CNN – The CIA is reviewing its authorities to use lethal force against drug cartels in Mexico and beyond as the Trump administration moves to make taking on the cartels a major priority for the intelligence agency, according to a US official and three people briefed on the matter.
The review does not indicate President Donald Trump has ordered the CIA to take direct action against the cartels.
But it is designed to help the agency understand what kinds of activities it could legally undertake and what the potential risks would be across the suite of options, the sources said — underscoring how seriously the Trump administration is considering the possibility.
It also highlights some US officials’ concerns that using traditional counterterrorism tools against cartels — as the Trump administration has said it intends to do — carries a much higher risk of collateral damage to American citizens than similar operations conducted in the Middle East, far from US soil.
Among the issues agency lawyers are examining is the CIA’s and its officers’ liability if an American is accidentally killed in any operation, according to one of the people briefed.
Agency officials are “cautious” about using “assets traditionally going after what were seen as military targets now being employed against cartel targets,” the US official said.
The Trump administration earlier this year designated a number of cartels as foreign terrorist organizations — a maneuver some current and former US officials believe is designed to build a predicate for lethal action — and the CIA is already flying surveillance drones that are capable of being armed over Mexico.
CNN was not able to determine whether the effort was ordered by the White House or CIA Director John Ratcliffe, or whether it was undertaken as a prudent planning measure by agency staff …
