New details emerged Wednesday about thesecond strikeby the U.S. military on an alleged drug smuggling boat on Sept. 2 that killed two survivors, according to a source familiar with the incident, including that the Pentagon had contingency plans for dealing with such situations.
The strike was the first U.S. military airstrike to target an alleged cartel boat the Trump administration said was smuggling drugs toward the United States.
An initial strike on the boat left two survivors who were later seen climbing back onto the boat, the source said.
They were believed to be potentially in communication with other boats in the vicinity and were salvaging some of the drugs that had been the boat's cargo, the source said.
Because of these actions, the two survivors were determined to be "still in the fight" and considered to be valid targets.
The second strike on the boat has led to criticism from some members of Congress that it may have constituted a war crime. They said there were violations of international law that protect enemy combatants no longer in the fight -- and of the maritime law guiding the rescue of persons shipwrecked at sea.
The new details emerged just before Adm. Frank "Mitch" Bradley, the commander of U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM), was headed to Capitol Hill Thursday to brief senior congressional leaders behind closed doors about the controversial second strike.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Bradley was in operational control of the second strike and that that the admiral was authorized to carry out per Hegseth's previous orders.
At the time of the Sept. 2 strike, Bradley was commander of Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), the command overseeing high-level special operations missions. He assumed command of SOCOM the following month.
Questions about the legality of the second strike have been swirling around Washington since it was firstreportedlast week by the Washington Post.
The source told ABC News that, as is typical with targeted strikes, a military lawyer was with Bradley providing legal advice throughout the Sept. 2 incident to ensure any actions were legally authorized.
On Wednesday, President Donald Trump told reporters that he would support the public release of any video the military may have of the incident.
"Whatever they have we'd certainly release, no problem," said Trump.
Hegseth reaffirmed on Tuesday that he had seen a live feed of the Sept. 2 operation but said that, after the initial strike, he had stepped away to carry on with his schedule and did not "personally see" the second strike or the two survivors killed.
After the first strike, Hegseth said, "I moved on to my next meeting" and found out sometime later that there had been an additional strike that sank the boat and "eliminated the threat."
Hegseth said Bradley had made "the right call, we have his back."
It appears that the second strike was in line with a contingency plan to deal with potential survivor situations that had been developed by the Pentagon prior to the first use of military force against drug smuggling boats, according to the source familiar with the incident.
If there were survivors from an initial strike on a boat, the U.S. military would try to rescue them if they were deemed to no longer be "in the fight" because they were shipwrecked and in need of help, the source said the plan called for.
But if they were deemed to be in communications with other cartel members, or took what appeared to be hostile action, they could then be targeted again, according to the plan, the source said.
3 key questions about the US boat strikes that killed survivors
The source said the U.S. military rehearsed the scenarios meticulously before the first strike against an alleged drug cartel boat on Sept. 2.
On Oct. 16, a strike on a semi-submersible left two survivors, but unlike the Sept. 2 incident the survivors were rescued and not targeted.
Those two survivors were deemed to "no longer be in the fight," according to the source, who explained that the semi-submersible they had been in had sunk in the airstrike and the pair were aboard a life raft not close to any of the drugs the vessel had carried.
The two survivors were rescued by a U.S. helicopter and days later were repatriated to their home countries of Ecuador and Colombia.
Another airstrike that left a survivor took place on Oct. 27 about 400 miles southwest of Acapulco, Mexico.
The boat that the survivor had been aboard sank in the airstrike and the survivor was spotted swimming in the ocean. The United States military asked Mexico to carry out a search and rescue mission for the survivor who was never located and is believed to have drowned.
Eighty-three people have been killed in the 21 airstrikes so far on suspected drug smuggling boats in the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific.
