Trump's strikes on alleged narco-boats spark rift with allies

The United States and Venezuela seem to be on a path toward direct conflict

At the same time, some American allies are questioning the legality of U.S. operations

in the Caribbean, specifically the strikes on speedboats suspected of carrying drugs

Now there are conflicting reports some allies are withholding intelligence from their American

counterparts because of the strikes. So to really understand where this all started, we sort of need to go back to January 20th of this year

That's when President Donald Trump retook the Oval Office and signed an executive order

laying the groundwork for certain South American cartels getting the Foreign Terrorist Organization label

In February, the White House formally declared eight Latin American crime organizations as FTOs In August the U military buildup began in the Caribbean and on September 2nd the U carried out its first known strike on a small boat suspected of carrying drugs

A month later, after all sorts of debates in Washington and abroad about the legality of the strikes

Trump sent a memo to Congress informing them the U.S. was now involved in a non-international armed conflict with the cartels that were declared FTOs

and therefore killing anyone working for or with the cartels was justified

because they were considered unlawful combatants. We've reported on this before, so check out san.com for a full breakdown

But basically, the Trump administration's legal arguments for the strikes is because a country has a right to defend itself

and because these cartels are now considered foreign terrorist organizations, the strikes are legal

But outside of the administration it not so clear cut Democrats on Capitol Hill and even some Republicans are accusing the administration of carrying out extrajudicial killings which is a nice way of saying the strikes amount to murder

And this is where we start getting into conflicting reports of intel sharing or

not sharing. France and the UK both have a significant military presence in the Caribbean

and often work closely with the United States on drug intradictions. CNN reported the UK suspended intelligence sharing with the US over the boat strikes

but both US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and his British counterpart Yvette Cooper denied that

claim and called it fake news. France did call the strikes on speedboats flatly illegal

but Paris and Washington are still sharing secrets too. Colombia did stop sharing intelligence with

the United States. The decision was made after Colombia's president, Gustavo Petro, said the

fight against drugs must come second to the fight to protect human rights Now up until this point all of the U strikes in the Caribbean and the Eastern Pacific happened in international waters

But if the U.S. starts hitting stuff on land in Venezuela, then U.S. allies may rethink their

stances on intel sharing, which happens in the international community. For instance

the Netherlands is not sharing intel with the U.S. right now because the Dutch think it might

wind up at the Kremlin. There have been at least 20 more strikes on suspected drug boats since the

first one in September. Around 80 people were killed in those strikes, maybe more. There have

also been several efforts in Congress led by Democrats to rein in the president's authority

in what's now being called Operation Southern Spear, but none of those efforts were successful

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