Donald Trump has declared war on drug cartels and notified Congress that the United States is now engaged in a ‘non-international armed conflict’.
The extraordinary escalation by the president follows a series of recent strikes on drug-smuggling vessels operated by ‘terrorist organizations’ in the Caribbean.
Trump’s declaration is intended to place an iron-clad legal framework around the military action. According to international law, a country may kill enemy fighters even when they pose no threat and detain them indefinitely without trial.
In a confidential memo sent to lawmakers on Thursday, the president calls the cartel gangsters ‘unlawful combatants’ whose actions ‘constitute an armed attack against the United States’.
It follows a closed-door Senate Armed Services Committee briefing on Wednesday during which Pentagon officials addressed lawmakers’ concerns over the legality of the strikes.
The president’s notice uses language from international law – ‘non-international armed conflict’ – which refers to war with a non-state actor.
‘The cartels involved have grown more armed, well-organized, and violent,’ the memo added. ‘They have the financial means, sophistication, and paramilitary capabilities needed to operate with impunity.’
It follows complaints from Democratic lawmakers that the strikes – including three deadly attacks on drug traffickers last month – are unlawful under the War Powers Act which requires the consent of the chamber for military action.
The War Powers Act, passed in the aftermath of the Vietnam War, has been challenged or sidestepped by almost every president since its enactment, including by Barrack Obama in Libya in 2011 and Bill Clinton in Kosovo in 1999.