The U.S. military said it carried out another strike on an alleged drug-trafficking boat in the eastern Pacific Ocean on Friday, killing two people, according to U.S. Southern Command. Southern Command said it targeted people it described as drug traffickers along known smuggling routes.
Southern Command also posted a video on X that showed a boat floating in the water before an explosion left it in flames. The military did not provide evidence that the vessel was carrying drugs.
The strike reflects an approach the Trump administration has pursued in Latin American waters that began earlier this year, the Associated Press reported. The military said the campaign of striking alleged drug-trafficking vessels has persisted since early September and that the strikes have taken place in both the eastern Pacific and the Caribbean Sea, with other attacks carried out in the Caribbean.
In total, the Associated Press reported that the administration’s campaign had killed at least 183 people by the time of the Friday strike. Other parts of the policy backdrop include the U.S. building up its largest military presence in the region in generations and the later January raid that captured then-Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
The Associated Press said Maduro was brought to New York to face drug trafficking charges and has pleaded not guilty. Against that background, Friday’s strike again came as Southern Command repeated that it targeted alleged traffickers along routes it described as known smuggling corridors.
President Donald Trump has described the situation as “armed conflict” with cartels in Latin America and has justified the strikes as a necessary escalation intended to stem the flow of drugs into the United States. Critics, meanwhile, have questioned whether the boat strikes are lawful, including given the military’s failure to provide evidence that the targeted vessels were carrying drugs.