THE OFFENSE

The Washington Post’s Alex Horton and Ellen Nakashima published an article from two unnamed sources claiming Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered a Joint Special Operations commander to “kill everybody” during an anti-terrorist operation in the Caribbean Sea.

THE TRUTH

The Department of War killed 11 narco-terrorists in a coordinated strike designed to “kill the narco-terrorists who are poisoning the American people.” This attack was the first in a series of lethal kinetic strikes against Designated Terrorist Organizations. The Washington Post published this unsubstantiated claim in an attempt to discredit the United States’ warfighters and inflame anti-American sentiment.

KEY POINTS

• The Washington Post published an unsubstantiated lie to undermine the Department of War’s anti-terrorist operations.

SOURCES

• The Washington Post: Hegseth order on first Caribbean boat strike, officials say: Kill them all
• White House Communications Director Steven Cheung’s Post
• Secretary of War Pete Hegseth’s Post
• The New York Times: Hegseth Ordered a Lethal Attack but Not the Killing of Survivors, Officials Say
• Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt's Statement