In a statement issued on Dec. 3, the Most Reverend Timothy P. Broglio, J.C.D., archbishop for the Military Services, USA, and former president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, condemned the Trump administration’s ongoing naval campaign against drug traffickers that it alleges are emerging from Venezuela.
“I call on our Nation’s leaders, legislators, and those specifically charged to direct our Armed Forces to respect the consciences of those who raise their right hands to defend and protect the Constitution by not asking them to engage in immoral actions,” Archbishop Broglio said in his statement. “Show the world our respect for human dignity and the rule of law.”
“In the fight against drugs,” he said, “the end never justifies the means, which must be moral, in accord with the principles of the just war theory, and always respectful of the dignity of each human person.”
He said, “No one can ever be ordered to commit an immoral act, and even those suspected of committing a crime are entitled to due process under the law.” The archbishop said the moral principle “forbidding the intentional killing of noncombatants is inviolable.”
“It would be an illegal and immoral order to kill deliberately survivors on a vessel who pose no immediate lethal threat to our armed forces,” he added.
“Our Nation has a long tradition of responding to injustice, liberating the oppressed, and leading the free world,” Archbishop Broglio said. “We cannot tarnish that reputation with questionable actions that fail to respect the dignity of the human person and the rule of law.
“Efforts to end the drug trade and their illicit use must never exclude employing the rule of law.” The United States, he said, should be an exemplar for other nations “and do what is right.”
“When we allow the moral law to guide our actions,” Archbishop Broglio said, “we not only protect the innocent, we protect our men and women in uniform. These principles have nothing to do with partisan politics, right, left, or center.”
The administration’s campaign against alleged drug traffickers has been criticized by experts in international law since it began in September. That first attack on Sept. 2, which claimed 11 lives, faced intense scrutiny after The Washington Post reported last week that the attack included a second strike on two survivors of the initial missile blast who could be viewed clinging to wreckage.
According to the report, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth issued a verbal order to “kill everybody” on the boat, the first vessel hit in the Trump administration’s counterdrug campaign in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean that has grown to include over 20 known strikes.
Legal experts told The Associated Press they believed the second strike on Sept. 2 violated both peacetime laws and those governing armed conflict. According to the Pentagon’s own manual on the laws of armed conflict: “Orders to fire upon the shipwrecked would be clearly illegal.”
“These are serious charges, and that’s the reason we’re going to have special oversight,” Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi, the Republican chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, told reporters.
During a Cabinet meeting at the White House on Dec. 2, Mr. Hegseth cited the “fog of war” in defending the follow-up strike, explaining that there were explosions and fire after the initial strike and that he did not see survivors in the water when the second strike was ordered and launched.
Mr. Hegseth told reporters that he “didn’t stick around” for the remainder of the September mission but said the admiral in charge “made the right call” in ordering the second hit, which he “had complete authority to do.”
President Donald Trump said he “didn’t know anything” regarding the order for a second strike and that he “still hasn’t gotten a lot of information because I rely on Pete,” referencing Mr. Hegseth.
“I didn’t know anything about people. I wasn’t involved in it,” he added.
The chairs of the congressional armed services committees, along with the top Democrats on the committees, are expected later this week to hear private testimony from Navy Vice Admiral Frank “Mitch” Bradley, whom the White House has said ordered the second strike on the survivors.
“Somebody made a horrible decision. Somebody needs to be held accountable,” said Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican.
The Trump administration has built up a fleet of warships near Venezuela, including the largest U.S. aircraft carrier, as U.S. forces continued drone and missile strikes on small boats allegedly being used to smuggle narcotics for drug cartels.
The expanding U.S. military presence is fueling speculation that a land attack against Venezuela to dislodge its president Nicolás Maduro could be next on the agenda. According to the Constitution, Congress has the sole authority to declare war. After months of attacks on alleged drug traffickers that have claimed as many as 80 lives, members of Congress have not yet formally authorized the use of deadly force in the region.
Pope Leo XIV was asked about tensions between the Trump administration and the Maduro government while he was returning to Rome at the conclusion of his first overseas visit, a trip to Turkey and Lebanon.
Pope Leo noted that “the voices coming from the United States keep changing,” alternating between ultimatums to Mr. Maduro and the occasional softening of rhetoric, but he rejected any use of force by the United States to overthrow Mr. Maduro.
He said there are other ways to bring change about, including “dialogue, negotiations and even economic pressure.” Pope Leo said that the Holy See and the Venezuelan bishops “are looking for ways to calm the situation, to seek above all the good of the people, because so often those who suffer the most in these situations are the people, not the authorities.”
In his statement, Archbishop Broglio, noting “from the beginning George Washington wanted chaplains with his troops to tell him the truth,” said that the United States “must ensure that the use of military force is ethical and legal.”
“We do not know if every sailor on a vessel presumed to be carrying illegal drugs knows the nature of the cargo,” he said. “We do know that there is a legal way to intercept a suspicious vessel, board it, and have members of the Coast Guard on hand who have the authority to make arrests. Then, the courts function in determining the guilty and the appropriate punishment.”
Due process “must apply to everyone, regardless of his or her role in illegal activity. The rule of law must guide all actions; abandoning due process undermines human rights, erodes public trust, and risks harming innocent people.”
“True justice,” the archbishop said, “is achieved through transparent legal procedures, accountability, and respect for life—not through violence outside the law.”
Some international law experts have raised the possibility of future legal culpability for service members who are involved in the strikes against drug traffickers. Another potential threat to those service members involved is the potential for “moral injury” related to their participation in the mortal attacks.
The issue of moral injury and its relationship to post-traumatic stress disorder among former U.S. service members has been a special concern of the Archdiocese for the Military, Services, USA, in recent years. At regional convocations in 2023, the problem was addressed in a presentation led by Mark Moitoza, the military archdiocese’s vice chancellor for evangelization.
He described moral injury as “damage to a person resulting from a violent contradiction of deeply held moral expectations” after witnessing or participating in events or acts while in military service.
“Those impacted by moral injury find that it disrupts their confidence and affects their ability to make ethical and moral decisions,” Mr. Moitoza said. “When this happens trust of self, trust of others, trust of the command, and even trust in God is broken and becomes difficult to bear.”
A study published in Frontiers of Psychiatry found that exposure to moral injury experiences can be “life altering.”
With reporting from The Associated Press
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