The US may have set a dangerous precedent by disguising a military aircraft as a civilian plane during an airstrike on a suspected drug boat in the Caribbean.
The move could put civilian aircraft flying in flashpoint areas at greater risk due to “suspicion” that they could be armed, the same way that the US military downed an Iranian airliner in 1988.
The US painted a military aircraft to look like a civilian aircraft for its first air strike on a boat suspected of smuggling drugs off the coast of Venezuela last year, as reported by The New York Times. The aircraft was part of a covert US fleet deployed for surveillance operations, and its munitions were purportedly concealed inside the fuselage rather than mounted under the wings.
This has since been confirmed to Associated Press by two sources familiar with the matter who wished to remain anonymous. However, which aircraft was used is currently unclear.
The US military conducted multiple armed strikes on suspected drug boats in the region starting in September 2025, and killed about 115 people as part of what it described as the war against narco-terrorism.
However, the feigning of civilian status to deceive adversaries into believing they are safe and then attacking them is called “perfidy,” and is in stark violation of the Pentagon’s own manual on the laws of war.
Perfidy is mentioned in the more than 1,000-page US Defense Department rulebook, which defines it as “acts that invite the confidence of enemy persons to lead them to believe that they are entitled to, or are obliged to accord, protection under the law of war, with intent to betray that confidence”.
In fact, the tactic was forbidden by the US Air Force because it means that the enemy “neglects to take precautions which are otherwise necessary.”
US military disguised warplane in deadly Venezuela strike to look like civilian aircraft
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A new report in The New York Times says the US military painted a warplane to look like a civilian aircraft and hid its weapons inside the fuselage before launching its first strike on a… pic.twitter.com/61MAFFnXj7— The Cradle (@TheCradleMedia) January 13, 2026
Meanwhile, the US Navy handbook states that sailors must employ offensive action “within the bounds of military honour, particularly without resort to perfidy,” and “attacking enemy forces while posing as a civilian puts all civilians at hazard.”
Responding to the claims, the Pentagon press secretary Kingsley Wilson said in a statement that “the US military uses a wide array of standard and nonstandard aircraft depending on mission requirements.”
There have been instances across the world when civilian aircraft have been used as shields to allow the movement of military aircraft meant to attack another country.
For instance, Iran’s air defences mistakenly shot down Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752, killing all 176 people on board.
A report into the incident released the following year stated that the tragedy was caused because Iran intentionally kept its airspace open to use civilian air passengers as “human shields” against a possible American retaliation to Iran’s missile attack that followed Qasem Soleimani’s assassination.
Russia has repeatedly accused Israel of using civilian airliners as cover during airstrikes in Syria.
In 2018, a Russian military aircraft with 15 people onboard was accidentally shot down by Syrian anti-aircraft defences, which was blamed by Moscow on Israel, which allegedly used the aircraft as cover against Syrian missiles in a “deliberate provocation.”
Rogue armed militants or state/non-state actors could use passenger airliners to wage war against others, simply by disguising their aircraft to look like a civilian jet.
It may force US adversaries to question what if the next plane they see overhead isn’t a commercial flight, but a camouflaged US aircraft ready to strike? This could, in turn, endanger the safety of passenger planes.
This could prove to be detrimental, as seen in the past when “suspicions” have led to the downing of an airliner, killing innocent civilians.
This reminds us of the US downing of an Iranian airliner based on suspicion that it was a military fighter armed with Maverick missiles. The keyword being “suspicion”.
When US Shot Down An Iranian Aircraft
During the 1980 to 1988 Iran-Iraq war, the US provided substantial military, intelligence, and monetary support to Iraq, including dual-use technology such as helicopters and chemical precursors, despite officially maintaining neutrality.
During the height of the war, Iran had allegedly been attempting to obstruct Iraq’s resupply via the Persian Gulf by launching rockets at ships and placing mines.
In response, the US increased its engagement in the Persian Gulf to defend oil tankers from Iranian attacks in the late 1980s. It launched operations like Earnest Will between 1987 and 1988, which saw US Navy ships escorting Kuwaiti tankers supporting Iraq’s oil exports, indirectly bolstering Iraq’s economy.
It was during one of these missions of protecting oil tankers that the US accidentally downed an Iranian airliner.
The incident happened on July 3, 1988, while tensions in the West Asian region were rising and the Iran-Iraq conflict was nearing its conclusion.
Due to the tanker war in the Persian Gulf, the US had become directly involved in conflict with Iranian forces due to its presence in the Persian Gulf.
On April 14, 1988, an Iranian naval mine struck the US cruiser USS Samuel B. Roberts, almost splitting it in two.
Four days later, an Iranian ship was shot at and sunk by the US.
On the fateful day of July 3, 1988, the US warship USS Vincennes was battling Iranian gunboats and protecting Kuwaiti oil tankers in the Persian Gulf as per usual when it attacked the Iranian airplane.
Iran Air Flight 655 took off from Bandar Abbas, a dual military-civilian airport where the Iranian military had deployed several of its F-14 fighter jets, according to a US Navy investigation of the shootdown.
According to information available to the US, the F-14s were equipped with Maverick missiles that could engage US ships within a 16-kilometer range.
The unwitting Iranian pilot was unaware of the hostilities ongoing in the area on the day, even though the Bandar Abbas tower had already sent warnings.
According to reports, the Iranian jetliner did not respond to warnings from US warships. However, the investigators admitted that it was likely that the aircraft’s crew was not watching the channels that broadcast the warnings from the United States.
When the ill-fated Iranian aircraft was detected by the US crew, the captain of the USS Vincennes was informed that an unidentified radar contact was not answering calls. He was also misinformed that this contact might be an F-14 from Iran.
The US inquiry later claimed that the captain had less than five minutes to determine whether the ship was in danger based on whether the Iranian aircraft was carrying the lethal Maverick missiles.
With barely any time at hand, the captain of the Vincennes ordered the firing.
The US surface-to-air missiles hit the Iranian airliner merely seven minutes after its takeoff.
Subsequent investigations verified that the airplane was climbing within its allocated route and squawking a civilian code, contrary to the US’s first assertion that it was falling toward the Vincennes and beyond its commercial corridor. Furthermore, according to some reports, the Vincennes was in Iranian territorial waters at the time.
The US Navy’s inquiry stated that crew error resulted from the psychological strain that first-time combatants endured. It was acknowledged that a mix of miscommunication and human error caused the misidentification.
The moral of the story is that disguising a civilian aircraft for military operations further heightens the threat to passenger airlines.
- Contact the author at sakshi.tiwari13 (at) outlook.com
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