Shortly after his return to the White House, Donald Trump and his new secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, fired the top military lawyers of the Army, Air Force, and Navy. Hegseth had long made clear his contempt for judge advocates general—the military professionals who advise troops and commanders on the laws of war—referring to them as “jagoffs” in his book. At the time of the firings, Hegseth said he wanted lawyers who wouldn’t be “roadblocks” to troops carrying out orders. In retrospect, of course, it seems obvious that the self-proclaimed “secretary of War” had been laying the groundwork for precisely the sort of extralegal campaign that the military is currently executing in the Caribbean, where at least 22 alleged drug boats have been struck and at least 87 people have been killed off the coast of Venezuela.