May 5, 2026 / 10:58 PM EDT / CBS/AP
The U.S. military carried out a strike Tuesday against a vessel in the eastern Pacific Ocean that it said was suspected of transporting drugs, killing three men.
U.S. Southern Command said in a social media post that its commander, Gen. Francis L. Donovan, ordered a “lethal kinetic strike” on a boat the command alleged was operated by “Designated Terrorist Organizations” and “was engaged in narco-trafficking operations.” The statement offered no evidence to back those assertions. The command released an unclassified video of the strike.
The attack followed a separate strike a day earlier in the Caribbean Sea, in which U.S. forces said two people were killed.
Since early September, the Trump administration has conducted a campaign of destroying vessels it says are involved in drug trafficking in Latin American waters. The Pentagon has said that campaign has killed at least 190 people in total.
Officials have continued the strikes even as the U.S. is engaged in a separate conflict with Iran, and activity has increased in recent weeks, underscoring the administration’s intensified efforts to combat what it calls “narcoterrorism” in the Western Hemisphere. The military has not produced evidence publicly that any of the targeted boats were carrying drugs.
U.S. officials said Tuesday’s strike targeted suspected traffickers operating along known smuggling routes. Southern Command posted a video on X showing a small vessel underway, followed by a large explosion that left the boat burning.
President Trump has characterized the U.S. role as being in “armed conflict” with drug cartels and has defended the strikes as necessary to curb the flow of illegal drugs and prevent fatal overdoses. Critics say the administration has provided scant proof that the people killed were members of “narcoterrorist” groups and have raised questions about the legal basis for the operations.
The campaign of maritime strikes began as the U.S. built up what officials have described as its largest military presence in the region in generations, and months before a January raid that resulted in the capture of then-Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Maduro was transported to New York to face drug-trafficking charges and has pleaded not guilty.
Questions about evidence and legality are likely to persist as the U.S. continues its strikes on suspected smuggling vessels in international waters.