随着中期选举临近，唐纳德·特朗普不仅在吹嘘其在国际水域对民用船只进行军事打击的政策——总统还将这些致命打击当作某种悲剧笑话的笑柄。
As the midterm elections approach, Donald Trump isn’t just boasting about his policy of military strikes on civilian boats in international waters — the president is also treating the deadly strikes as some kind punchline to a tragic joke.
但当他不拿这项政策开玩笑时，他就在夸耀其成效。“美国已对贩毒船只实施数十次打击，摧毁了进入海洋和海域的97%的毒品，”特朗普上个月在联合国发表讲话时吹嘘道。“你们看到了；它们消失得非常快，我们下降了90%。它们下降了97%。”该政策首次实施一年多后，这仍然是白宫辩护的核心：该政府已经粉碎了海上贩毒。然而，事实并非如此。
But when he’s not kidding about the policy, he’s bragging about its efficacy. “The United States has carried out dozens of strikes on cartel drug boats, destroying 97% of the drugs coming into the ocean and sea,”Trump boasted in an address to the United Nations last month. “You’ve seen it; they disappear very quickly, and we’re down 90%. They’re down 97%.”More than a year after the policy was first implemented, this remains at the heart of the White House’s defense: The administration has crushed maritime drug trafficking. Except, it hasn’t.
《华尔街日报》报道，在亚马逊深处，走私者已将货物转向东部，将毒品藏在穿越雨林广阔河流网络的船只上。在哥伦比亚漫长的海岸线上，船员们通过沿着海岸线航行，躲避美国军方的空袭，使用的正是美国正在打击的那种快艇。
The Wall Street Journal reported Deep in the Amazon, smugglers have shifted shipments east, hiding drugs on boats moving through the rain forest’s vast river network. And on Colombia’s long coast, crews evade U.S. military airstrikes by hugging the shoreline in the exact same speedboats the Americans are targeting.
来自四大洲的执法官员表示，创纪录的可卡因供应量每天仍然抵达美国、欧洲乃至遥远的澳大利亚，价格更便宜、纯度更高，数十年来未见。
Record supplies of cocaine still arrive in the U.S., Europe and as far away as Australia every day, cheaper and purer than they’ve been in decades, said law-enforcement officials across four continents.
关于在使用武力时采取“目的证明手段正当”的基本立场，确实值得讨论，但最新报道与数月来的证据一致，表明该政府的辩护显然是错误的：该政府正在杀害大量人员、摧毁大量船只，但非法毒品仍然抵达美国。
There’s an important argument to be had about the underlying ends-justify-the-means approach to the use of military force, but this latest reporting is consistent with months’ worth of evidence suggesting the administration’s defense is plainly wrong: The administration is killing a lot of people and destroying a lot of boats, but illicit drugs are reaching the U.S. anyway.
“我们无法靠轰炸来解决毒品危机，”罗德岛州民主党参议员、参议院军事委员会资深成员杰克·里德在最近的一份声明中说道。“我们尝试了数十年，但都失败了。如今我们需要的是以执法部门为主导，需要五角大楼如实汇报情况，还需要一个愿意履行自身职责的国会。” 然而从种种迹象来看，白宫似乎并不在意这些关键细节。恰恰相反，《纽约时报》5月份报道称，白宫副幕僚长斯蒂芬·米勒每月两次主持所谓的“成果汇报会”，要求政府官员汇报各项工作取得的成效。
“We cannot bomb our way out of a drug crisis,” Democratic Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the ranking member on the Senate Armed Services Committee, explained in a recent statement. “We tried that for decades and it failed. What we need now is law enforcement in the lead, honest accounting from the Pentagon, and a Congress willing to do its job.”By all appearances, the White House doesn’t care much about these relevant details. On the contrary, The New York Times reported in May that deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller chairs bimonthly meetings, apparently called “wins” meetings, at which administration officials are expected to report on various successes.
据报道，因船只袭击造成的死亡人数被五角大楼“频繁列为”其“最显著的成果之一”。
The Pentagon’s death toll from boat strikes is reportedly “regularly highlighted” as “one of the biggest” such accomplishments. The post More than a year later, Team Trump’s boat strikes continue to fail on multiple fronts MS NOW