“the goal of disrupting and deterring drug smuggling would not justify a policy of summarily executing criminal suspects without statutory authorization or any semblance of due process. That is why Trump is trying to justify his bloodthirsty anti-drug strategy by calling his targets “combatants” in a “non-international armed conflict”—a term he has stretched beyond recognition.
Congress has not recognized that purported “armed conflict,” and it is a counterintuitive label for the unilateral violence exemplified by the September 2 attack. The boat that Bradley destroyed, which reportedly “turned around before the attack started because the people onboard had apparently spotted a military aircraft stalking it,” was not engaged in any sort of attack on American targets and offered no resistance. The same was true of the vessels destroyed in subsequent attacks on suspected drug boats
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The violence in such attacks is so one-sided that the government’s lawyers claim blowing up drug boats does not constitute “hostilities” under the War Powers Resolution because U.S. personnel face no plausible risk of casualties. So we are talking about an “armed conflict” that does not involve “hostilities” yet somehow does involve enemy “combatants.”
Unless you accept that baffling premise, the attempt to justify Bradley’s second strike under the law of war is incomprehensible. “Two U.S. officials have said the military intercepted radio communications from the survivors to suspected cartel members, raising the possibility that any drugs on the boat that had not burned up in the first blast could have been retrieved,” The New York Times reports. “The military, they said, interpreted the purported distress call as meaning the survivors were still ‘in the fight’ and so were not shipwrecked.”
In reality, of course, those men were not “in the fight” to begin with, because there was no “fight.” A unilateral act of aggression by U.S. forces hardly amounts to a battle, and it is hard to see how a radio call for help qualifies as the sort of “hostile act” that the Defense Department’s manual says excludes someone from “shipwrecked” status. To illustrate that exception, the manual notes that “shipwrecked persons do not include combatant personnel engaged in amphibious, underwater, or airborne attacks who are proceeding ashore.””
https://reason.com/2025/12/04/boat-attack-commander-says-he-had-to-kill-2-survivors-because-they-were-still-trying-to-smuggle-cocaine/
“While the renewed congressional interest in the legal and moral justification for Trump’s bloodthirsty anti-drug strategy is welcome, that inquiry should not be limited to the question of whether one particular attack violated the law of war.
The details of Bradley’s defense nevertheless illustrate the outrageous implications of conflating drug smuggling with violent aggression. He argues that the seemingly helpless men in the water, who were blown apart by a second missile while clinging to the boat’s smoldering wreckage, still posed a threat because they could have recovered and delivered whatever cocaine might have remained after the first strike.
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In reality, there was no “fight” to stay in. The violence exemplified by this attack is so one-sided that the government’s lawyers claim blowing up drug boats does not constitute “hostilities” under the War Powers Resolution because U.S. personnel face no plausible risk of casualties. So we are talking about an “armed conflict” that does not involve “hostilities” yet somehow does involve enemy “combatants”—who, contrary to that label, are not actually engaged in combat.
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Bradley seems to have determined that the flailing men were engaged in a “hostile act” simply by existing near a boat remnant that might have contained salvageable cocaine. As ridiculous as that position is, it is only a bit more risible than Trump’s assertion that supplying cocaine to Americans amounts to “an armed attack against the United States” that justifies a lethal military response.
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“There is a risk that the focus on the second strike and specifically the talk of ‘war crimes’ feeds into the administration’s false wartime framing and veils the fact that the entire boat-strikes campaign is murder, full stop,” Cardozo School of Law professor Rebecca Ingber, an expert on the law of war, told The New York Times. “The administration’s evolving justification for the second strike only lays bare the absurdity of their legal claims for the campaign as a whole—that transporting drugs is somehow the equivalent of wartime hostilities.””
https://reason.com/2025/12/05/the-threat-that-supposedly-justified-killing-2-boat-attack-survivors-was-entirely-speculative/
How strong is China’s navy?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHakHz3WCNE
“Overall the incidents have mostly involved juveniles, who are “more playful and courageous in approaching boats,” said Zerbini, who also chairs the International Whaling Commission’s scientific committee.
He imagines a young orca butted its head against a boat’s rudder one time and when it moved the orca thought, “This is fun.” After ramming it a few times, a piece of the rudder broke off and that was even more fun because there was something to play with.
“There’s documented evidence of the orcas then playing with the pieces,” he said.
Orcas, which are also called killer whales, are not actually a whale species but are instead the largest member of the dolphin family.
This type of behavior isn’t surprising, given that orcas have culture, exhibit coordinated behavior, share knowledge and have long memories, said Rose.
“It’s a very sophisticated thing to do something for no purpose other than that it amuses you,” she said.”
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“Killer whale groups, especially younger individuals, are known for their fads and idiosyncrasies.
In the Pacific Northwest, one group of killer whales suddenly got into the habit of carrying dead salmon around on their heads in 1987. The fad arose and spread widely among the group that summer.
The salmon hats craze began with adolescent orcas but then spread, said Rose.
“By the end everyone was wearing them, including the adults,” she said.
Then the fashion dropped out of style as quickly as it had begun.”
https://www.yahoo.com/news/killer-whales-keep-attacking-sinking-090349442.html