Whitehouse Spokesperson Karoline Leavitt's admission that a US army commander ordered strikes on a survivor at sea amounts to the White House confessing to a serious crime. Photo: Getty Images.
White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt stated that the military officer who ordered the killing of the survivors had the “authority to do so”.
White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt issued new and controversial statements on Monday regarding the scandal sparked by the apparent killing of survivors from one of many US military attacks on small boats in the Caribbean, acknowledging that the order to kill the civilian crew members was issued by the commanding officer.
A reporter asked during a press briefing: “Was Admiral Frank Bradley the one who gave the order for a second strike?” Leavitt replied, without hesitation: “And he was within his authority to do so.”
The response adds fuel to the fire of the controversy in the United States over the crime of killing defenseless civilians after their boat was struck by a missile—an action that has been described as a crime against humanity, given that no war has been declared in the conflict initiated by Washington.
Following accusations levelled inside the US against Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, President Donald Trump came to his defense, stating: “I wouldn’t have wanted that. Not a second bombing. The first strike was very lethal and was fine.” He reiterated his confidence in Hegseth: “Pete said he did not order the killing of those two people.”
Nevertheless, Hegseth had previously declared that he had given the order to “kill them all.”
In the same statement, Trump bizarrely defended the presidential pardon granted to convicted narco-trafficker and former president of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernández, which entirely contradicts Trump’s own nominal “anti-narcotics” stance against Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
Despite the White House’s backing, lawmakers from both parties—led by Mike Rogers and Adam Smith in the House of Representatives and Roger Wicker and Jack Reed in the Senate—announced that they will conduct rigorous oversight of the attacks to clarify what occurred.
Senator Tim Kaine warned that if the accusations are confirmed, “this could rise to the level of a war crime.” Representative Mike Turner added that there are “very serious concerns about the attacks on boats in the Caribbean and the Pacific and the legal justification put forward by the government.”
Trump and Hegseth now find themselves at the center of a debate pitting US security policy against international legal limits as Congress turns its attention to establishing accountability and transparency in the military operations in the region.
This comes after former chief of US military operations across Latin America, US SOUTHCOM Admiral Alvin Holsey, stepped down in October amid tensions surrounding the unlawful Caribbean bombings.
Venezuelan Parliament to investigate extrajudicial executions
The president of Venezuela’s National Assembly, Jorge Rodríguez, announced on Saturday that Venezuela’s Parliament will open a formal investigation into the extrajudicial executions committed by US forces in the Caribbean Sea since September 2. The announcement came after a meeting with victims’ families during which Rodríguez repudiated the grave violations of human rights and international humanitarian law.
“What has been occurring since September 2 in the Caribbean Sea is clearly illegal, clearly illegitimate, and violates international humanitarian law, the United Nations Charter, the Human Rights Charter, and also threatens laws related to navigation, maritime law, and even the laws of war,” Rodríguez stated.
The legislator quoted Article 12 of the 1949 Geneva Convention, which establishes that the wounded or sick “shall be respected and protected in all circumstances” and “must be treated and cared for humanely,” prohibiting any attacks on their lives.
He also cited Additional Protocol I of 1977, which in Article 41 prohibits attacks against persons who are out of combat, such as the wounded, unarmed individuals, or shipwreck survivors.
Rodríguez noted that the identities of the relatives of those killed—who attended the meeting—are being kept confidential “because they have been receiving threats from sectors and individuals with a strong interest in preventing them from telling the truth and in obstructing the clarification of the events.”
Venezuela Under Siege: A Hundred Deaths at Sea – Hundreds of Thousands by Sanctions
(Últimas Noticias) with Orinoco Tribune content
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
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Cameron Baillie is an award-winning journalist, editor, and researcher. He won and was shortlisted for awards across Britain and Ireland. He is Editor-in-Chief of New Sociological Perspectives graduate journal and Commissioning Editor at The Student Intifada newsletter. He spent the first half of 2025 living, working, and writing in Ecuador. He does news translation and proofreading work with The Orinoco Tribune.
