U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth expressed support for the September 2 second strike on a suspected drug boat in the Caribbean. The decision has sparked debate over the killing of survivors. Hegseth said he would have made the same call himself.
On December 6, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth voiced support at the Reagan National Defense Forum in Simi Valley, California, for the September 2 strike on a suspected drug boat in the Caribbean. "I fully support that strike," Hegseth said. "I would have made the same call myself."
A video of the attack was shown to members of Congress behind closed doors on Thursday. Reports indicate the commander overseeing the operation ordered a second strike to eliminate two survivors, allegedly to follow Hegseth's direction that everyone should be killed. However, officials from President Donald Trump's administration have stated that Hegseth did not order the additional strike, and Admiral Frank Bradley, who led the Joint Special Operations Command at the time, determined the boat's wreckage needed neutralization due to potential cocaine aboard.
Hegseth reiterated his account, saying he witnessed the first strike on September 2 but left the room for another meeting. He declined to comment on whether the full video would be released, calling the matter "under review."
The September 2 attack marked the first of 22 U.S. military strikes on vessels in the southern Caribbean and Pacific, part of the Trump administration's campaign to curb illegal drug flows into the United States, resulting in 87 deaths. This includes one strike in the eastern Pacific on Thursday. While the administration frames these as a war against drug cartels—describing them as armed groups whose drugs kill Americans—the September 2 incident has raised concerns that U.S. forces may have committed a war crime.
According to two sources familiar with the imagery, the video depicted two shirtless, unarmed men clinging to wreckage after their vessel was destroyed, with no visible communications equipment. The Defense Department's Law of War Manual prohibits attacks on incapacitated, unconscious, or shipwrecked combatants if they refrain from hostilities and do not attempt escape, citing firing on shipwreck survivors as an example of a "clearly illegal" order.