Four people killed in latest strike on suspected drug boat off Latin America, Pentagon says
The US military continued its assault on what it claims are drug smuggling boats off Latin America’s coastal waters with another strike on Thursday that the Pentagon said killed four people.
The strike in the Eastern Pacific was ordered by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, U.S. Southern Command said in a social media post that included unclassified video of the attack.
“Intelligence confirmed that the vessel was transporting illicit narcotics and transiting a known route for narcotics trafficking in the Eastern Pacific,” said U.S. Southern Command, which is responsible for U.S. military operations in the Caribbean Sea and the waters off Central and South America. “Four narcoterrorists on board the ship were killed.”
Since early September, the U.S. military has launched at least 22 strikes against ships in the eastern Pacific and Caribbean that the Trump administration claimed, without providing further evidence, were intended for drug trafficking.
So far, at least 87 people have been killed in the strikes. Thursday’s was the first known strike since November 15.
The boat attacks are part of larger efforts by the White House put pressure on the regime of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro.
It also comes as Hegseth has faced increased scrutiny following a recent Washington Post report. following a boat strike on September 2 in the Caribbean who killed 11 peoplethe first in a series of ship attacks.
The report claims the US military hit the boat with two missiles, a revelation confirmed by the White House. Some lawmakers question whether the second strike constitutes a war crime.
A source close to the matter told CBS News on Wednesday that the second strike occurred as two people who survived the first missile attempted to get back on the boat. The survivors would have tried to recover part of the drugs, according to the source.
Hegseth denied ordering the second strike, saying the decision was made by Navy Adm. Frank “Mitch” Bradley, head of Special Operations Command. The Washington Post report also claimed that Hegseth ordered everyone on the boat killed, which he denied, and which Bradley also denied, lawmakers who were briefed on the strikes told reporters.
THURSDAY, Congressional lawmakers held a closed session in which they saw video of that second strike and were briefed on the incident by Bradley and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
After seeing the video, Rep. Jim Himes of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, called it “one of the most disturbing things I’ve seen in my career in public service.”
However, Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said he “sees nothing concerning.”
