AS THE WARS in Ukraine and Gaza rage on, President Donald Trump says the U.S. military has attacked three Venezuelan boats in the Caribbean in recent weeks, killing at least a dozen people. Trump claims these boats were filled with gang members bringing drugs to the United States, and his administration appears to be gearing up for more deadly force in the Caribbean, a rare escalation in the Western Hemisphere — one that legal experts say he may not have the standing to carry out.
“These may be illegal since it’s not clear under what legal authority these strikes were conducted,” said Mara Karlin, a former top defense official in the Biden and Obama administrations now with the Brookings Institution.
Here’s what’s going on.
Only Congress can declare war
Congress hasn’t formally declared war since World War II. It has approved something more broad and less explicit, called authorization for use of military force, in other conflicts since then — a fact that experts say underscores the legislative branch’s reluctance over the years to fulfill its constitutional role in declaring war.
But these attacks in the Caribbean have piqued Congress’s interest, particularly since Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on social media that more strikes could be coming: “We will track them, kill them, and dismantle their networks throughout our hemisphere — at the times and places of our choosing.”
Yet there is no congressional authorization for this deadly force, and Trump hasn’t asked Congress for it.
More than 20 Democrats in Congress sent Trump a letter last week emphasizing this: “Congress made no declaration of war nor did it authorize the use of military force for future similar operations,” they wrote.
Trump officials argue that because the president signed an executive order that classified drug traffickers as foreign terrorists, he can go after the cartels.
After the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Congress authorized the broad use of military force to target terrorists in the Middle East. The authorization has since been used by multiple administrations in other conflicts, but “to say it also covers drug cartels in the Caribbean is a huge stretch,” said Mark Cancian, a retired military official now with the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Over the decades, Congress has given much of its authority on the use of military action to the executive branch. But at least one Republican has expressed discomfort with Trump using lethal force without sharing a reason grounded in the law: “If the new policy is that we will blow you up if we think you might be a drug dealer, that’s kind of a worrisome policy,” said Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky).
At issue is the evidence Trump has presented for these strikes
After the first strike, on Sept. 2, members of Congress said they knew little about who was killed, why, what was on the boat and where it was going, despite the military’s assertion to The Washington Post that it presented to lawmakers clear evidence that those killed were connected to a foreign terrorist organization.
“There is no evidence — none — that this strike was conducted in self-defense,” Sen. Jack Reed (D-Rhode Island) said on the Senate floor after being briefed by the administration.
Even if they were drug traffickers whom Trump has classified as terrorists, military experts have asked: Why kill them rather than have the U.S. Coast Guard try to intercept them?
“Traditionally, the U.S. would intercept smugglers or work with partners to do so,” Karlin said.
‘When superpowers break rules, others will too’
The U.S. military has said it wants to go after drug traffickers in Latin America — raising the prospect of more military operations close to home. (Cancian says full-out conflict or war is unlikely unless the U.S. builds up a much bigger military presence in the region.)
But even when it’s conducting limited strikes, experts say, the U.S. military should not be above accountability. It could make mistakes, like firing on a boat of migrants, and its actions could ultimately make the region more dangerous in unpredictable ways.
“International law is founded on the principle of reciprocity: States follow rules because they know others will too,” said Constanze Stelzenmüller, the director of the Center on the United States and Europe at the Brookings Institution. “When superpowers break rules, others will too, and there may come a time when the superpower finds that to be damaging to its interests.”
It’s also healthier for democracy when the president is forced to explain why military force is necessary, said Karlin.
“When the U.S. military takes action, the public should know why and how it did so, the impact of using force, and the legal authority used,” she said. “In the post-9/11 wars, the public often paid little attention to these issues. That wasn’t healthy for democracy then, and it has only grown more problematic.”
The Washington Post
