US Airstrikes Destroy 4 Alleged Drug Boats, Kill 14

The U.S. military conducted airstrikes against four boats in the eastern Pacific Ocean on Oct. 27, killing 14 people that the Trump administration alleges were engaged in drug smuggling, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth announced on social media.

It is the first time the U.S. has conducted multiple strikes in a single day as it steps up the frequency of airstrikes and bomber flights near Latin America. One person survived the strikes, and Mexican authorities assumed responsibility for the search-and-rescue efforts, Hegseth and Mexican officials said.

“The four vessels were known by our intelligence apparatus, transiting along known narco-trafficking routes, and carrying narcotics,” Hegseth wrote in a post on X, along with video of the strikes.

Hegseth said the strikes were directed at designated terrorist organizations, a label that has been applied to Latin American cartels. Hegseth made comparisons between the boat strikes and America’s Global War on Terror in the first two decades of the 2000s, a refrain the Pentagon has adopted over the past week.

“The Department has spent over TWO DECADES defending other homelands. Now, we’re defending our own,” Hegseth wrote. “These narco-terrorists have killed more Americans than Al-Qaeda, and they will be treated the same. We will track them, we will network them, and then, we will hunt and kill them.”

As with previous strikes, the Pentagon did not immediately provide evidence for its claim that the vessels were transporting drugs. 

The Trump administration has said the U.S. is in an “armed conflict” with drug cartels and has said President Trump has the authority to conduct strikes against alleged drug-smuggling efforts. But lethal boat strikes have not been authorized by Congress, and many Democrats and some Republicans have questioned whether they are legal. 

“The Constitution says that when you go to war, Congress has to vote on it,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) said on Fox News Sunday on Oct. 26. “We’ve had no evidence presented. So at this point, I would call them extrajudicial killings.”

The U.S. has now carried out 13 airstrikes against 14 boats that have killed at least 57 people and left three survivors. 

On Oct. 27, the first strike hit two boats, killing eight, Hegseth said, while the second strike killed four, and the third strike killed three people. The Pentagon chief, who is currently on official travel in Asia, said the strikes were in international waters.

Last week, the U.S. military carried out its first strikes in the eastern Pacific Ocean as its operation in Latin America expanded, with the world’s largest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerard R. Ford, heading to the region.

On Oct. 27, the U.S. dispatched two B-1B Lancer bombers on a nearly day-long flight from Grand Forks Air Force Base, S.D., to the Caribbean. The B-1s flew along the waters off northern Venezuela and were only around 20 miles away from the country’s coastline—the closest of three bomber missions the U.S. Air Force has conducted this month as a show of force against Caracas and drug cartels.

The military operations are part of a broader pressure campaign on drug cartels and the regime of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, whom the White House says is an illegitimate leader. President Donald Trump has said on multiple occasions that the U.S. may strike targets on land.

It is unclear which platforms the U.S. used to conduct the Oct. 27 strikes. The U.S. Air Force has been operating multiple AC-130J Ghostrider gunships and at least six different MQ-9 Reapers from Puerto Rico in the Caribbean. The AC-130s and MQ-9s have been photographed with live Hellfire missiles during their deployment. 

The Marines have 10 F-35Bs stationed on the same U.S. territory. There are also USMC AV-8 Harrier fighter jets, AH-1 attack helicopters, and other aircraft embarked on the USS Iwo Jima, an amphibious assault ship that has been operating in the Caribbean, along with a number of destroyers and the Special Operations ship MV Ocean Trader. The Harriers and helicopters have conducted live-fire exercises during their deployment.