The U.S. military carried out another deadly strike on an alleged drug-trafficking vessel in the Eastern Pacific Ocean on Friday, killing three people, according to U.S. Southern Command. The strike was the latest in a sustained campaign of aerial attacks on boats the military says are engaged in narcotics trafficking.
The strike raises to at least 148 the death toll from the Trump administration’s military campaign against drug boats in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific since early September. The escalation has drawn fierce criticism over its legality, effectiveness, and the use of follow-up strikes that have killed survivors.
U.S. Southern Command said the boat “was transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific and was engaged in narco-trafficking operations.” The command released a video showing the vessel in flames.
The Escalating Campaign
This strike is the latest in an intensifying military campaign. Since early September, the Trump administration has carried out attacks on vessels in both the Caribbean Sea and the Eastern Pacific, accumulating a death toll of at least 148 across at least 43 strikes.
Administration’s Justification
President Donald Trump has characterized the effort as armed conflict against Latin American cartels and described the strikes as necessary to stem the drug flow into the United States. The administration has offered little public evidence to support its claims about killing what it calls “narcoterrorists.”
Questions of Legality and Effectiveness
Critics have questioned both the legality and effectiveness of the strikes. Legal scholars note that much of the fentanyl fueling U.S. overdose deaths is typically trafficked over land from Mexico, not by boat. The fentanyl is produced in Mexico using chemicals imported from China and India.
That criticism intensified after an early incident: the military killed survivors of the first boat attack with a follow-up strike. The Trump administration and Republican lawmakers have defended this follow-up strike as legal and necessary, while Democratic lawmakers and legal experts have characterized it as murder or possibly a war crime.
The campaign represents a significant shift in U.S. counternarcotics strategy in the Western Hemisphere. It began shortly after the Trump administration captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in early January.