Is a retroactive, dubiously legal justification for extra legal killings a thing?

[Rogue AI]

So you believe something for no other reason than that the guy who routinely lies… told you so

Got it

Why don't you explain how you think this whole operation works. I could use a good laugh.

 

[OODA_Loop]

In your mind, that does that belief justify the regime breaking international and US law?

 

[Lesh]

Why don't you explain how you think this whole operation works. I could use a good laugh.

I have no idea and neither does anyone else

That SHOULD concern you

 

[Rogue AI]

I have no idea and neither does anyone else

That SHOULD concern you

You don't understand how the government works? The president tasked the appropriate authorities to target Venezuelan drug cartels as the terrorists they are. They are using long standing protocols already in existence. You didn't question Obama or Biden on targeting terrorists. TDS is rotting your brain.

 

[struth]

So you believe something for no other reason than that the guy who routinely lies… told you so

Got it

We aren’t talking about your dead pal Epstein or your former leader Biden and his admin full of liars

We are talking about the United States military

Who ever according to the Seditious 6 haven’t followed any illegal orders

 

[Hafar1014]

Trump ‘Determined’ the U.S. Is Now in a War With Drug Cartels, Congress Is Told​

President Trump has decided that the United States is engaged in a formal “armed conflict” with drug cartels his team has labeled terrorist organizations and that suspected smugglers for such groups are “unlawful combatants,” the administration said in a confidential notice to Congress this week.

The notice was sent to several congressional committees and obtained by The New York Times. It adds new detail to the administration’s thinly articulated legal rationale for why three U.S. military strikes the president ordered on boats in the Caribbean Sea last month, killing all 17 people aboard them, should be seen as lawful rather than murder.

Mr. Trump’s move to formally deem his campaign against drug cartels as an active armed conflict means he is cementing his claim to extraordinary wartime powers, legal specialists said. In an armed conflict, as defined by international law, a country can lawfully kill enemy fighters even when they pose no threat, detain them indefinitely without trials and prosecute them in military courts.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/02/us/politics/trump-drug-cartels-war.html?campaign_id=60&emc=edit_na_20251002&instance_id=163691&nl=breaking-news&regi_id=65145149&segment_id=207041&user_id=fecdfdffdaaa11107b72f0f4f6e429cc

Memo to Congress.........."Oh, by the way, those dead Venezuelans I ordered to be killed without any evidence that's been presented to you or anyone else, it's okay cuz I unilaterally decided it's okay. Pay no attention to this guy."

Geoffrey S. Corn, a retired judge advocate general lawyer who was formerly the Army’s senior adviser for law-of-war issues, said drug cartels were not engaged in “hostilities” — the standard for when there is an armed conflict for legal purposes — against the United States because selling a dangerous product is different from an armed attack.

Any active JAG or IG of a similar opinion will just be fired so no worries.

Trump fights the drug war successfully and democrats oppose it. Drug deaths hit record highs under Biden. How much money to drug dealers donate to democrat campaigns

 

[Hafar1014]

We aren’t talking about your dead pal Epstein or your former leader Biden and his admin full of liars

We are talking about the United States military

Who ever according to the Seditious 6 haven’t followed any illegal orders

Those 6 idiots gave the unlawful order and now 2 National Guard soldiers have been killed triggered by their hate speech. Stephanic stated the National Guard shoots people randomly. Then an illegal alien kills two guardsmen a week later

 

[Lesh]

Those 6 idiots gave the unlawful order and now 2 National Guard soldiers have been killed triggered by their hate speech. Stephanic stated the National Guard shoots people randomly. Then an illegal alien kills two guardsmen a week later

Ridiculous post

One has nothing to do with the other

 

[Lesh]

You don't understand how the government works? The president tasked the appropriate authorities to target Venezuelan drug cartels as the terrorists they are. They are using long standing protocols already in existence. You didn't question Obama or Biden on targeting terrorists. TDS is rotting your brain.

Obama blew up drug boats? I think not

 

[Rogue AI]

Obama blew up drug boats? I think not

A terrorist is a terrorist whether in a boat, a car, or encampment. The legal and strategic justification is the same. You loons really don't even know why you are whining about this. How very sad.

 

[struth]

Those 6 idiots gave the unlawful order and now 2 National Guard soldiers have been killed triggered by their hate speech. Stephanic stated the National Guard shoots people randomly. Then an illegal alien kills two guardsmen a week later

To be fair I don’t think it was an illegal alien. Sounds like it was a refugee from the xiden Afghan surrender

 

[Hafar1014]

Obama blew up drug boats? I think not

Democrats failed to stop drugs and deaths hit record highs under Biden. Trump stops drugs with success and democrats go nuts. Drugs are small part of the issue. Venezuela funds terror all over the world and is the open door fir China to invade our area. Trump dies it right democrats fail lie deny and blame

 

[Lesh]

A terrorist is a terrorist whether in a boat, a car, or encampment. The legal and strategic justification is the same. You loons really don't even know why you are whining about this. How very sad.

So declaring anyone a terrorist allows our government to do whatever?

 

[Lesh]

Democrats failed to stop drugs and deaths hit record highs under Biden. Trump stops drugs with success and democrats go nuts. Drugs are small part of the issue. Venezuela funds terror all over the world and is the open door for China to invade our area. Trump dies it right democrats fail lie deny and blame

Trump hasn’t stopped anything

 

[Rogue AI]

So declaring anyone a terrorist allows our government to do whatever?

You should look into that. Maybe if you loons did some research you'd stop making complete asses of yourselves.

 

[Lesh]

You should look into that. Maybe if you loons did some research you'd stop making complete asses of yourselves.

Oh? What would I find if I “looked into that”?

 

[Rogue AI]

Oh? What would I find if I “looked into that”?

Solve your own mystery. You loons simply scurry off if you don't like anything presented by others. In fact the information is probably somewhere in this thread, or should be.

 

[Lesh]

Solve your own mystery. You loons simply scurry off if you don't like anything presented by others. In fact the information is probably somewhere in this thread, or should be.

You’re the one “scurrying off” junior.

But hey… surrender accepted

 

[ColonelAngus]

I have been curious how a President can order the killing of US citizens with drone strikes.

 

[berg80]

They are using long standing protocols already in existence.

You folks always rely on lies at some point. Where in US law does the prez have the authority to unilaterally declare any person or group of people what amounts to a designation as enemy combatants justifying their murder?

Legal Flaws in the Trump Administration’s Notice to Congress on “Armed Conflict” with Drug Cartels​

Legal Flaws in the Trump Administration’s Notice to Congress on “Armed Conflict” with Drug Cartels

Top legal expert analyzes the Trump administration's notice to Congress of an "armed conflict" with drug cartels.

www.justsecurity.org

The Trump administration’s “armed conflict” justification, however, is groundless. No one—in the public, in Congress or, most importantly, in the military itself—should treat it as a plausible legal basis that might justify lethal strikes on the alleged drug vessels and the civilians on those boats.

There are at least two basic problems with the assertion.

The first and most fundamental problem is simply that the United States is not engaged in an armed conflict with any drug cartel. Under the well-established understanding of the preconditions for a “noninternational armed conflict,” it is necessary (at a minimum) (i) that the non-State entity is an “organized armed group” with the sort of command structure that would render members targetable on the basis of their status because they’re subject to commanders’ direction and control and (ii) that the organized armed group has engaged in armed violence against the State that is of some intensity (think of al Qaeda’s attacks on Sept. 11, 2001) and that has been protracted. See Prosecutor v. Haradinaj, Case No. IT-04-84-T, Trial Judgment ¶ 49 (Int’l Crim. Trib. for the former Yugoslavia, Apr. 3, 2008); Prosecutor v. Tadić, Case No. IT-94-1-AR72, Decision on Defence Motion for Interlocutory Appeal on Jurisdiction ¶ 70 (Int’l Crim. Trib. for the former Yugoslavia, Oct. 2, 1995); International Committee of the Red Cross, Commentary to Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, Part C-2-b.

The Trump administration hasn’t made any effort—not publicly, anyway—to demonstrate that any of the drug cartels in question are “organized” armed groups with the sort of command structure that would render members targetable on the basis of their status. But even if it could do so, those cartels haven’t engaged in any protracted or intense armed violence against the United States.

The notice the administration sent to Congress this week asserts, without citing any evidence, that the cartels “conduct ongoing attacks throughout the Western Hemisphere” and that “their actions constitute an armed attack against the United States.” The notice, however, doesn’t identify any such armed attack against the United States, let alone attacks of sufficient intensity and duration to establish a noninternational armed conflict with the United States. (I am uncertain whether intense armed violence that isn’t “prolonged” or “protracted” would suffice to establish a noninternational armed conflict, but that question isn’t relevant here, where the cartels haven’t engaged in armed attacks against the United States that are prolonged or intense.). It’s fairly evident from the notice that when the President uses the term “armed attack” he is referring not to any actual armed attack as any States or international tribunals understand that term, but instead to the “flow of illicit narcotics into the United States,” which “illegally and directly cause the deaths of tens of thousands of American citizens each year.” The distribution of dangerous narcotics, however, isn’t an armed attack or armed violence in the sense used in international law to determine whether an armed conflict has commenced. As far as I know, there’s nothing in international law that even suggests that such drug activity is sufficient to trigger the right of the affected State to kill persons simply because they are members of the drug cartel (which isn’t surprising, given the radical implications of such a theory).