‘Sources’ Tell CNN Hegseth Ordered Survivors of Drug Boat Strike to be Killed
“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.”
CNN’s Natasha Bertrand, formerly a reporter for Politico, is best known for boldly breaking the story of the pivotal and now-discredited letter signed by 51 former top intelligence officials claiming the Hunter Biden laptop story showed “all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.” The letter is viewed by many as having swayed the result of the 2020 presidential election.
In June, after President Donald Trump’s strikes on three Iranian nuclear sites, Bertrand reported that “sources” told CNN an early intelligence assessment produced by the Defense Intelligence Agency that the strikes “did not destroy the core components of the country’s nuclear program and likely only set it back by months.” It turned out the strikes caused considerable damage to the sites.
Once again, she has proven that, for her, evidence and context are optional. Currently, Bertrand is trying to identify an illegal military order to bolster insinuations made in the now-infamous “Seditious Six” video.
Her latest report claims that “sources familiar with the matter” told CNN that “the U.S. 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.”
According to Bertrand [Emphasis added]:
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.
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.
Officials have acknowledged not knowing the identities of everyone on board the boats before they are struck, CNN has reported.
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.
Hegseth called the report “fake news” on X, writing that “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.”
He noted that “Biden coddled terrorists, we kill them.”
And he reiterated that the strikes “are lawful under both U.S. and international law, with all actions in compliance with the law of armed conflict.”
As usual, the fake news is delivering more fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting to discredit our incredible warriors fighting to protect the homeland.
As we’ve said from the beginning, and in every statement, these highly effective strikes are specifically…
— Secretary of War Pete Hegseth (@SecWar) November 28, 2025
Other legacy media outlets linking to Bertrand’s “scoop” noted that Hegseth did not deny the allegations in his remarks, implying that the story must be true, just as CNN reported it.
Bertrand continued:
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 U.S. 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.
The article went on to cite “experts” claiming that the “double-tap” strike was illegal and that “the Republican-led Senate and House armed services committees” plan to “conduct ‘vigorous oversight’ on the follow-up strike.”
Let the investigations begin. CNN has chosen to present one side of the story — the darkest, most damaging interpretation they could find. But we’re not obligated to accept a narrative built on selective framing. Before Hegseth is judged, we need to see all the evidence, all the context, and the complete truth. This would not be the first time Bertrand has misled the public on an important story.
The crew members on these drug boats are well aware of the risks they take. But the promise of a huge payday from a single run makes the risk irresistible to them. According to The Wall Street Journal, the pilots of these vessels can earn up to $100,000 from a successful run.
The Left’s glee at the thought of nailing Hegseth — and ultimately Trump — is simply one more indication that they would rather side with narco-terrorists than the hundreds of thousands of Americans who have died as a result of their activities.
Elizabeth writes commentary for Legal Insurrection and The Washington Examiner. She is an academy fellow at The Heritage Foundation. Please follow Elizabeth on X or LinkedIn.
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Comments
“The Sources…”
The same people who bring us Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy, Trolls, Goblins, Giants, Mother Earth, Cupid, and a host of other beings that don’t exist, but are brought up regularly to control others.
Yup. Calling BS on this. The timing, along with the Sedition 6, is just too cute.
More anonymous sources familiar with the matter. These hacks are persistent if nothing else. Like a bad Hollywood sequel to the Russian collusion fraud.
Only days after a National Guardswoman was murdered, this story was planted to change the damning criticism of Joe Biden and to cover for the seditious-six and justify their video message and cast doubt so that they are off the hook. It is all planned. There is a midterm election to win and the Democrats have the GOP playing defense again.
As far as I am concerned, there should not be any survivors unless there is a reason for intelligence. This problem is far to severe to play nice.
That would be a war crime. An order to kill survivors who are out of the fight would be exactly the sort of blatantly illegal order that the military are trained to refuse. And the sort that, if obeyed, will get the person who obeyed it prosecuted.
If it is true that Hegseth ordered this, then it’s a major scandal. But I don’t believe it is true. Certainly such a serious allegation requires serious evidence, and so far there is none at all.
And of course here comes the legal know-it-all to help defend narcos.
If Hegseth ordered them to kill narco survivors he should get the Medal of Honor. Because it is an honor to have narcos wiped off the face of the earth and I get tired of idiotic wannabe civilized people covering for grotesque people
Do you dispute the law on this???? The law is clear and undisputed, deliberately killing helpless people in war is a crime, and it’s so obviously a crime that it’s not a defense to say that you were following an order and didn’t know it was illegal. If Hegseth did give such an order, he needs to be thrown in a cell for a long time. But it’s probably not true. A serious allegation requires serious evidence.
Yes, I dispute theclae on this. And going back to my other point to you, there is only one law of war. And that’s WIN. Fools like you keep trying to civilized barbaric behavior, except for barbaric behavior that is done against you. And it’s a good thing that over time people are starting to abandon the nonsense you support. It should have never been supported.
I would think it was probably more of a follow up strike to sink the boat than to “kill survivors”. Follow up strikes are not uncommon, nor are they illegal. If the objective is to sink the boat and the drugs in it and that didn’t happen with the first strike then you do it again. The presence of “survivors” isn’t really a factor.
If it was a building no one would be saying a word.
All of what you say is correct, but the allegation is that the order was specifically to kill the survivors. If that is true then it’s a war crime and whoever gave that order, as well as those who carried it out, must be put on trial. But it’s probably not true.
Not disagreeing at all. Just speculating on what seems to be a more realistic scenario.
‘Sources’ at planned parenthood are recorded on hidden camera bragging about harvesting dead baby parts to sell for profit, and leftists cheer while those who did the recording are prosecuted.
South American drug runners in international waters will be killed. Survivors will be killed again.
I don’t really care Margret.
IMO Narcoterrorist = Pirate and Pirates don’t rate any quarter being offered.
Amen.
Destroy them all. Let G*d sort them out.
The law of war requires it. There is no such thing as “no quarter”.
There is only one law of war. Win and make sure the other side spends as much of their resources as possible on their way to losing.
That is not true, and any soldier with that attitude deserves to be hanged. The laws of war are absolutely binding, and war criminals are hanged.
As we’ve just been told endlessly by everyone on our own side, every serviceman is very well aware of their duty to refuse illegal orders. So aware that they don’t need Democrat senators to tell them so. Now you’re suddenly denying any such thing!
Not true at all. Non State actors are by definition unlawful combatants and remain unprotected by the ‘law of war’ b/c they have chosen to operate outside the laws of and among Nations.
It is possible that a Nation State could choose to voluntarily restrain their actions to the boundaries of the ‘law of.war’ and apply them to Non State actors but they are under no obligation to do so.
Even where two Nation States are in conflict if one has signed onto X treaty provision re Y wartime issue of Z protocol it isn’t required to extend that to the second Nation State unless that second Nation State is also a signatory AND it faithfully abides by the protocol/provision.
The laws of war apply regardless of whether the combatants are legal or illegal. They are incorporated into US law and are enforceable in US courts. Killing enemies who have surrendered or are otherwise out of combat is outright murder. It makes no difference who the enemy is.
Thanks for agreeing with me that a Nation can voluntarily choose to extend the protections of ‘laws of war’ to Non State Actors and/or Nations not signatory to particular treaties as the USA has done to some extent but no Nation required to do so.
Even with that, Unlawful Combatants don’t receive the full panoply of protections afforded to Lawful Combatants. Furthermore determination of the tactical situation re end of engagement is made in the moment by the field Commander not second guessed by chairborne REMFs long after the event unless it was a shockingly obvious breach.
What a pansyass you are.
Cancel that.
Where is the law of war written?
Who enforces it?
What country are we at war with that the laws of war would apply?
What country are the dead narco terrorists uniformed soldiers of?
We know that the laws of war, voluntary as they are, don’t apply here, because if they did, we would have committed an act of war against another sovereign country. And no one is arguing that.
These are criminals in international waters. They very closely resemble pirates and slavers of old. Those were considered Hostis humani generis, the enemy of all mankind. Beyond the protection of any law. Any country that found them could kill them. And they did. Their navies slaughtered every pirate they could get their hands on. I see no difference.
18 USC 2441
Whoever, whether inside or outside the United States, commits a war crime, in any of the circumstances described in subsection (b), shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for life or any term of years, or both, and if death results to the victim, shall also be subject to the penalty of death.
[…]
(d)(1)(D): (D) Murder.—
The act of a person who intentionally kills, or conspires or attempts to kill, or kills whether intentionally or unintentionally in the course of committing any other offense under this subsection, one or more persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including those placed out of combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause.
[…]
(d) (3) Inapplicability of certain provisions with respect to collateral damage or incident of lawful attack.—
The intent specified for the conduct stated in subparagraphs (D), (E), and (F) or paragraph (1) precludes the applicability of those subparagraphs to an offense under subsection (a) by reasons of subsection (c)(3) with respect to—
(A) collateral damage; or
(B) death, damage, or injury incident to a lawful attack.
Thank you for agreeing with me.
Agreeing with you?! I just cited the law that definitively proves you wrong!
Cartels give no quarter, the deserve no quarter, or maybe drawing and quartering. Maybe that would make them reconsider?
Maybe, but the law says otherwise.
“Other legacy media outlets linking to Bertrand’s “scoop” note that Hegseth does not deny the allegations in his remarks, implying that the story must be true, just as CNN reported it.”
Along the same lines as Hey Joe Burden, when did you stop raping children. Not denying the story must make it true.
And its BS, because they HAVE denied it. Bluntly, completely, denied it and said it was false. They’re just lying because Hegseth hasn’t given individual statements to every one of 500 different ‘news’ outlets.
Obama was well known for enjoying and ordering double taps in the ME
Hey, Ben.
Was it illegal when Obama ordered extrajudicial drone strikes on American citizens, including children?
You helped lead the Obama NSC when this happened.
Should the Trump Justice Department investigate these killings?
Murders?
Ben Rhodes
@brhodes
This is illegal.
What is this “extrajudicial” nonsense? Those drone strikes were targeted at literal enemies of the USA in wartime. When the USA is at war, its armed forces are charged with killing the enemy. That’s what they’re for. Shooting enemy troops on the battlefield involves no judiciary,.
And in the entire history of the USA it has never made any difference what passports the enemy hold. If the person is an enemy soldier, he is a legitimate target, unless he’s been injured and no longer capable of fighting.
None of those drone strikes targeted civilians or wounded enemy soldiers.
Are you referring to the ones he ordered on US Citizens?
Numerous
How about the one where Biden bombed a family of ten for no apparent reason and nothing happened?
https://nypost.com/2021/09/17/pentagon-admits-its-killed-civilians-not-isis-terrorist-in-drone-strike/
Who cares what passport they held? They were enemy soldiers in wartime. No civilians were targeted; any civilians that died were collateral damage.
They are trying to
1.) get the military to rebel
2.) hope they win Congress in 2026 and impeach Trump, sighs, again
” . . . for her, evidence and context are optional.” Nicely put. Isn’t that the core of CNN’s journalistic mission?
So what. Even the marijuana these is different from what we smoked in the 1980s. And that’s without the possibility of being laced with fentanyl. Kill these rats.
“Let the investigations begin. CNN has chosen to present one side of the story — the darkest, most damaging interpretation they could find. But we’re not obligated to accept a narrative built on selective framing. Before Hegseth is judged, we need to see all the evidence, all the context, and the complete truth. This would not be the first time Bertrand has misled the public on an important story.”
How ’bout, NO. This is an unsubstantiated, scurrilous accusation that Hegseth has responded to. If there is evidence, the accuser is responsible to bring it forward, not the Secretary.
Name names or it’s a big nothingburger.
.
Would be great if the military knew who was talking and names those names. “Oh, we know, and guess who’s being court-matialed?”
I guess we’re making progress with these bleeding heart, illogical, progressive c*nts. They’ve stopped objecting to blasting them the first time and are now limiting their incessant whining and crying to blasting them the second time. They’re almost there. Kill some more and soon the prog loons will be fully inured to the reality.
1) we are not required to shoot only once. You shoot until you know your target is destroyed.
2) The narco-terrorists were not simple fisherman: the most elementary profiling suffices to establish who and what they were.
3) we are not obligated to take the narco-terrorists prisoner.
4) if we do take them prisoner, what then? No doubt the National Lawyers Guild and the Center for Constitutional Rights will be clamoring to represent these jokers in a civilian trial, and to turn that trial into a circus. Better to avoid all that.
5) there are those who say that Venezuela “only” represents 10% of the drug trade to the U.S. — why aren’t we dealing with Mexico? My response to them: “Patience, grasshopper.”
6) the previous status quo, of poison coming into our country, is not acceptable. We’ll perhaps need similar tactics to deal with the fentanyl.
Alas, there are few decent options other than whacking the narco-terrorists. So we must. Bomb away, Mr. Hegseth.
FAFO
#1
If the mission was “sink the boat” and the boat hadn’t sunk after the first strike, then it should have been struck again. The Japanese sunk one of our aircraft carriers in WW II after it had been put out of action, and nobody ever accused them of committing a war crime for doing so.
And the men in the boat? Shark food if their boat is destroyed. We’re under no obligation to assist them after sinking their boat. What should we do? Allow those in the water to suffer for hours as a variety of natural environmental take their toll over a period of hours and days until they’re all dead?
Striking the boat again in order to sink it is certainly legitimate. But the unsupported allegation here is that the order was specifically to kill the survivors. If that were true it would be a major scandal deserving of a Nuremberg-style outcome. But there’s no reason to believe it’s true.
When these mules bring a boat load of Fentanyl laced fake drugs that are lethal and have been warned of the consequences of bringing it to the US are killed, who is to blame? Would “We will chase you down and arrest you” be more of a threat considering our broken justice system? Consider the leftists judges who routinely release felons because of cashless bail. The narcos would be out of jail in ten minutes because it could not be proved that they had killed anyone.
The only complaint I have is that if the narco boat and its crew wasn’t taken with the first round, the aircrew needs to brush up a bit on their marksmanship skills.
Excellent suggestion.
It is very difficult to properly lead a target that is bouncing on waves at high speed. The gunners are doing a fine job, given the conditions, but they are getting better at it.
Obama didn’t even require a name
Or if there was any
Proof the individual was a terrorist, could be in the wrong place “looking suspicious “
But the media and
Congress just let
Obama literally to
Get away with murder…
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/obama-finally-talks-drone-war-but-its-almost-impossible-to-believe-him/
Natasha Bertrand + unnamed sources = propaganda operation
The formula computes every time.
Anonymous sources means no sources at all. Unless and until your source comes forward it’s just more TDS disguised as lsm reporting. Notice how all the others ran with it after cnn published it. That’s how russia, russia, russia was amplified. Same MO different result. There will be no special prosecutor. We don’t believe you.
Anonymous sources simply means that Bubba in the backroom of CNN just made the information u, passed it on to Bertrand and it bears no relation to actual reality in any way shape or form.
Natasha Bertrand has a track record of stupid, partisan hack Journolism.
In the real wars, like WWII, a famous submarine commander killed the survivors of one of the Japanese warships he sank. The Dems may, but I don;t want to give aid and comfort to the enemy.
Clay Blair’s account of the Buyo Maru massacre was hotly contested, but if it is true then Morton was a war criminal, and so were all his men who obeyed his illegal order.
My sources…which are not courtesy of the Magic Eight Ball…say that all Trump supporters think death is a pretty strong way of stopping narcoterrorism and fully support such action.
My elder son died from fentanyl. Yes, kill all the importers and distributors.
I’m so sorry
Honestly, I don’t see the problem.
“…boldly breaking the story of the pivotal and now-discredited letter signed by 51 former top intelligence officials…”
Wasn’t the Felonious Fifty-One letter padded with a lot of “Former Assistant Deputy Undersecretary in Charge of Paperwork” types?
The last 500 dramatic anti-Trump stories that relied on anonymous sources turned out to be complete lies, but this one is real. Honest. I had an anonymous source tell me so.
(and if you believe that….)
Sure he did… 🙄
Whenever any LeftMedia outlet, but especially CNN, cites anonymous ‘sources’ in their reporting, it is only prudent to wonder if the ‘sources’ even exist.
Frankly I’m tired of “sources” and I don’t care about the argument about the First Amendment protecting sources. It’s time to make sources illegal. At least at the Federal level.
The first amendment doesn’t protect sources. Nor does it protect “journalists”. It gives the news industry no more privileges than any other industry. The rights it protects belong to everyone equally. Just like the rights protected by the second, third, fourth, fifth, etc.
I agree with John Hinderaker on this subject:
“The story is based on anonymous “sources,” i.e., deep state leakers. Unless and until someone steps forward, identifies himself, tells us what he knows and how he knows it, and takes responsibility for his statements, I assume everything in the story is probably a lie.”
Watch the video (run it at half speed) ….
https://news.usni.org/2025/09/02/u-s-military-makes-precision-strike-against-suspected-drug-vessel-as-warships-gather-in-the-caribbean
Note the second blast near the end. Gas from the engines or tank.
Doubtful anyone survived the initial blast.
“Sources” … when they name their sources then there’s a chance they can be taken seriously, but only a chance.
The LOAC rules against a second strike specifically to kill survivors might be an issue. But, if they weren’t in the water, they weren’t “hors de combat” and weren’t protected in any way, really.
If the second strike was to sink the vessel, then it isn’t a problem, at all.
(BTW, the idea of not killing someone who is “hors de combat” is directly linked to you not “shooting to kill” – instead, shooting to stop – in a self-defense situation.)
Exactly. If true this story would be a big scandal, but we have no reason to believe it to be true.
These lies are designed to motivate ongoing disruptions by the 25-30% hardcore leftist base that dominates the Democrat Party nowadays. They no longer have any credibility elsewhere, though they do sometimes serve as a pretext for further lawfare by activist judges. There probably should be an investigation to determine if these “sources” constitute another deep state cell in the operations network, and then take them down to forestall further mischief. But it is quite likely that these “sources” were entirely fabricated,
Many people are saying that unnamed insiders heard whistle blowers claim that Hegseth actually said. “Then use more firepower the first time.”
I mean, he’s not wrong.
And that would be completely appropriate. But the main point is that anything attributed “unnamed insiders” deserves no more attention than it would if it were attributed to a ouiji board.
I’m wondering if another approach might be more effective, and that would be a policy of “Return to Sender”. Instead of blowing up the boats, you could intercept the boats and confiscate the cargo. Then, process the drugs into little plastic one-use sized packets and return them to the sender by “carpet bombing” the cartel-owned properties and the Venezuelan government properties with millions of these small packets. If China doesn’t stop participating in providing the precursors, you could carpet bomb Trenaman Square. The carpet bombing could be accomplished with drone technology so that no service members would be in danger. This would be almost impossible to clean up and I think it would send a stronger message than the cartel losing a small number of “expendable” resources. It would hit them right where it hurts. I can’t imagine that “Return to Sender” would be legally problematic.