this post was submitted on 04 May 2026

303 points (99.7% liked)

News

37814 readers

1426 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil

Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.

2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.

Obvious biased sources will be removed at the mods’ discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted separately but not to the post body. Sources may be checked for reliability using Wikipedia, MBFC, AdFontes, GroundNews, etc.

3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.

Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.

4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source. Clickbait titles may be removed.

Posts which titles don’t match the source may be removed. If the site changed their headline, we may ask you to update the post title. Clickbait titles use hyperbolic language and do not accurately describe the article content. When necessary, post titles may be edited, clearly marked with [brackets], but may never be used to editorialize or comment on the content.

5. Only recent news is allowed.

Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.

6. All posts must be news articles.

No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials, videos, blogs, press releases, or celebrity gossip will be allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis. Mods may use discretion to pre-approve videos or press releases from highly credible sources that provide unique, newsworthy content not available or possible in another format.

7. No duplicate posts.

If an article has already been posted, it will be removed. Different articles reporting on the same subject are permitted. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.

8. Misinformation is prohibited.

Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.

9. No link shorteners or news aggregators.

All posts must link to original article sources. You may include archival links in the post description. News aggregators such as Yahoo, Google, Hacker News, etc. should be avoided in favor of the original source link. Newswire services such as AP, Reuters, or AFP, are frequently republished and may be shared from other credible sources.

10. Don't copy entire article in your post body

For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 3 years ago

MODERATORS

JonsJava@lemmy.world

gedaliyah@lemmy.world

little_cow@lemmy.world

303

Trump’s Killing Spree Isn’t Stopping the Flow of Drugs Into the U.S. (theintercept.com)

submitted 4 weeks ago by girlfreddy@lemmy.ca to c/news@lemmy.world

25 comments fedilink hide all child comments

The Pentagon claims that attacks on civilian boats in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific have severely curtailed the import of illegal drugs to the United States. And President Donald Trump says this has saved more than 1 million American lives. Experts call these assertions laughable and reporting by The Intercept shows that claims by the White House and War Department are baseless, phony, or both.

“The administration has failed to explain the long-term objectives of this mission or provide any evidence of reduced drug flows into the United States,” Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee said about the campaign on Thursday. “I would ask for a credible answer to this most fundamental question: What is the operation actually meant to accomplish?”

Experts in the laws of war, as well as members of Congress from both parties, say the strikes are illegal, extrajudicial killings because the military is not permitted to deliberately target civilians — even suspected criminals — who do not pose an imminent threat of violence. These summary killings are a deviation from the standard practice in the long-running U.S. war on drugs, in which law enforcement agencies generally detained suspected drug smugglers and brought them to trial on criminal charges.

all 26 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[–] LePoisson@lemmy.world 37 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)

what is the operation actually meant to accomplish.

Test the waters for what officers and enlisted men will not follow an unlawful orders. Or the other way, make sure that the people will follow orders they should not.

I genuinely think that's what it's for. Testing the waters (if you'll pardon the pun) for pushback over what I would say is pretty blatant violation of international law and overall norms our Navy has abided for decades now regarding how we do or do not intercept and interact with these "drug boats".

I would argue it's pretty wrong and fucked up just on the face of it to straight murder people for drug trafficking and it still is against the law. Not that we seem to care anymore.

Even in some contrived scenario where they were flying a flag that said "cocaine on board for sure" and the dudes driving the boat all were clearly cracked out and swore they were gonna sell them off to someone in the USA - it still would be inhumane and improper to do what we are.

I'll tell you one thing for sure, any sort of good will agreements or help we may have gotten from partners in South America is gone now. If the goal was to lessen the amount of drug use in the USA, hell even if it was simply to try to slow and control the supply - this is yielding the opposite result.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 11 points 4 weeks ago (2 children)

murder people for drug trafficking

murder people SUSPECTED for drug trafficking.

[–] grue@lemmy.world 12 points 4 weeks ago* (last edited 4 weeks ago) (1 children)

But that was his point: even if it were 100.000000% blatantly obvious that they were guilty -- or Hell, even if they were convicted of it in a legitimate jury trial -- it would still be both illegal and morally wrong to execute them for it, let alone summarily!

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 5 points 4 weeks ago

Yes, that's a good point.

PS:
I like your accuracy on the 100%. 👍

[–] LePoisson@lemmy.world 5 points 4 weeks ago (2 children)

Oh I know that's what makes it even worse. I'm just saying even if they were guilty of snuggling drugs the penalty shouldn't be extrajudicial execution.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 5 points 4 weeks ago

Absolutely, as someone wrote, it's probably a test to see which officers will perform illegal orders.
There is no law under which this is legal.

[–] watson387@sopuli.xyz 5 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)

All drugs need a good snuggling.

[–] LePoisson@lemmy.world 5 points 4 weeks ago

I saw the typo as soon as I hit post but I thought it was funny so kept it.

Drugs do need a good snuggle.

[–] Bloefz@lemmy.world 24 points 4 weeks ago* (last edited 4 weeks ago) (2 children)

Has the goal of the war on drugs ever really been to eliminate drugs?

I think it's always been more of a pork barrel and geopolitical show. Because if you want to portray yourself as a hero saviour you're going to need an enemy everyone else hates too.

Of course Trump dialled it all to 11 just like he does with everything.

[–] frongt@lemmy.zip 10 points 4 weeks ago

It's mostly to oppress people. Minorites, the poor, etc. The rich and well-connected get a pass on their drug habits.

[–] imrighthere@lemmy.ca 8 points 4 weeks ago

“The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and Black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or Black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and Blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”

[–] Elilol@fedinsfw.app 9 points 4 weeks ago

WHAT!? Something Trump is doing ISNT having the predicted/promised outcome?

How could this be possible, its as if he was incompetent :O

[–] EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com 9 points 4 weeks ago

Why would cutting funding to USAid stop the flow of drugs into the US?

Why would bombing schools in Iran stop the flow of drugs into the US?

Oh, the other killing spree.

[–] resipsaloquitur@lemmy.cafe 7 points 4 weeks ago

Better explode even more fishermen.

[–] Lemminary@lemmy.world 7 points 4 weeks ago

It's not meant to stop the drugs. It's meant to stop people from asking about the Trumpstein files.

[–] D_C@sh.itjust.works 6 points 4 weeks ago

The most important thing is that the orange child rapist gets his jollies off by murdering people. The ineffective drug thingy stuff is fluff.

[–] Mulligrubs@lemmy.world 6 points 4 weeks ago* (last edited 4 weeks ago)

It's almost as if most illegal drugs are stashed in cargo containers at every point of access, and we can't possibly stop even a tiny fraction without also stopping international trade dead in its tracks.

Oh well, guess we should murder some more people to stop other people from getting high off of opiates or cocaine, our hands are tied.

No worries. Surely, increasing danger from fighting this international trade won't encourage chemical engineers from continuing to produce even more and more deadly alternatives locally! We are so smart we stopped those darn opium dens we win drug war.

[–] finallymadeanaccount@lemmy.world 6 points 4 weeks ago

Yeah, but each murder gave Hegseth's whisky dick a semi, so he figures it's worth it.

[–] Bubbaonthebeach@lemmy.ca 5 points 4 weeks ago

If there is any rationale other than the "we are the USA, we can do whatever we want, whenever we want, for no reason at all", I would be surprised.

[–] theuniqueone@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 4 weeks ago

It would be beyond silly to expect it to and that was never the motive.

[–] Tollana1234567@lemmy.today 4 points 4 weeks ago

arnt they flowing through mexico border by land. and he isnt even targeting the cartels, just some easy targets.

[–] Grimy@lemmy.world 4 points 4 weeks ago

Tbh, I just figured they were beating down on one cartel so the CIA owned one can flourish? That or extortion (you pay or your boat gets sunk).

[–] absGeekNZ@lemmy.nz 3 points 4 weeks ago

So what you are saying is; Drugs continue to win the war on drugs.

[–] mechoman444@lemmy.world 2 points 4 weeks ago

What! No way! You're saying that drug dealers are going to find ways to sell drugs in America. Holy crap who'd have thunk it!

[–] sircac@lemmy.world 2 points 4 weeks ago

I am pretty sure that he is just favouring friends handling their competition...