US Forces Destroy Drug Running Submersible and Take First Drug War Prisoners
The United States is repatriating the survivors of Thursday's attack on a drug-smuggling submersible craft somewhere in the Caribbean. President Trump announced the strike via Truth Social.
It was my great honor to destroy a very large DRUG-CARRYING SUBMARINE that was navigating towards the United States on a well known narcotrafficking transit route. U.S. Intelligence confirmed this vessel was loaded up with mostly Fentanyl, and other illegal narcotics. There were four known narcoterrorists on board the vessel. Two of the terrorists were killed. At least 25,000 Americans would die if I allowed this submarine to come ashore. The two surviving terrorists are being returned to their Countries of origin, Ecuador and Colombia, for detention and prosecution. No U.S. Forces were harmed in this strike. Under my watch, the United States of America will not tolerate narcoterrorists trafficking illegal drugs, by land or by sea. Thank you for your attention to this matter!
This accompanying video shows the mostly submerged craft being hit by what are probably two Hellfire missiles from a Predator drone.
This is the sixth known attack on drug cartel vessels since kinetic operations began in the Caribbean (Shots Fired! The US Military Sinks a Venezuelan Drug Runner (Updated) – RedState), and the first yielding prisoners. They were pulled from the water by a Coast Guard cutter.
Some social media accounts are trying to invent a scandal here. There isn't.
The usual policy. Something that the New York Times highlights.
Mr. Trump has previously described people aboard suspected drug-smuggling boats, which the United States has targeted in several deadly airstrikes since early September, as “unlawful combatants.” He has claimed the authority, widely disputed by legal experts, to summarily kill such suspects in military strikes as if they were enemy soldiers in a war.
It was a sharp break from the traditional handling of maritime smuggling, in which the Coast Guard would intercept boats and arrest people if suspicions proved accurate.
The decision to transfer the two survivors, however, was in line with the Coast Guard’s practice of repatriating or handing off to friendly countries people who were intercepted outside the United States as suspected traffickers.
By sending the men back home, the New York Times sees the administration avoiding some legal issues.
It also avoided the dilemma of what to do with the first people captured in what Mr. Trump has declared a formal armed conflict against drug cartels. Holding them as indefinite wartime detainees at the military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, could have opened the door to a court’s reviewing whether this really is a war as part of a habeas corpus lawsuit.
Prosecuting the men in U.S. civilian court would have raised other problems. For one, it was not known if any courtroom-admissible evidence was available to demonstrate that the survivors of the attack engaged in criminal wrongdoing.
To prove a connection to drug cartels, the government would have had to turn over very sensitive documents and images that would reveal intelligence sources and methods. Without the drugs, the administration might very well have had to kick the men free without an indictment, after which they'd probably apply for asylum in D.C., Maryland, or New York, and some wacko judge there would give them honorary citizenship.
The Times, being The Times, also goes in for some incredibly stupid crap: "Still, avoiding legal and logistical headaches by sending the men home seemed to contradict the administration’s stance that suspected drug smugglers pose such a severe danger that Mr. Trump can have the military summarily kill them."
The fact that the two men were pulled out of the water by the Coast Guard and spent two days in Navy custody means they probably told us anything they knew. That they came from a submersible effectively negates the "oh, poor fishermen" narrative the media would love to set up. The added advantage of sending these men home is that they will tell family and friends about their experience. That is sure to have an impact on recruiting.
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