The Second Strike and the Soul of America
America’s moral authority depends on our willingness to condemn wrongdoing—even our own.
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In the wake of the news about the second strike on survivors of a drug-smuggling boat in the Caribbean, I haven’t been able to shake a sense of moral sickness. I’ve spent a good part of my life in uniform. I’ve flown combat missions, operated under strict rules of engagement, and watched American servicemembers show more restraint in war than some governments show in peacetime. My job as a pilot of the RC26b was to fly and watch, collect information, find targets, and launch missions to kill or capture them. I know what lawful force looks like. I know what necessity looks like. And I know what a war crime looks like. The second strike was a war crime. Not a borderline case, not a tough call, not one of the ambiguous gray moments people like to point to in hindsight. Survivors were in the water—injured, exhausted, unable to fight—and were struck again. Once someone is hors de combat- out of the fight, they are protected. That’s not an opinion. That’s the Law of Armed Conflict (LOAC) as every one of us in uniform has been trained to understand it.
When I flew missions in Iraq, there were so many moments when the easy thing would have been to launch a mission. When someone looked suspicious. When we were tired, angry, or recovering from indirect fire the night before. But we didn’t. We didn’t because the rules weren’t suggestions; they were obligations. I’ve watched teams hold fire even when a target would get away. I’ve watched pilots wave off because a civilian vehicle entered the picture. I’ve heard the frustration in people’s voices when restraint meant letting a bad guy escape, but they did it anyway because that’s what the law required. Because that’s what morality required. And because that’s who we are supposed to be as Americans. The individual soldier doesn’t have to love it, but they will appreciate it when they are older.
That’s why this incident hits so hard. The second strike was not just a violation of LOAC —it violated the foundational principles that guide any legitimate use of force: distinction, necessity, proportionality, and humanity. You must distinguish between combatants and those who can no longer fight. Survivors drowning in the sea are not combatants. There was no military necessity; incapacitated people pose no threat. The harm obviously outweighed any conceivable gain. And inflicting lethal force on shipwrecked survivors is the definition of unnecessary suffering. These aren’t loopholes or technicalities. These are the bedrock rules meant to preserve some sliver of humanity even amid violence.
And beyond LOAC, maritime law makes this even clearer. For centuries—long before the Geneva Conventions—there has been a universal expectation that ships must rescue people in distress at sea. Everyone. Even enemies. Even pirates. Even those engaged in wrongdoing. When they are in the water, the duty is to save them, not abandon them, and certainly not target them. When a government kills shipwrecked survivors, it is violating one of the oldest and most fundamental laws on Earth. It is not something we would excuse from Russia in the Black Sea or China in the South China Sea. We should not excuse it from ourselves.
I know how this will get spun in some corners. “They were drug traffickers.” “They weren’t innocent.” “They knew the risks.” But the law does not stop applying because we dislike the people involved. Following the rules is not a reward for good behavior; it’s the price of maintaining any moral legitimacy in the world. If America wants to lead a rules-based international order, we don’t get to toss the rules aside for convenience. The moment we do that, we lose the very thing we claim to defend. And I say this as someone who has watched, firsthand, how the rest of the world looks to us—not for perfection, but for example. When I served in Congress, and when I served in uniform, the countries we dealt with weren’t looking for a flawless America. They were looking for a principled one.
Let’s forget the legal arguments for a moment and talk about the human reality. Imagine the last moments of the men in that water—injured, scared, probably in shock, praying the first explosion was the last one. Who knows why they were pressed into drug trafficking… it really doesn’t matter. Imagine hearing another aircraft or drone circling back. There are few more helpless positions a human being can be in than floating in open water with no way to protect yourself. To fire on people in that condition is not just a violation of law. It is an abandonment of basic humanity.
This is where the story stops being about “them” and becomes about us. Who are we? Who do we want to be? America’s greatness has never come from our GDP or our weapons systems. Those matter, but they’re not what make us exceptional. What makes us exceptional—when we choose it—is our willingness to bind ourselves to moral rules even when it costs us something. The restraint we show. The compassion we show. The belief that strength is not the same thing as cruelty. When we abandon that, when we normalize acts like this, we begin losing something far more important than any tactical advantage. We lose our identity.
And I say all of this not because I want to tear America down, but because I want it to be what it can be. A nation that faces hard truths. A nation that holds itself accountable. A nation that understands that leadership isn’t doing whatever you want—it’s doing what’s right when it’s hardest. The second strike was wrong. It was illegal. It was immoral. And if we want America to be a force for good, we have to say so. We have to demand accountability. Not because we hate America, but because we love it enough to believe it can be better than this.
I hope we choose that path. I hope we choose to be the country that restrains its power rather than abuses it. And I hope we never lose sight of the fact that how we act when no one is watching reveals who we truly are.
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