Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said Tuesday he did not witness a controversial — and potentially illegal — second strike in early September that killed two survivors clinging to a burning alleged drug-running boat off the Venezuelan coast.
The secretary’s exact order in the Sept. 2 strike has been under scrutiny after The Washington Post reported Friday that Hegseth gave a verbal directive to “kill everybody” that in turn led the commanding admiral to order a follow-on strike to kill two alleged drug smugglers who survived an initial attack.
Hegseth’s comments responded to a reporter’s question at the end of President Donald Trump’s livestreamed two-hour Cabinet meeting.
“I watched that first strike live. As you can imagine, at the Department of War we got a lot of things to do, so … I moved on to my next meeting,” Hegseth told reporters.
The secretary said he learned a “couple of hours later” that Adm. Frank M. “Mitch” Bradley “made the correct decision to ultimately sink the boat and eliminate the threat.”
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