XPost: alt.politics.republicans, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, talk.politics.guns   
   XPost: sac.politics, alt.drugdealers   
   From: support@girls.sports   
      
   Washington — Military officials showed lawmakers video of a second   
   strike on an alleged Venezuelan drug boat behind closed doors on Capitol   
   Hill on Thursday, and testified that there was no order from Defense   
   Secretary Pete Hegseth to kill everyone on board, multiple lawmakers   
   said.   
      
   Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Navy Adm.   
   Frank "Mitch" Bradley, head of Special Operations Command, briefed the   
   leaders of the Armed Services and Intelligence Committees for both the   
   House and the Senate. The classified briefings centered on the Trump   
   administration's campaign against alleged drug trafficking boats off the   
   coast of South America, including the Sept. 2 follow-on strike that has   
   become a flashpoint in Congress.   
      
   The Pentagon has been under fire since the Washington Post reported that   
   a second missile killed two survivors of the initial strike. Hegseth has   
   said the decision to strike the boat again was made by Bradley, who was   
   leading the mission. The survivors were attempting to climb back onto   
   the boat before it was hit a second time, a source familiar with the   
   matter told CBS News on Wednesday.   
      
   GOP Sen. Tom Cotton, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee,   
   and Rep. Jim Himes, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence   
   Committee, spoke with reporters after the briefings. They both said   
   Bradley told them that he had not been ordered to leave no survivors.   
   The initial Post report quoted an anonymous source as saying that,   
   before the first strike, Hegseth verbally ordered that everyone on the   
   boat be taken out. "The order was to kill everybody," the Post's story   
   quoted the source as saying. Hegseth has denied the Post's account.   
      
   The lawmakers also said they were shown the video of the second attack,   
   which has not been made public. Himes, a Connecticut Democrat, told   
   reporters after the briefing that "what I saw in that room was one of   
   the most troubling things I've seen in my time in public service."   
      
   "You have two individuals in clear distress without any means of   
   locomotion, with a destroyed vessel, who are killed by the United   
   States," Himes said.   
      
   "Any American who sees the video that I saw will see the United States   
   military attacking shipwrecked sailors — bad guys, bad guys — but   
   attacking shipwrecked sailors," Himes added. "Now there's a whole set of   
   contextual items that the admiral explained — yes, they were carrying   
   drugs. They were not in the position to continue their mission in any   
   way. People will someday see this video, and they will see that that   
   video shows, if you don't have the broader context, an attack on   
   shipwrecked sailors."   
      
   President Trump said Wednesday that he would support releasing the   
   footage.   
      
   Cotton, an Arkansas Republican, refuted Himes' characterization of the   
   video after his briefing, saying he "didn't see anything disturbing   
   about it."   
      
   Cotton said the four strikes on Sept. 2 were "entirely lawful and   
   needful, and they were exactly what we'd expect our military commanders   
   to do."   
      
   "I saw two survivors trying to flip a boat loaded with drugs bound for   
   the United States back over so they could stay in the fight, and   
   potentially, given all the context we've heard of other narco-terrorist   
   boats in the area coming to their aid to recover the cargo and recover   
   those narco-terrorists," Cotton said.   
      
   https://www.cbsnews.com/news/pentagon-briefing-congress-venezuela-alleged   
   -drug-boats/   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)