deadly campaign amounts to extrajudicial killings. Other experts, speaking to The Independent, have labeled the actions as outright murder and a war crime.
News of the investigation comes following a report from The Washington Post which alleged that Hegseth had ordered military personnel to ‘kill everybody’ on board a vessel in the Caribbean, suspected of carrying drugs, on September 2 (US Secretary of Defense Pete Heg)More
The Independent has contacted the Department of War for comment on news of the Senate investigation.
Hegseth took to social media Friday to blast The Post’s report as “more fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting” aimed at discrediting the administration's work and insisted that the operations were lawful.
“As we’ve said from the beginning, and in every statement, these highly effective strikes are specifically intended to be ‘lethal, kinetic strikes,’” he wrote in the lengthy post.
The declared intent is to stop lethal drugs, destroy narco-boats, and kill the narco-terrorists who are poisoning the American people. Every trafficker we kill is affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization.”
He added: “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.”
Mike Bedigan
Sat, November 29, 2025
GOP senators to join Democrats in investigating Pete Hegseth ‘kill everybody’ allegations
Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience.Generate Key Takeaways
Senators from both sides of the political aisle will join forces to investigate allegations that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered there to be no survivors in U.S. airstrikes on alleged drug-running boats.
GOP Senator Roger Wicker, Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Democratic Senator Jack Reed announced the decision in a joint statement Saturday.
"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 in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility,” the statement read.
“The Committee has directed inquiries to the Department, and we will be conducting vigorous oversight to determine the facts related to these circumstances.”
It comes following a report from The Washington Post, which alleged that Hegseth had ordered military personnel to “kill everybody” on board a vessel in the Caribbean, suspected of carrying drugs, on September 2.
A first missile strike left two survivors, but a Special Operations commander overseeing the attack ordered a second strike to comply with Hegseth’s instructions to “kill everybody,” according to the Post, which cited officials with direct knowledge of the operation.
The two men were then “blown apart in the water,” according to the report.
Wicker and Reed’s statement is a significant development following weeks and now months of intense scrutiny around the administration’s siege of what it describes as “narco-terrorists.”
The attack on September 2 was the first of more than a dozen attacks on alleged drug-running boats that have killed more than 80 people over the last three months.
International investigators and members of Congress have since questioned the legality of the operations, alleging that the Trump administration’s deadly campaign amounts to extrajudicial killings. Other experts, speaking to The Independent, have labeled the actions as outright murder and a war crime.
News of the investigation comes following a report from The Washington Post which alleged that Hegseth had ordered military personnel to ‘kill everybody’ on board a vessel in the Caribbean, suspected of carrying drugs, on September 2 (US Secretary of Defense Pete Heg)More
The Independent has contacted the Department of War for comment on news of the Senate investigation.
Hegseth took to social media Friday to blast The Post’s report as “more fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting” aimed at discrediting the administration's work and insisted that the operations were lawful.
“As we’ve said from the beginning, and in every statement, these highly effective strikes are specifically intended to be ‘lethal, kinetic strikes,’” he wrote in the lengthy post.
The declared intent is to stop lethal drugs, destroy narco-boats, and kill the narco-terrorists who are poisoning the American people. Every trafficker we kill is affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization.”
He added: “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.”
Pete Hegseth lashes out at 'kill them all' report on boat strikes
Phillip M. Bailey,
Hegseth defends ditching 'kid gloves approach' to drug war
Pete Hegseth, secretary of the Department of War ‒ formally known as the Department of Defense ‒ at the White House in Washington, DC, on Nov. 18, 2025.
Under the 1949 Geneva Conventions, which are at the center of humanitarian rules and international standards, any wounded or sick combatants are to be retrieved and receive care by either side in a conflict.
But in his Nov. 28 post slamming the report, Hegseth argued that each "trafficker we kill is affiliated" with a terrorist group and the current U.S. operations in the Caribbean are lawful under both U.S. and international law.
"The Biden administration preferred the kid gloves approach, allowing millions of people — including dangerous cartels and unvetted Afghans — to flood our communities with drugs and violence," he said.
"The Trump administration has sealed the border and gone on offense against narco-terrorists. Biden coddled terrorists, we kill them."
Legal scholars and others, however, continue to raise questions about the legality of the boat strikes and spokespersons for the White House, Justice Department and the Pentagon have not responded to USA TODAY requests for comment on what laws the administration is using to justify the attacks.
Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in an Nov. 28 statement that his powerful panel has directed inquiries to the defense department about the strikes, "and we will be conducting vigorous oversight to determine the facts related to these circumstances."
Wicker, along with Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., the ranking Democrat on the committee, have sent Hegseth multiple requests for basic information including legal justifications and intelligence underpinning individual strikes.
Several legal experts have spoken out, too, saying Trump and his administration's rationale marks an unprecedented step by U.S. using the military, rather than law enforcement, to enforce the drug war with congressional approval.
During Trump's first term he expressed admiration for foreign leaders who instituted the death penalty for drug traffickers, including former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte who is facing crimes against humanity charges at the International Criminal Court for war on drugs policies.
Trump said last month he saw no reason to involve Congress when asked about the boat strikes, suggesting lawmakers and voters wouldn't mind such actions in the name of stopping illegal narcotics.
"I don’t think we’re necessarily going to ask for a declaration of war," Trump said. "I think we’re just gonna kill people that are bringing drugs into our country. We’re going to kill them. They’re going to be, like, dead."
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Hegseth slams 'kill them all' report on Caribbean boat strikes
Phillip M. Bailey,
USA TODAY
Sat, November 29, 2025
U.S Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is lashing out at a report that he ordered military officials to "kill them all" during one of the Trump administration's strikes in the Caribbean aimed a boat allegedly carrying drug cargo.
"As usual, the fake news is delivering more fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting to discredit our incredible warriors fighting to protect the homeland," Hegseth, 45, said in a Nov. 28 post on X.
The defense secretary was responding to a Washington Post story citing two anonymous sources that claimed he ordered troops to leave no survivors after a missile struck the vessel, which was traveling off the Trinidad coast, as two individuals were clinging to the smoldering wreckage.
Since September, the Trump administration has attacked at least 21 boats traversing international waters, killing 83 people. Trump and other officials defend the boat strikes as an attempt to crackdown on illegal narcotics flooding into the U.S., but lawmakers from both parties have criticized the administration for providing no intelligence briefings or other evidence about what the vessels are carrying.
"At this point, I would call them extrajudicial killings," Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., said during an Oct. 26 appearance on Fox News Sunday. "This is akin to what China does, what Iran does with drug dealers − they summarily execute people without presenting evidence to the public. So it's wrong."
Sept. 15, 2025: The U.S. military killed three people in a strike on a boat allegedly trafficking drugs in the Caribbean Sea.
Sept. 15, 2025: The U.S. military killed three people in a strike on a boat allegedly trafficking drugs in the Caribbean Sea.
Oct. 24, 2025: The U.S. military killed six people in a strike on a boat in the Caribbean, alleged to be carrying narcotics, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced on Oct. 24.
US military conducts deadly boat strikes against alleged drug traffickers
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Sept. 15, 2025: The U.S. military killed three people in a strike on a boat allegedly trafficking drugs in the Caribbean Sea.
Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., who shared the story about Hegseth's alleged order, raised similar concerns about the constitutionality of the strikes in an Nov. 28 post on X.
"If you want to know why Hegseth is panicking about reminders that there is accountably for giving or carrying out illegal orders, it’s likely because he knows he has given illegal orders to murder people," Murphy said.
The report comes amid a U.S. military buildup near Venezuela, which Trump has argued is necessary to combat gangs, such as Tren de Aragua, and others like Mexico's Sinaloa Cartel. A Venezuelan criminal organization known as Cartel de los Soles, for example, was designated as a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. on Nov. 24.
Sat, November 29, 2025
U.S Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is lashing out at a report that he ordered military officials to "kill them all" during one of the Trump administration's strikes in the Caribbean aimed a boat allegedly carrying drug cargo.
"As usual, the fake news is delivering more fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting to discredit our incredible warriors fighting to protect the homeland," Hegseth, 45, said in a Nov. 28 post on X.
The defense secretary was responding to a Washington Post story citing two anonymous sources that claimed he ordered troops to leave no survivors after a missile struck the vessel, which was traveling off the Trinidad coast, as two individuals were clinging to the smoldering wreckage.
Since September, the Trump administration has attacked at least 21 boats traversing international waters, killing 83 people. Trump and other officials defend the boat strikes as an attempt to crackdown on illegal narcotics flooding into the U.S., but lawmakers from both parties have criticized the administration for providing no intelligence briefings or other evidence about what the vessels are carrying.
"At this point, I would call them extrajudicial killings," Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., said during an Oct. 26 appearance on Fox News Sunday. "This is akin to what China does, what Iran does with drug dealers − they summarily execute people without presenting evidence to the public. So it's wrong."
Sept. 15, 2025: The U.S. military killed three people in a strike on a boat allegedly trafficking drugs in the Caribbean Sea.
Sept. 15, 2025: The U.S. military killed three people in a strike on a boat allegedly trafficking drugs in the Caribbean Sea.
Oct. 24, 2025: The U.S. military killed six people in a strike on a boat in the Caribbean, alleged to be carrying narcotics, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced on Oct. 24.
US military conducts deadly boat strikes against alleged drug traffickers
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Sept. 15, 2025: The U.S. military killed three people in a strike on a boat allegedly trafficking drugs in the Caribbean Sea.
Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., who shared the story about Hegseth's alleged order, raised similar concerns about the constitutionality of the strikes in an Nov. 28 post on X.
"If you want to know why Hegseth is panicking about reminders that there is accountably for giving or carrying out illegal orders, it’s likely because he knows he has given illegal orders to murder people," Murphy said.
The report comes amid a U.S. military buildup near Venezuela, which Trump has argued is necessary to combat gangs, such as Tren de Aragua, and others like Mexico's Sinaloa Cartel. A Venezuelan criminal organization known as Cartel de los Soles, for example, was designated as a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. on Nov. 24.
Hegseth defends ditching 'kid gloves approach' to drug war
Pete Hegseth, secretary of the Department of War ‒ formally known as the Department of Defense ‒ at the White House in Washington, DC, on Nov. 18, 2025.
Under the 1949 Geneva Conventions, which are at the center of humanitarian rules and international standards, any wounded or sick combatants are to be retrieved and receive care by either side in a conflict.
But in his Nov. 28 post slamming the report, Hegseth argued that each "trafficker we kill is affiliated" with a terrorist group and the current U.S. operations in the Caribbean are lawful under both U.S. and international law.
"The Biden administration preferred the kid gloves approach, allowing millions of people — including dangerous cartels and unvetted Afghans — to flood our communities with drugs and violence," he said.
"The Trump administration has sealed the border and gone on offense against narco-terrorists. Biden coddled terrorists, we kill them."
Legal scholars and others, however, continue to raise questions about the legality of the boat strikes and spokespersons for the White House, Justice Department and the Pentagon have not responded to USA TODAY requests for comment on what laws the administration is using to justify the attacks.
Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in an Nov. 28 statement that his powerful panel has directed inquiries to the defense department about the strikes, "and we will be conducting vigorous oversight to determine the facts related to these circumstances."
Wicker, along with Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., the ranking Democrat on the committee, have sent Hegseth multiple requests for basic information including legal justifications and intelligence underpinning individual strikes.
Several legal experts have spoken out, too, saying Trump and his administration's rationale marks an unprecedented step by U.S. using the military, rather than law enforcement, to enforce the drug war with congressional approval.
During Trump's first term he expressed admiration for foreign leaders who instituted the death penalty for drug traffickers, including former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte who is facing crimes against humanity charges at the International Criminal Court for war on drugs policies.
Trump said last month he saw no reason to involve Congress when asked about the boat strikes, suggesting lawmakers and voters wouldn't mind such actions in the name of stopping illegal narcotics.
"I don’t think we’re necessarily going to ask for a declaration of war," Trump said. "I think we’re just gonna kill people that are bringing drugs into our country. We’re going to kill them. They’re going to be, like, dead."
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Hegseth slams 'kill them all' report on Caribbean boat strikes
Survivors on ‘narco boat’ targeted by Trump order were blown apart after Hegseth verbal command to ‘kill everybody’: Report
Alex Woodward
Fri, November 28, 2025
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth allegedly instructed military personnel to leave no survivors behind as the Trump administration launched a series of strikes targeting boats suspected to carrying drugs towards the United States (REUTERS)More
The Department of Defense “has no response to this post and declines to comment further,” a Pentagon spokesperson told The Independent Friday.
Chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell told The Washington Post that the newspaper’s “entire narrative is completely false” and that “ongoing operations to dismantle narcoterrorism and to protect the Homeland from deadly drugs have been a resounding success.”
In a statement on Friday evening, Hegseth criticized what he called “fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting” but he did not refute the claims.
“As we’ve said from the beginning, and in every statement, these highly effective strikes are specifically intended to be ‘lethal, kinetic strikes,’” he wrote on X. “The declared intent is to stop lethal drugs, destroy narco-boats, and kill the narco-terrorists who are poisoning the American people.”
He claimed the airstrikes are compliant with “U.S. and international law” and under rules of armed conflict, “approved by the best military and civilian lawyers, up and down the chain of command,” he added.
In September, the Trump administration told Congress that the United States is formally engaged in an “armed conflict” with drug cartels that the president has labeled “unlawful combatants.”
Administration officials have labeled cartels “nonstate armed groups” whose actions “constitute an armed attack against the United States” and are now engaged in a “noninternational armed conflict” — or war with a non-state actor.
In the weeks that followed, the Trump administration directed more than a dozen strikes that have killed more than 80 people on vessels in the Caribbean and Pacific Ocean but have not publicly provided any evidence or legal justification for their deaths, according to lawmakers and civil rights groups.
A newly unveiled legal memo from the Department of Justice claims military personnel involved in the strikes won’t face criminal prosecution in the future, a defense that legal experts and national security scholars say has failed to prevent exposure to potential criminal liability.
The alleged traffickers pose no imminent threat to the United States and are not in what the administration has labeled an “armed conflict” with the country, according to officials and experts.
“The term for premeditated killing outside of armed conflict is murder,” said Brian Finucane, senior adviser with the International Crisis Group, a conflict policy nonprofit.
“And the Trump administration has not established that these strikes are taking place in an armed conflict nor that the targets would be lawful under the law of war,” he told The Independent this month.
Donald Trump shared video of a missile strike on September 2 that killed11 people on a boat that officials claim was carrying drugs headed toward the United States (White House)
While it’s not clear what instructions the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel has provided the administration, the White House appears to be using that guidance as a “legal permission slip to commit acts that might otherwise be criminal,” according to Finucane.
Asked why he won’t seek permission from Congress for his military campaign taking aim at South American regimes he claims are fueling a drug epidemic in the United States, Trump has said his government is “just going to kill people” instead.
“I don’t think we're going to necessarily ask for a declaration of war. I think we’re just going to kill people that are bringing drugs into our country, OK? We’re going to kill them,” Trump said during a White House roundtable with administration officials last month.
“They’re going to be, like, dead, OK,” he said.
Trump shared a 29-second drone footage of the first strike on September 2 in a post on his Truth Social account the following day, warning that that the attack also served as a “notice to anybody even thinking about bringing drugs into the United States of America. BEWARE!”
The president said the 11 people on board were “terrorists” from the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, which the administration has labeled a foreign terrorist organization.
Admiral Frank M. “Mitch” Bradley, the commander overseeing the operation from Fort Bragg in North Carolina, told personnel involved in the strike that survivors were legitimate targets because they could theoretically call other traffickers to retrieve them and their cargo, according to people with knowledge of the command who spoke to The Washington Post.
Bradley allegedly ordered the second strike to fulfill Hegseth’s command to kill all onboard.
At the time of the attack, he led the Joint Special Operations Command, which operates under command of the U.S. Special Operations Command and typically is responsible for performing classified military operations. He was later promoted to lead the parent organization.
SEAL Team 6 — formally known as the Naval Special Warfare Development Group, which handles complex and classified operations that may include higher-profile targets — reportedly performed intelligence collection to determine who was on the boat.
News of the so-called “double tap” strike was first reported by The Intercept within days after the attack.
Trump administration officials have posted drone-captured footage on social media chronicling more than a dozen attacks on alleged drug-carrying vessels that law-of-war experts say amount to illegal extrajudicial killings (US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth)More
Earlier this month, members of Congress last month received closed-door briefings on the attacks from administration officials, who were “unable to provide any credible explanation for its extrajudicial and unauthorized” attacks, according to Rep. Gregory Meeks, the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
The legal justifications are “dubious and meant to circumvent Congress’ constitutional power on matters of war and peace,” he said in a statement following the briefings.
Top Democrats on House committees overseeing national intelligence, armed forces and foreign affairs have also demanded a vote on a resolution to block the Trump administration from continuing the strikes.
“The Trump administration has not provided a credible rationale for its 21 unauthorized military strikes on vessels in the Western Hemisphere, which have resulted in the extrajudicial killings of dozens of individuals,” they said in a joint statement last week.
“Nor has this administration explained why it has deployed an invasion-level force of roughly 15,000 troops, a carrier strike group, and military aircraft for a mission it claims is about counter-narcotics,” they added. “This posture is wildly disproportionate to the stated objective and far more reminiscent of preparations for war.”
US military carried out second strike killing survivors on a suspected drug boat that had already been attacked, sources say
Natasha Bertrand, CNN
Sat, November 29, 2025
This screengrab of a video posted to Donald Trump’s Truth Social account on September 2, 2025, shows what Trump described as a Tren de Aragua boat carrying drugs from Venezuela. - Donald Trump/Truth Social
The US military carried out a follow-up strike on a suspected drug vessel operating in the Caribbean on September 2 after an initial attack did not kill everyone on board, sources familiar with the matter told CNN.
That September strike was the first in what became a regular series of attacks on alleged drug boats.
While the first strike appeared to disable the boat and cause deaths, the military assessed there were survivors, according to the sources. The second attack killed the remaining crew on board, bringing the total death toll to 11, and sunk the ship.
The Republican-led Senate and House armed services committees said they plan to conduct “vigorous oversight” on the follow-up strike.
Before the operation, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth ordered the military to ensure the strike killed everyone on board, but it’s not clear whether he knew there were survivors before the second strike, one of the sources said.
The strike and deaths were announced by President Donald Trump on the day of the attacks, but the administration has never publicly acknowledged killing survivors.
Trump said on Thursday that action on land to stop suspected drug-trafficking networks in Venezuela could “start very soon,” amid questions about the legality of the US military’s campaign around Latin America. Officials have acknowledged not knowing the identities of everyone on board the boats before they are struck, CNN has reported.
“I have been alarmed by the number of vessels that this administration has taken out without a single consultation of Congress,” Democratic Rep. Madeleine Dean told CNN this week. The House Foreign Affairs Committee member said she viewed in a sensitive compartmented information facility “some documents around the sinking of these vessels and the murder of the people on those boats. Nowhere in there was there evidence of what was going on.”
People briefed on the “double-tap” strike said they were concerned that it could violate the law of armed conflict, which prohibits the execution of an enemy combatant who is “hors de combat,” or taken out of the fight due to injury or surrender.
“They’re breaking the law either way,” said Sarah Harrison, a former associate general counsel at the Pentagon who now serves as a senior analyst at the Crisis Group think tank. “They’re killing civilians in the first place, and then if you assume they’re combatants, it’s also unlawful — under the law of armed conflict, if somebody is ‘hors de combat’ and no longer able to fight, then they have to be treated humanely.”
Details of the strikes were first reported by The Intercept and The Washington Post.
Hegseth in a social media post Friday continued to defend the strikes on alleged drug boats, writing, “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.”
“Every trafficker we kill is affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization,” Hegseth said.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth attends a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group in Brussels on October 15, 2025. - Yves Herman/Reuters
The US military was aware there were survivors in the water following the first strike on September 2 and carried out another to both sink the vessel and kill the remaining crew, the sources said. Pentagon officials told lawmakers in briefings afterward that the second strike was done to sink the boat so it would not pose a threat to navigation, the sources said.
The US military has hit boats multiple times in several instances to sink them, the sources said, but the September 2 strike is the only known instance where the military deliberately killed survivors.
It is not clear why the survivors were not picked up like they were following another strike in the Caribbean in October. In that instance, the Trump administration rescued two survivors and repatriated them to their home countries.
In a post announcing the September 2 strike on Truth Social, Trump said the US military had conducted “a kinetic strike against positively identified Tren de Aragua narcoterrorists in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility.”
The administration has tried to legally justify its strikes on the boats by claiming they are carrying individuals linked to roughly two dozen drug cartels engaged in an armed conflict with the US. The White House has said repeatedly that the administration’s actions “comply fully with the Law of Armed Conflict,” the area of international law that is designed to prevent attacks on civilians.
Many legal experts, however, say the suspected drug traffickers are civilians, not combatants, and that the strikes therefore amount to extrajudicial killings.
The top officials on the Republican-led Senate Armed Services Committee said late Friday their panel plans to conduct “vigorous oversight” on the follow-up strike.
“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 in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility,” the committee’s Republican chair, Sen. Roger Wicker, and top Democrat, Sen. Jack Reed, said in a statement.
“The Committee has directed inquiries to the Department, and we will be conducting vigorous oversight to determine the facts related to these circumstances,” the statement read.
Reps. Mike Rogers and Adam Smith, the top Republican and top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, respectively, followed suit Saturday evening, saying they are “taking bipartisan action to gather a full accounting of the operation in question.”
Before the US military began blowing up boats in September, countering illicit drug trafficking was handled by law enforcement and the US Coast Guard, and cartel members and drug smugglers were treated as criminals with due process rights.
But in a classified legal opinion produced over the summer, the Justice Department argued the president is legally allowed to authorize lethal strikes against 24 cartels and criminal organizations in self-defense, because the groups pose an imminent threat to Americans, CNN has reported.
That argument has potentially been undercut by the behavior of the suspected traffickers who have been targeted: In at least one instance, a boat had turned around and was moving away from the US before being struck. Survivors of the strike on September 2 also posed no imminent threat, since they were effectively incapacitated, the sources briefed on the strikes and Harrison noted.
Senior US defense officials and US allies have expressed skepticism of the legality of the military campaign. The commander of US Southern Command, Adm. Alvin Holsey, offered to leave his post during a tense meeting last month with Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine after he raised questions about the legality of the strikes, CNN has reported. Holsey will leave his post in December, just one year into his tenure as the SOUTHCOM chief.
Lawyers specializing in international law within the Pentagon’s Office of General Counsel have also raised concerns about the legality of the strikes. Multiple current and former uniformed lawyers told CNN the strikes do not appear lawful.
The United Kingdom is also no longer sharing intelligence with the US about suspected drug-trafficking vessels in the Caribbean because it does not want to be complicit in US military strikes and believes the attacks are illegal, CNN has reported.
This story has been updated with additional details.
CNN’s Veronica Stracqualursi contributed to this report.
Alex Woodward
Fri, November 28, 2025
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reportedly gave a verbal order to leave no survivors behind as Donald Trump’s administration launched the first of more than a dozen attacks on alleged drug-running boats that have killed more than 80 people over the last three months.
On Septeried 11 people accused of trafficking drugs into the United States.
mber 2, U.S. military personnel fired a missile striking a vessel in the Caribbean that car
When two survivors emerged from the wreckage, a Special Operations commander overseeing the attack ordered a second strike to comply with Hegseth’s instructions to “kill everybody,” according to The Washington Post, citing officials with direct knowledge of the operation.
The two men were then “blown apart in the water,” according to the report.
News of Hegseth’s alleged command follows intense legal scrutiny from international investigators and members of Congress alleging that the Trump administration’s deadly campaign amounts to illegal extrajudicial killings, which law-of-war experts speaking to The Independent have labeled outright murder and a war crime.
On Septeried 11 people accused of trafficking drugs into the United States.
mber 2, U.S. military personnel fired a missile striking a vessel in the Caribbean that car
When two survivors emerged from the wreckage, a Special Operations commander overseeing the attack ordered a second strike to comply with Hegseth’s instructions to “kill everybody,” according to The Washington Post, citing officials with direct knowledge of the operation.
The two men were then “blown apart in the water,” according to the report.
News of Hegseth’s alleged command follows intense legal scrutiny from international investigators and members of Congress alleging that the Trump administration’s deadly campaign amounts to illegal extrajudicial killings, which law-of-war experts speaking to The Independent have labeled outright murder and a war crime.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth allegedly instructed military personnel to leave no survivors behind as the Trump administration launched a series of strikes targeting boats suspected to carrying drugs towards the United States (REUTERS)More
The Department of Defense “has no response to this post and declines to comment further,” a Pentagon spokesperson told The Independent Friday.
Chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell told The Washington Post that the newspaper’s “entire narrative is completely false” and that “ongoing operations to dismantle narcoterrorism and to protect the Homeland from deadly drugs have been a resounding success.”
In a statement on Friday evening, Hegseth criticized what he called “fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting” but he did not refute the claims.
“As we’ve said from the beginning, and in every statement, these highly effective strikes are specifically intended to be ‘lethal, kinetic strikes,’” he wrote on X. “The declared intent is to stop lethal drugs, destroy narco-boats, and kill the narco-terrorists who are poisoning the American people.”
He claimed the airstrikes are compliant with “U.S. and international law” and under rules of armed conflict, “approved by the best military and civilian lawyers, up and down the chain of command,” he added.
In September, the Trump administration told Congress that the United States is formally engaged in an “armed conflict” with drug cartels that the president has labeled “unlawful combatants.”
Administration officials have labeled cartels “nonstate armed groups” whose actions “constitute an armed attack against the United States” and are now engaged in a “noninternational armed conflict” — or war with a non-state actor.
In the weeks that followed, the Trump administration directed more than a dozen strikes that have killed more than 80 people on vessels in the Caribbean and Pacific Ocean but have not publicly provided any evidence or legal justification for their deaths, according to lawmakers and civil rights groups.
A newly unveiled legal memo from the Department of Justice claims military personnel involved in the strikes won’t face criminal prosecution in the future, a defense that legal experts and national security scholars say has failed to prevent exposure to potential criminal liability.
The alleged traffickers pose no imminent threat to the United States and are not in what the administration has labeled an “armed conflict” with the country, according to officials and experts.
“The term for premeditated killing outside of armed conflict is murder,” said Brian Finucane, senior adviser with the International Crisis Group, a conflict policy nonprofit.
“And the Trump administration has not established that these strikes are taking place in an armed conflict nor that the targets would be lawful under the law of war,” he told The Independent this month.
Donald Trump shared video of a missile strike on September 2 that killed11 people on a boat that officials claim was carrying drugs headed toward the United States (White House)
While it’s not clear what instructions the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel has provided the administration, the White House appears to be using that guidance as a “legal permission slip to commit acts that might otherwise be criminal,” according to Finucane.
Asked why he won’t seek permission from Congress for his military campaign taking aim at South American regimes he claims are fueling a drug epidemic in the United States, Trump has said his government is “just going to kill people” instead.
“I don’t think we're going to necessarily ask for a declaration of war. I think we’re just going to kill people that are bringing drugs into our country, OK? We’re going to kill them,” Trump said during a White House roundtable with administration officials last month.
“They’re going to be, like, dead, OK,” he said.
Trump shared a 29-second drone footage of the first strike on September 2 in a post on his Truth Social account the following day, warning that that the attack also served as a “notice to anybody even thinking about bringing drugs into the United States of America. BEWARE!”
The president said the 11 people on board were “terrorists” from the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, which the administration has labeled a foreign terrorist organization.
Admiral Frank M. “Mitch” Bradley, the commander overseeing the operation from Fort Bragg in North Carolina, told personnel involved in the strike that survivors were legitimate targets because they could theoretically call other traffickers to retrieve them and their cargo, according to people with knowledge of the command who spoke to The Washington Post.
Bradley allegedly ordered the second strike to fulfill Hegseth’s command to kill all onboard.
At the time of the attack, he led the Joint Special Operations Command, which operates under command of the U.S. Special Operations Command and typically is responsible for performing classified military operations. He was later promoted to lead the parent organization.
SEAL Team 6 — formally known as the Naval Special Warfare Development Group, which handles complex and classified operations that may include higher-profile targets — reportedly performed intelligence collection to determine who was on the boat.
News of the so-called “double tap” strike was first reported by The Intercept within days after the attack.
Trump administration officials have posted drone-captured footage on social media chronicling more than a dozen attacks on alleged drug-carrying vessels that law-of-war experts say amount to illegal extrajudicial killings (US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth)More
Earlier this month, members of Congress last month received closed-door briefings on the attacks from administration officials, who were “unable to provide any credible explanation for its extrajudicial and unauthorized” attacks, according to Rep. Gregory Meeks, the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
The legal justifications are “dubious and meant to circumvent Congress’ constitutional power on matters of war and peace,” he said in a statement following the briefings.
Top Democrats on House committees overseeing national intelligence, armed forces and foreign affairs have also demanded a vote on a resolution to block the Trump administration from continuing the strikes.
“The Trump administration has not provided a credible rationale for its 21 unauthorized military strikes on vessels in the Western Hemisphere, which have resulted in the extrajudicial killings of dozens of individuals,” they said in a joint statement last week.
“Nor has this administration explained why it has deployed an invasion-level force of roughly 15,000 troops, a carrier strike group, and military aircraft for a mission it claims is about counter-narcotics,” they added. “This posture is wildly disproportionate to the stated objective and far more reminiscent of preparations for war.”
US military carried out second strike killing survivors on a suspected drug boat that had already been attacked, sources say
Natasha Bertrand, CNN
Sat, November 29, 2025
This screengrab of a video posted to Donald Trump’s Truth Social account on September 2, 2025, shows what Trump described as a Tren de Aragua boat carrying drugs from Venezuela. - Donald Trump/Truth Social
The US military carried out a follow-up strike on a suspected drug vessel operating in the Caribbean on September 2 after an initial attack did not kill everyone on board, sources familiar with the matter told CNN.
That September strike was the first in what became a regular series of attacks on alleged drug boats.
While the first strike appeared to disable the boat and cause deaths, the military assessed there were survivors, according to the sources. The second attack killed the remaining crew on board, bringing the total death toll to 11, and sunk the ship.
The Republican-led Senate and House armed services committees said they plan to conduct “vigorous oversight” on the follow-up strike.
Before the operation, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth ordered the military to ensure the strike killed everyone on board, but it’s not clear whether he knew there were survivors before the second strike, one of the sources said.
The strike and deaths were announced by President Donald Trump on the day of the attacks, but the administration has never publicly acknowledged killing survivors.
Trump said on Thursday that action on land to stop suspected drug-trafficking networks in Venezuela could “start very soon,” amid questions about the legality of the US military’s campaign around Latin America. Officials have acknowledged not knowing the identities of everyone on board the boats before they are struck, CNN has reported.
“I have been alarmed by the number of vessels that this administration has taken out without a single consultation of Congress,” Democratic Rep. Madeleine Dean told CNN this week. The House Foreign Affairs Committee member said she viewed in a sensitive compartmented information facility “some documents around the sinking of these vessels and the murder of the people on those boats. Nowhere in there was there evidence of what was going on.”
People briefed on the “double-tap” strike said they were concerned that it could violate the law of armed conflict, which prohibits the execution of an enemy combatant who is “hors de combat,” or taken out of the fight due to injury or surrender.
“They’re breaking the law either way,” said Sarah Harrison, a former associate general counsel at the Pentagon who now serves as a senior analyst at the Crisis Group think tank. “They’re killing civilians in the first place, and then if you assume they’re combatants, it’s also unlawful — under the law of armed conflict, if somebody is ‘hors de combat’ and no longer able to fight, then they have to be treated humanely.”
Details of the strikes were first reported by The Intercept and The Washington Post.
Hegseth in a social media post Friday continued to defend the strikes on alleged drug boats, writing, “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.”
“Every trafficker we kill is affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization,” Hegseth said.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth attends a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group in Brussels on October 15, 2025. - Yves Herman/Reuters
The US military was aware there were survivors in the water following the first strike on September 2 and carried out another to both sink the vessel and kill the remaining crew, the sources said. Pentagon officials told lawmakers in briefings afterward that the second strike was done to sink the boat so it would not pose a threat to navigation, the sources said.
The US military has hit boats multiple times in several instances to sink them, the sources said, but the September 2 strike is the only known instance where the military deliberately killed survivors.
It is not clear why the survivors were not picked up like they were following another strike in the Caribbean in October. In that instance, the Trump administration rescued two survivors and repatriated them to their home countries.
In a post announcing the September 2 strike on Truth Social, Trump said the US military had conducted “a kinetic strike against positively identified Tren de Aragua narcoterrorists in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility.”
The administration has tried to legally justify its strikes on the boats by claiming they are carrying individuals linked to roughly two dozen drug cartels engaged in an armed conflict with the US. The White House has said repeatedly that the administration’s actions “comply fully with the Law of Armed Conflict,” the area of international law that is designed to prevent attacks on civilians.
Many legal experts, however, say the suspected drug traffickers are civilians, not combatants, and that the strikes therefore amount to extrajudicial killings.
The top officials on the Republican-led Senate Armed Services Committee said late Friday their panel plans to conduct “vigorous oversight” on the follow-up strike.
“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 in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility,” the committee’s Republican chair, Sen. Roger Wicker, and top Democrat, Sen. Jack Reed, said in a statement.
“The Committee has directed inquiries to the Department, and we will be conducting vigorous oversight to determine the facts related to these circumstances,” the statement read.
Reps. Mike Rogers and Adam Smith, the top Republican and top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, respectively, followed suit Saturday evening, saying they are “taking bipartisan action to gather a full accounting of the operation in question.”
Before the US military began blowing up boats in September, countering illicit drug trafficking was handled by law enforcement and the US Coast Guard, and cartel members and drug smugglers were treated as criminals with due process rights.
But in a classified legal opinion produced over the summer, the Justice Department argued the president is legally allowed to authorize lethal strikes against 24 cartels and criminal organizations in self-defense, because the groups pose an imminent threat to Americans, CNN has reported.
That argument has potentially been undercut by the behavior of the suspected traffickers who have been targeted: In at least one instance, a boat had turned around and was moving away from the US before being struck. Survivors of the strike on September 2 also posed no imminent threat, since they were effectively incapacitated, the sources briefed on the strikes and Harrison noted.
Senior US defense officials and US allies have expressed skepticism of the legality of the military campaign. The commander of US Southern Command, Adm. Alvin Holsey, offered to leave his post during a tense meeting last month with Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine after he raised questions about the legality of the strikes, CNN has reported. Holsey will leave his post in December, just one year into his tenure as the SOUTHCOM chief.
Lawyers specializing in international law within the Pentagon’s Office of General Counsel have also raised concerns about the legality of the strikes. Multiple current and former uniformed lawyers told CNN the strikes do not appear lawful.
The United Kingdom is also no longer sharing intelligence with the US about suspected drug-trafficking vessels in the Caribbean because it does not want to be complicit in US military strikes and believes the attacks are illegal, CNN has reported.
This story has been updated with additional details.
CNN’s Veronica Stracqualursi contributed to this report.
