April 14, 2026 / 8:53 PM EDT / CBS/AP
The U.S. military struck another vessel accused of carrying drugs in the eastern Pacific on Tuesday, killing four people in the fourth such attack announced in recent days.
U.S. Southern Command posted aerial video showing a boat bobbing in the water before it was hit by a projectile and exploded. The military said it had struck two boats on Saturday and a third on Monday.
Officials said all the vessels were “operated by Designated Terrorist Organizations” and that intelligence indicated they “were transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific and were engaged in narco-trafficking operations,” but they did not provide supporting evidence.
Asked about a separate strike in the eastern Pacific that killed two men on Monday, a Southern Command spokesperson told CBS News, “For operational security reasons, we cannot discuss specific sources or methods.”
The latest strike brings the reported death toll to 175 since the operations began in early September. The U.S. Coast Guard has suspended the search for one survivor from the Saturday attack.
At least six people have survived strikes on alleged drug-smuggling boats, prompting search-and-rescue efforts in most cases. Authorities have later called off several searches, though in an October operation two survivors were rescued by a Navy helicopter and repatriated to Ecuador and Colombia.
During the first strike of the Trump administration’s campaign on Sept. 2, two people survived an initial strike but were killed in a follow-on attack, leading to accusations that the second strike may have constituted a war crime.
Critics have questioned the legality and effectiveness of the boat strikes, noting that much of the fentanyl behind fatal overdoses is typically trafficked overland from Mexico, where it is produced with chemicals imported from China and India.
President Trump has said the U.S. is in “armed conflict” with cartels in Latin America and has defended the attacks as necessary to curb the flow of drugs and overdose deaths. His administration has provided little evidence to support claims that those killed were “narcoterrorists.”