Both the House and the Senate have started inquiries into a reported second strike on an alleged drug boat in the Caribbean in September that killed the survivors of an initial strike.
The Defense Department conducted a second strike on a boat the Trump administration says was carrying drugs from Venezuela after the first strike on the boat failed to kill all of its occupants, one U.S. official and a source familiar with the Pentagon’s actions that day told NBC News.
The first of the two strikes conducted on Sept. 2 left at least two survivors, the officials said. The second strike killed the remaining survivors, according to the officials.
The boat was carrying 11 people, the Pentagon said at the time.
Both strikes that day were the first of several known U.S. strikes on vessels in the Caribbean Sea that the administration alleges carry drugs to the U.S. Since then, the Pentagon has conducted more than 20 strikes on vessels it says were transporting drugs from Venezuela, killing more than 80 people.
The Washington Post was the first to report about the second strike in the Sept. 2 boat attack. The Post reported that the second strike was ordered by the Joint Special Operations commander overseeing the strike who was complying with a previous order from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to "kill everybody."
NBC News has not confirmed that detail.
The second strike is significant as some legal experts say that if it was ordered to kill people who would be otherwise incapacitated, it amounts to a war crime.
Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., said Sunday on CNN that if the reporting on the second strike is true, “it seems to” constitute a war crime.
“If what has been reported is accurate, I’ve got serious concerns about anybody in that, you know, chain of command stepping over a line that they should never step over,” Kelly said. “We are not Russia. We’re not Iraq. We hold ourselves to a very high standard of professionalism.”
Speaking to reporters Sunday, President Donald Trump said he didn't know anything about the reported second strike, adding that Hegseth "said he did not say that, and I believe him 100%."
Asked whether he thought it would be legal if a second strike had taken place to kill those wounded in the first, Trump said, "I don't know that that happened. And Pete said he did not want that — he didn't even know what people were talking about.
"We'll look into it. But no, I wouldn't have wanted that. Not a second strike. The first strike was very lethal. It was fine, and if there were two people around, but Pete said that didn't happen. I have great confidence," he added.
“Pete said he did not order the death of those two men,” Trump said.
The top Republican and Democrat on the GOP-led Senate Armed Services Committee said in a statement Friday that the committee was aware of recent reports.
“The Committee has directed inquiries to the [Department of Defense], and we will be conducting vigorous oversight to determine the facts related to these circumstances,” Sens. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., and Jack Reed, D-R.I., said in the statement.
The Republican-led House Armed Services Committee followed suit Saturday, with Reps. Mike Rogers, R-Ala., and Adam Smith, D-Wash., saying in a joint statement that the House committee is “committed to providing rigorous oversight of the Department of Defense’s military operations in the Caribbean.”
“We take seriously the reports of follow-on strikes on boats alleged to be ferrying narcotics in the SOUTHCOM region and are taking bipartisan action to gather a full accounting of the operation in question,” Rogers and Smith wrote.
Chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell told the Post in a statement that “this entire narrative is completely false.” He told the newspaper that the “ongoing operations to dismantle narcoterrorism and to protect the Homeland from deadly drugs have been a resounding success.”
Hegseth posted Friday evening on X that the strikes were 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. Every trafficker we kill is affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization,” he wrote.
“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 added.
The Trump administration is ratcheting up pressure on Venezuela. Trump is weighing military action against the country following nearly two dozen known U.S. strikes on vessels in the region, which have killed at least 82 people. Trump said Saturday morning that Venezuela’s airspace should be considered “closed.”
The strikes have raised concerns in Congress about a lack of information from administration officials. Trump last month indicated that his administration will not seek congressional approval for targeting drug traffickers, saying, “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,” Trump added.
