Adm. Frank M. Bradley’s classified briefing on the U.S. military’s September strike on an alleged drug boat in the Caribbean left many members of Congress with more questions than answers.
One of the lawmakers who attended the briefing, Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., who is the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, told MS NOW’s Jen Psaki that what he witnessed raised “profound moral and ethical issues.”
Himes was among a handful of lawmakers who were shown an unedited video of the military operation, which has come under intense scrutiny after reports that the U.S. intentionally targeted survivors. The administration has defended the repeated strikes on what they referred to as “narco-terrorists,” claiming the attack was an act of “self-defense.”
“These sorts of videos in other contexts are not foreign to me,” Himes said on “The Briefing” on Thursday. “I’m not pearl-clutching over something I haven’t seen before. But what I saw in that video — and I’m hoping that the American people will have an opportunity to see it and judge for themselves — were two individuals whose boat had been incinerated and capsized, clinging for life without any visible means of survival or support, and then they were killed.”
The Democrat told Psaki that, contradicting reports, Bradley told the lawmakers that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth did not issue a “kill order” and was not in the room when Bradley instructed forces to conduct another strike. Himes, however, said that information does not absolve Hegseth of responsibility. “You can delegate authority, but you cannot delegate responsibility,” he added.
“There’s just no way to get away from the fact that the United States killed two individuals who were shipwrecked and in massive distress,” Himes added.
The Connecticut Democrat said he would “leave it to the lawyers to determine the precise elements of the legality” of the strike, but he stressed that “anybody who sees that video would have real questions about whether the United States is abiding by the values that distinguish us around the world.”
Psaki asked the congressman about a report from The Wall Street Journal that said Bradley had concluded the two survivors were attempting to continue their drug run and were believed to be communicating by radio with other smugglers. Himes said that based on what he heard at Thursday’s briefing, that was not the case. “I don’t want to get specific here, but there was no radio,” he said. “There were two individuals clinging to flotsam — that’s what there was. There wasn’t weaponry of any kind, there wasn’t a radio, there was no means for them to communicate, other than the fact that the fire and the smoke was fairly well visible for a long distance around. But there was no radio.” Himes urged the administration to release the unedited video. “America needs to see what it means to be doing what we’re doing in the Caribbean,” he said. “So I hope that video is made public to people.” You can watch Psaki’s full interview with Himes in the clip at the top of the page.
Allison Detzel is an editor/producer for MS NOW. Recommended
