Admiral Bradley ordered second strike on drug boat

Admiral Bradley Approved 2nd Strike, Not Hegseth

White House officials said Monday that the “double tap” hit targeting survivors of a U.S. strike on a purported drug smuggling vessel in September was legal.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that War Secretary Pete Hegseth authorized Adm. Mitch Bradley to conduct the mission and that Bradley was the one, not Hegseth, who ordered a follow-up strike on a destroyed vessel that had already been targeted by U.S. forces after it became clear that there were two people who survived.

Last week, the Pentagon disputed reporting from the Washington Post that Bradley, the Special Operations commander overseeing the Sept. 2 attack, ordered service members to carry out a subsequent strike, or “double tap,” targeting survivors. That started the campaign to destroy alleged drug boats in the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific Ocean.

Leavitt said Hegseth did not order the military to kill everyone on board, contradicting reporting that Hegseth made the order to “kill everybody.”

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