Back around 2012, off the coast of West Africa, a combination of poverty, weak governments ashore, and lightly regulated traffic on international waters led to a rash of acts of piracy against cargo, leisure, and cruise lines. They involved a wide array of ships, flying under a broad range of national flags.
Acts of violence and attacks on any seagoing vessel sailing in international waters more than 12 miles off any coast or shoreline are considered acts of piracy. During 2020, in the Gulf of Guinea, near the Horn of Africa, 180 crew members, seafarers, and passengers were taken hostage and kidnapped for ransom, or in some cases, tossed into the sea. The pirates themselves came from a variety of African states, though none were government or official naval sailors.
They were heavily armed, often very violent, and, after oil and other valuable cargo on board, initially shifted their tactics to larger and larger ships to steal more and more valuable cargo, as well as ransoming the crews back to their shipping lines and companies.
Extreme poverty in parts of the continent of Africa, particularly among Somalis, made these crimes appear, at least to the perpetrators, as crimes of survival. And though down from the numbers of the early 2010s, the problem persists.
Which brings us to today, and half a world away, long-troubled relations between the United States and Venezuela, primarily with its current leader, Nicolas Madur,o during a Nov. 30 phone call, President Trump called on Maduro to resign immediately and guaranteed him and his family safe passage out of the country — but only if Maduro agreed to leave office and the country immediately.
Maduro countered, seeking a global pardon for any crimes he and his associates might later be charged with. Trump declined that request, and their talks reached an impasse.
Within hours, Trump announced the closure of Venezuela’s airspace and notified private pilots through the FAA not to fly over or into Venezuela, and that the nation’s airspace is closed.
In addition to moving an aircraft carrier into the region, since early September, our U.S. Navy has been ordered, on several occasions, to blow Venezuelan ships suspected of carrying drug traffickers out of the waters of the North Atlantic and Caribbean seas. Yes, you read that correctly.
If those ships were in U.S.coastal waters, our U.S. Coast Guard, at times backed up by our Navy or Naval Reserves, would come aboard, commandeer, and occasionally seize vessels suspected of drug trafficking. The sailors and crews of those boats would be taken into custody, charged with appropriate crimes, or, in some cases, deported immediately back to their nation of origin to a potentially more dangerous fate.
We are not in any declared state of military conflict with the nation of Venezuela, with the exception of their recently closed airspace. The president has defended these actions, as well as the decisions of Secretary of DefensePete Hegseth, as likely saving the lives of thousands of Americans from ingesting illegal and dangerous fentanyl. (Still, I was surprised to learn during one of my own recent surgeries that, although 50 times more potent than morphine, fentanyl is also used in very small doses as a surgical anesthetic.)
Without boarding any of these ships, we have doomed dozens to death, with evidence gathered only by drones or intelligence sources. Plus, we know of many other countries that produce and smuggle larger amounts of fentanyl into the U.S.
Leading Democrats and Republicans on the two committees in both chambers of Congress overseeing the Pentagon have begun raising questions about the manner and force used by our U.S. Navy against these alleged drug boats.
Operating under verbal commands alleged to have been given by Hegseth, the use of lethal force has been authorized against all ships and crew members suspected of drug smuggling at sea. International maritime law provides no nation with such authority. Interdict a boat, move on board, seek out smuggling activity, gun or drug running, etc. … and then make arrests and later hold trials … but not execution without proof and convictions for illegal actions.
As we often stand atop a small mountain of our own piety to justify our military actions and foreign policy choices, before this goes much further, let’s take a good, hard look in the mirror.
Are we directing and making our own long and justifiably proud U.S. Navy sailors into pirates themselves?