Washington — President Trump said Sunday that he “wouldn’t have wanted” a reported second strike on an alleged drug boat earlier this year, while pledging to look into the matter that has sparked concern among lawmakers.
“The first strike was very lethal, it was fine and if there were two people around,” the president told reporters on Air Force One. “But Pete said that didn’t happen. I have great confidence in him.”
The Washington Post reported Friday that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave a verbal order to leave no survivors in the first U.S. strike on a suspected drug smuggling boat in the Caribbean in September. The Post reported that the first strike left two survivors in the water, and said the commander of the operation ordered a second strike to comply with Hegseth’s directive, killing the survivors.
Hegseth has called the reporting “fabricated, inflammatory and derogatory,” claiming the operations in the Caribbean are “lawful under both U.S. and international law.”
CBS News has not independently confirmed the Washington Post’s reporting.
The reporting sparked concern from lawmakers and experts, including a group of former military lawyers who argued in an assessment on Saturday that the reported second strike would be a violation of international or domestic law. In Congress, the leaders of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees pledged to investigate the reported follow-on strike. And Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia said on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” Sunday that the reported follow-on strike “rises to the level of a war crime if it’s true,” while GOP Rep. Mike Turner of Ohio agreed that it “would be an illegal act” if true.
The president defended Hegseth on Sunday, telling reporters multiple times that the defense secretary told him he never gave the reported order.
Pete Marovich / Getty Images 
“I don’t know that that happened and Pete said he did not want them, he didn’t even know what people were talking about,” Mr. Trump said.
The president said, “I’m going to find out about it, but Pete said he did not order the death of those two men.”
The developments come as the U.S. has carried out close to two dozen boat strikes in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean since the first strike on Sept. 2.
Asked by CBS News if he has concerns about the boat strikes more broadly, Mr. Trump said “very little, because you can see the boats, you can see the drugs in the boats and each boat is responsible for killing 25,000 Americans.”
“The amount of drugs coming into our country by sea is infinitesimal compared to what it was just a few months ago,” the president said.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-alleged-drug-boat-strike-venezuela-hegseth/
