Piracy
defined: Acts of robbery, violence or detention at sea.
The unprovoked attacks in the Caribbean
Sea being carried out by the US Department of Defense, without investigation,
due process or motive for defensive action, harken back centuries to lawless
times when colonial powers, privateers and pirates ruled the seas by force,
without regard for territories, the law, or any interests but their own. The
crimes committed at sea and from the sea back then were a major basis for
America’s revolt against colonialism and its struggle for independence from
British rule.
In the last three months, the US, under
orders from its ever-more-authoritarian president, has carried out 21 military
strikes against at least 22 vessels in the Caribbean region, with particular
emphasis on boats out of Venezuela. In all cases, the Trump administration has
claimed that the vessels attacked and destroyed, usually by drones, were “narco-boats”
transporting illegal narcotics. But neither the Department of Defense nor the
White House has deigned to provide any evidence at all that this was the case.
And even if they were narco-trafficking vessels, without due process, the act
of blowing them out of the water without legal standing or authorization is unlawful.
Indeed, the Trump regime, to date, has made zero effort to explain its actions—except
as bully-posturing, and in terms of cowboy “street justice”—to the American
public or to the world. And now, retired
members of the JAG Corps (the US military’s justice system) are indicating
that, under international law and the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the
attacks are not only illegal but may well constitute summary execution or
murder.
Eighty-three people have perished in
these unprovoked attacks. Only two have been captured and repatriated. The
victims could just as easily have been fishermen, vacationers or boating
enthusiasts as drug-runners, since we only have the word of Trump (long since
proven to be a serial liar) and his Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth that the
vessels hit by devastatingly lethal US drone attacks had anything to do with
narcotics shipments.
Whether Trump and his hijacked
Republican Party recognize it or not, all of these attacks have been
unlawful at a both national, and global level, constituting gross violations of
international law and the Law of the Sea. At a strictly domestic level, they
violate a number of federal laws, regulations and the Constitution.
To start with, the attacks are a violation of constitutional
separation of powers. Congress alone is empowered to declare war or authorize
captures or strikes at sea, especially in peace time. They also violate domestic
criminal statutes and executive-branch prohibitions against assassination or
unlawful killing, since these are basically summary executions without any due
process whatsoever. Furthermore, they contravene doctrines of due process and the
right to life under both US and international human-rights law. Additionally,
they infringe on international maritime law and principle of the sovereignty of
States over vessels under their flags on the high seas, where the attacker does
so without consent from the country involved or from the United Nations General
Assembly or Security Council.
And now we must add to this horror new
reports that point to the probability that the Department of Defense has at
least unofficially been imposing a “no survivors” rule. Backing this theory was
information reported this week regarding a September strike that wiped out a
vessel, followed by a second strike that killed survivors who remained alive
and overboard, clinging to pieces of their craft, following the attack. If
these allegations prove true, such an act would unquestionably be a summary
execution (murder).
This latest report is stirring outrage
in Congress, even among a handful of GOP
lawmakers. But it has also caught the attention of US military law experts.
Earlier this week, a statement was released by the Former JAGs Working Group,
which indicated that, if the “no-quarter” orders alleged to have emanated from
the Department of Defense (DoD) prove true, “both the giving and the execution
of these orders (would) constitute war
crimes, murder, or both.”
The Former JAGs Working Group was
established in February of this year after Trump unilaterally fired the Army
and Air Force Judge Advocates General. The organization, whose members are
former military attorneys, created their watchdog group after Trump began “his
systematic dismantling of the military’s legal guardrails.” In their statement,
they said that, “Had those guardrails been in place, we are confident they
would have prevented these crimes.” They added that their assessment of the
crimes of which they are potentially accusing the administration was unanimous.
Explaining the legal precedents that led
them to this evaluation, the Former JAGs Working Group stated that, “If the US
military operation to interdict and destroy suspected narco-trafficking vessels
is a “non-international armed conflict,” as the Trump Administration suggests,
orders to “kill everybody,” which can reasonably be regarded as an order to
give ‘no quarter’, and to ‘double-tap’ a target in order to kill survivors, are
clearly illegal under international law. In short, they are war crimes.”
The ex-JAGs made it clear that: “If the
US military operation is not an armed conflict of any kind, these orders to
kill helpless civilians clinging to the wreckage of a vessel our military
destroyed would subject everyone from (the Secretary of Defense) down to the
individual who pulled the trigger to prosecution under US law for murder.”
The Former JAGs Working Group made a
plea to both Congress and the American people, saying: “We call upon Congress
to investigate and the American people to oppose any use of the US military
that involves the intentional targeting of anyone—enemy combatants, non-combatants,
or civilians—rendered hors de combat (“out of the fight”) as a result of
their wounds or the destruction of the ship or aircraft carrying them.”
They also went on to tacitly back the
position of retired Navy captain and current Senator Mark Kelly, whom the Trump
regime is currently seeking to court martial for reminding Armed Forces
personnel that they are under no obligation to obey unlawful orders, no matter
who gives them. According to Trump (who, as a 34-count convicted felon, has no
regard for the Constitution or any other law), military personnel must obey all
orders of the commander-in-chief, no matter what those orders might be.
In their statement, on this point, the
ex-JAGs said: “We also advise our fellow citizens that orders like those
described above are the kinds of ‘patently illegal orders’ all military members
have a duty to disobey.”
They added that, “Since orders to kill
survivors of an attack at sea are ‘patently illegal’, anyone who issues or
follows such orders can and should be prosecuted for war crimes, murder, or
both.”
More specifically, from an international
viewpoint, legal experts make it clear that, if the Trump regime orders US
forces or agents to carry out lethal strikes on Venezuelan territory,
territorial waters, or flagged vessels without a UN Security Council mandate,
Venezuelan consent, or a lawful claim of self-defense, such actions are deemed unlawful
uses of force under Article 2 of the United Nations Charter. They also
constitute violations of Venezuelan sovereignty under customary international
law and International Court of Justice doctrine.
Furthermore, US attacks on vessels navigating
under Venezuelan flag on the high seas are a violation of the Law of the
Sea—an international statute negotiated worldwide in the 1970s and 1980s and in
effect around the globe since the nineties. The alleged “double-tap” orders
from the DoD are considered extrajudicial executions, and are in violation of international
human rights laws. Under international humanitarian law (IHL) and Articles 7
and 8 of the Rome Statute (under which the International Criminal Court was
founded) such actions are deemed to be war crimes.
Bottom line, the face of the United
States that the world is seeing right now under the Trump regime is that of an
all-powerful but lawless, rogue nation, bent on dominating other sovereign
states by force, and in total disregard for long-standing diplomatic and
international legal norms. We are being seen as a barbaric and violent people
with no respect for the sovereignty of other nations. In short, we are being seen
as a nation ruled by a dictator, who, like his erstwhile idol, Vladimir Putin,
is willing to make use of all of the devastating power at his fingertips as a
threat, so as to impose his whims on the world by force. And we are also being
seen as a once democratic nation that is now ruled by an autocrat, and by the
corrupt ruling party that he has usurped to serve as his shill in a mere pantomime
of representative government.
