'Murder on the high seas’: Outrage after Trump admin vows to 'blow up' more boats

@ThePatientAnarchist

In summary:
- an armed vessel in international waters was heading at high speed toward American waters.
- the vessel was of such a type that it could easily make the trip to US waters if not stopped.
- the vessel had been monitored by various ISR assets and was known to be coming from an area with known narco-terror ops.
- the vessel was engaged by a US Navy warship and ordered to heave to and prepare to be boarded.
- the vessel instead engaged in evasive maneuvers and attempted to outrun the destroyer.
- the US ship fired warning shots and repeated the order to heave to.
- the vessel continued to engage in high-speed evasive maneuvers and instead of stopping or heading back to its home port it continued to attempt to outrun the destroyer.

The combatant commander had a choice to make:
- allow the vessel to use its superior speed and move out of weapons range, or
- stop the vessel.

The commander made the absolutely correct decision and bottomed the vessel.

A word of advice: If a Naval vessel from the US (or Canada or any NATO ally) orders you to heave to and prepare to be boarded, comply and maybe make sandwiches. Better to feed your hosts than be fed to the fishes.

@ThePatientAnarchist Speaking just for myself, I’d love to hear it.

So far it has all the markings of another rash tRUMP screw up that when it really hits the fan he’ll be frantically searching for a scapegoat to frame for it…

@KunsanVeteran see above. Looks like your reply and Sarabee's crossed paths.

@sarabee1995 Are you certain that it was a US Navy ship and not a Coast Guard ship? The Rules of Engagement are different.

Engaging that vessel not in self defense may have violated international maritime law.

@KunsanVeteran As far as I know it was a US Navy Arleigh Burke-class destroyer that engaged the Venezuelan narco-terrorists. Can you cite the law that you reference?

@sarabee1995 I am not an expert on maritime law, but bear in mind 1. We are not at war. Therefore, peacetime Rules of Engagement apply. This was international waters. 2. There were other options for apprehending the ship. The Coast Guard is quite adept at that type of operation and does so on a regular basis. 3. With whom did the order to use deadly force originate? The Captain does not have that authority and, unless attacked and operating in self defense, he may face charges under the UCMJ.

I will wait to hear what the Navy JAGs say about this, but there are significant holes in this story and simply saying that the vessel’s course originated in an area with known narcotics activities doesn’t seem like probable cause to use deadly force.

@KunsanVeteran
RoE are far more varied, complex, and situationally-specific than simply "peacetime" or "wartime".

Really? From what I heard, the narco-terrorist boat was faster than the destroyer or the RIBs onboard.

Very true, but my understanding is that they weren't there.

The weapons release order would've been authorized by the combatant commander on-site (the Captain of the ship) based on his reading of his RoE and issued to the tactical officer in the CIC where the TAO would have issued the order.

Really? Have you read his RoE?

I seriously doubt this.

The Navy JAG office would have already reviewed the RoE in context with maritime law before they were communicated to the combatant commanders in theater.

That's not all I said. I said:
- an armed vessel in international waters was heading at high speed toward American waters.
- the vessel was of such a type that it could easily make the trip to US waters if not stopped.
- the vessel had been monitored by various ISR assets and was known to be coming from an area with known narco-terror ops.
- the vessel was engaged by a US Navy warship and ordered to heave to and prepare to be boarded.
- the vessel instead engaged in evasive maneuvers and attempted to outrun the destroyer.
- the US ship fired warning shots and repeated the order to heave to.
- the vessel continued to engage in high-speed evasive maneuvers and instead of stopping or heading back to its home port it continued to attempt to outrun the destroyer.

The Captain and TAO made the right decisions. If you are ordered to heave to by a warship while attempting to head towards it's homeland or an allied homeland, I suggest you comply.

@sarabee1995 Are you denying that we are under Peace Time RoE? When was the war declared by Congress?

By your own narrative, the boat was being tracked. Fighters “could” have been scrambled to intercept it or helicopters, it could have been peacefully bordered by Coast Guard who routinely do these types of operations as drug smuggling interdiction is part of their responsibilities and core competencies, there were other options—the Captain did not have the authority to authorize deadly force. If the Captain wasn’t the ordering authority, who was? The order probably wasn’t a legal order—certainly not by anything in your narrative because there was no probable cause. There may have been enough cause of concern to board the boat; likely was, but certainly not to use deadly force.

Again, in all you wrote there is not probable cause to use deadly force. The fact that there were 11 people on the craft is atypical of a drug smuggling operation and heightens fear that this was human smuggling. Likely we’ll never know since all the evidence was lost.

This will be investigated and there may very well be charges under the UCMJ.

I will await the results of the investigation.

@sarabee1995 - allow the vessel to use its superior speed and move out of weapons range, or
- stop the vessel.

How do you move out of range of an attack helicopter?

@Vin53 Yes, I was just sent information implying this was an aerial strike, possibly by a drone, and not a naval action as I was previously led to believe. That does change things a bit. I'm just getting caught up on some of this today.

@KunsanVeteran Yes, of course we are not in a state of war. The last time Congress declared war was 1942 (I think). That doesn't mean that since the end of WWII the US Armed Forces (and NATO for that matter) has operated continuously under "peacetime RoE"!! That's just silly.

RoE are developed situationally-specific. I don't know what RoE the Navy is operating under in the Caribbean but I can assure you it is nothing as over simplified or generic as "peacetime RoE". Commanders have RoE and standing orders that give them latitude to defend themselves and the homeland.

But, with all that said, I did just receive information indicating that this was an air assault, not naval fire that took out the boat. For a lot of reasons, this is a very different situation and some of what I asserted above was incorrect.

@Vin53 The facts remain: we are not at war with Venezuela, despite tRUMP and Kegsbreath deploying multiple naval assets to the region Congress has not declared war, they must operate under peacetime Rules of Engagement. Drug Interdiction is not a core competency nor mission of the Navy—those operations are under Law Enforcement (principally the Coast Guard and DEA, etc.), the boat did not engage in hostilities against any American unit (evasion is not a hostile action and is not a justification for the use of deadly force), this all occurred in international waters, nothing the crew of this boat did constitutes probable cause, no US units were threatened and this was not an act of self defense (self defense could have been a viable defense but even then the minimum amount of force is required).

Had it been handled properly, the boat could have been boarded, any drugs or other evidence recovered, and (while not common, these types of incidents over the previous decades are not all that rare) the Coast Guard would once again have been credited with a successful operation netting $ xxxx resulting in enormous international pressure on Venezuela to behave.

Instead, the US has fired the first salvo in an undeclared war murdering 11 people without probable cause.

Now, do we even trust the dialogue that we are hearing from the tRUMP misadministration?

tRUMP has openly called for regime change in Venezuela and interfered with their most recent election to favor Maduro’s opposition. I could care less about who rules in Venezuela, but the fact is that Pam Bondi recently declared a $ 50 million USD bounty on Nicolas Maduro.. Last time the US did that we were at war.

We have watched tRUMP and Kegsbreath ****censored**** up every single thing they do from violations of the most basic OPSEC to not assuring proper security clearances (think Musk’s China briefing by Kegsbreath—ok, it got stopped before it actually happened, but no thanks to Kegsbreath!)

tRUMP knows nothing about the proper role of the military. All he knows is how to get his daddy to have his official medical record falsified to avoid the draft. He really couldn’t care less about The Law of Armed Combat.

Regardless of who gave the “weapons free” actual order or who pulled the trigger, it certainly looks more like piracy than a legitimate law enforcement operation.

And Maduro is threatening escalation into an intercontinental conflict.

@KunsanVeteran I have doubts as to whether it was even a drug boat. Maybe they were smuggling immigrants because I didn't see anything that looked like drug parcels on that boat.

And why do you have 11 guys on a boat transferring small amount of drugs anyway.

@Vin53 Exactly. It is really odd that there would be that number of people on a craft that size if they were smuggling drugs. The scale of economy explains that.

It is much more likely that it was a human smuggling operation. But as far as probable cause goes, it might even be something else.

Now 11 people are dead. We have no evidence to support what will likely be considered an act of piracy—it cannot be an act of war as we are NOT at war with Venezuela and this was not a response to a threat or attack. And, even if it had been, we are required to use the minimum force necessary.

This fails on oh so many levels…

@Vin53 @PicturesOfABetterTomorrow
@ThePatientAnarchist

I just saw this on YouTube but it parallels our thoughts closely.

[media=https://www.youtube.com/shorts/O5FDv_VuflE]

@KunsanVeteran Although ordinarily I would never consider something like this, but since Chris Hayes brought up the idea that tRUMP and his misadministration used AI to fake the video of the attack on the Venezuela boat I really have to admit that it could, in fact, be true. tRUMP is constantly posting AI generated fakes and memes. He and his orbit seem to function at that level.

We have no physical evidence. The details of the story have already changed several times since Tuesday (not at all uncommon with tRUMP lies & alibis).

And—of course—just as bombs were dropping re: the Epstein survivors & RFK, Jr, etc.

Was it all a fabrication designed to distract?

@KunsanVeteran that video states the situation very well :(

@Vin53 More and more is coming out regarding this incident (or possibly fake incident) and more and more questions about it.

[media=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQEq9E2DE6c]

Well worth watching and pondering.