“We’ll consider it. But no, I didn’t want that, a second strike. The first strike was very deadly, that was fine, and if there were two people around – but Pete said there wasn’t… Pete said he didn’t order those two people to die.”
President Donald Trump speaks to reporters during a flight aboard Air Force One on Sunday.Credit: A.P
These claims have added to concerns in Congress about the legality and ethics of strikes against alleged drug traffickers. Some lawmakers have complained for three months about the lack of information about upcoming proceedings through official briefing channels.
In a joint statement, the top Republican and top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee said the group “will conduct vigorous monitoring to determine the facts surrounding these circumstances.”
Democratic senator and former naval officer Mark Kelly, who is a member of the committee, told CNN that if the claims were true, they amounted to a war crime.
U.S. Senator Mark Kelly said the claims against Higgsett, if true, amounted to war crimes.Credit: A.P
“We’ll have hearings, we’ll put people under oath,” he said. “I have serious concerns about anyone in this regard stepping over a line they should never have stepped over.”
Since the September 2 operation, more than 80 people have been killed on boats accused of transporting drugs to the Caribbean or the Pacific. Hegseth and the War Department routinely share visions of the strikes on social media.
The Trump administration has declared that it is in an armed conflict with cartels trafficking into the United States to kill Americans, and that the suspected traffickers are “illegal combatants” affiliated with Venezuelan gangs such as Tren de Aragua.
The administration is also increasing its military presence in the Caribbean, including at least one nuclear-powered submarine, reportedly the USS Newport News, and the world’s largest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford, which arrived in November.
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Trump confirmed that he had spoken with Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro, but would not reveal the contents of the call. “I wouldn’t say it went well or badly, it was a phone call,” he said.
CNN reported that Trump held a meeting at the White House on Monday evening (Tuesday AEDT) about Venezuela’s next steps, amid speculation that the US is planning to escalate military operations to force Maduro from power.
Meanwhile, Hegsett defended the boat attacks in several media posts, including a cartoon frog in a military helicopter shooting missiles at fishing boats stocked with drug packages.
“These highly effective strikes are specifically intended to be ‘lethal, dynamic strikes,'” he said.
“The stated intent is to interdict deadly drugs, destroy drug boats and kill narco-terrorists poisoning the American people. Every trafficker we kill is affiliated with a designated terrorist organization.”
Hegsett said U.S. operations in the Caribbean complied with U.S. and international law, and the law of armed conflict, and were endorsed by military and civilian lawyers up and down the chain of command.
“We have just started killing the narco terrorists,” he said.
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