Nine months into the Trump administration’s deadly campaign against so-called drug boats, there is a pattern to the strikes. And a glaring anomaly.

The U.S. military has conducted more than 60 attacks, resulting in over 200 extrajudicial killings in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean. In almost all the strikes, between one and four people lost their lives. In only one strike did the death toll of a single boat reach double digits: the first attack on September 2, 2025.

Since then, experts, lawmakers, and even military officials behind the scenes have been asking a simple but haunting question: Why was that boat packed with 11 people?

  • dan1101@lemmy.world
    cake
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    128
    ·
    2 days ago

    You mean that blowing up suspected drug boats with no oversight or arrests or trials might have caused some innocent people to die?!?!? Wow I hope the trump administration feels bad and learns from this.

    • Iusedtobeanalien@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      16 hours ago

      Blowing up speedboats with million dollar missiles made for spectacular TV, it was the spectacle that mattered.

      A few weeks earlier the same people were trying to convince the nation someone’s random knuckle tattoos were MS25 gang signs

    • Tiral@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      3
      arrow-down
      83
      ·
      2 days ago

      So, playing devil’s advocate, would you rather be killed instantly because you’re being human trafficked or let pass because it’s the middle of a “warzone” and you can’t be bothered because there are people with bigger weapons than human traffickers. So the people would make it to their destination and sold.

      Personally I’d rather die, but that’s me. I have zero love for captain dipshit, but you don’t get it both ways simply because you don’t like him. It’s not as simple to do what you’re talking about. Not that it’s justification, but it’s just not as simple as you’re acting like it is.

      • finallymadeanaccount@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        8
        ·
        2 days ago

        The US Navy possesses the ability to board vessels and see for themselves up close who the people on the boats are before they reach their destination.

      • AnarchistArtificer@slrpnk.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        51
        ·
        2 days ago

        I have a friend who escaped human trafficking, and whilst there were times that she came close to ending her own life to escape her situation, she is tremendously glad that she didn’t, because otherwise then her life would have been entirely defined by being a victim.

        Last year marked the point at which she had been free for longer than she had been treated as property. It’s taken a lot of work for her to heal from the trauma of being trafficked, and certainly she was extremely lucky to be able to escape from that situation, but if we give up on trying to save people like her, then we’re just papering over one tragedy with another.

        If I were being trafficked, I don’t know that I would’ve had the strength to endure as she has. However, I am certain that I would not want to be given up on.

      • Xerxos@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        4
        ·
        1 day ago

        Remember that they fucking killed the survivors instead of capturing them (which is illegal btw)

        They destroyed the boats and fired again if someone survived. Trafficking victims, probably some fisherman and yes, some people who possibly deserved it.

        This can’t be justified.

      • Asetru@feddit.org
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        35
        arrow-down
        3
        ·
        2 days ago

        Wow man, you’re one hell of a disgusting being. This isn’t 4chan, why don’t you take your ethics there and stop producing your typed diarrhea here?

        • MonkeMischief@lemmy.today
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          6
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          2 days ago

          Yeah. That’s the kinda rah-rah Big Damn Hero shit the U.S was allegedly supposed to be doing with all that defense funding. We’d absolutely be capable of being the heroic force from all the movies.

          …Instead of being no better than the random child-killing warlords of the week, just with better murder training and fancier bombs.

      • tocopherol@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        15
        ·
        2 days ago

        Not everyone trafficked in this way is a slave, they smuggle people sometimes who wouldn’t otherwise be able to leave their country. I’d rather not get blown up. And it is pretty simple, they are killing any boaters they want for the purpose of terrorism, they could simply not do that.