The U.S. military announced on Monday that it carried out a strike on a vessel in the eastern Pacific, killing two individuals and leaving one survivor, in the latest such incident.
The administration of President Donald Trump has recently championed its success in targeting suspected drug trafficking vessels.
The military confirmed on X that the vessel was “engaged in narco-trafficking operations.”
Reuters could not immediately verify the information.
Ecuador’s Maritime Rescue Coordination Center is coordinating the search and rescue operations, the U.S. Coast Guard said in a statement, adding that it is providing technical support.
This is the third known attack since the raid that captured Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro last month.
Strikes carried out under the Trump administration against alleged drug boats have now resulted in 130 fatalities, following Monday’s incident. This tally emerges amidst the broader efforts of the Trump administration to assert control over a South American country’s oil resources.
The administration has previously seized seven tankers as part of this strategy.
Earlier today, military forces boarded a sanctioned oil tanker in the Indian Ocean after tracking the vessel from the Caribbean Sea. The operation is part of an “oil quarantine” designed to pressure Venezuela, which faces U.S. sanctions on its crude exports.
Venezuela has reportedly relied on a “shadow fleet” of falsely flagged tankers to smuggle oil into global supply chains, circumventing these restrictions. The intercepted ship was among several that fled the Venezuelan coast in early January, following the raid to apprehend Maduro.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth confirmed the boarding on Monday, telling shipyard workers in Maine that his instructions to military commanders were clear: “the only guidance I gave to my military commanders is none of those are getting away.” He added, “I don’t care if we got to go around the globe to get them; we’re going to get them.”
Last week, the U.S. military carried out another deadly strike on a vessel accused of trafficking drugs in the eastern Pacific Ocean, resulting in two fatalities.
U.S. Southern Command confirmed on social media that the boat was targeted because it “was transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific.” A video accompanying the post depicted the vessel engulfed in flames after the strike.
This incident occurred just hours after U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth made an unsubstantiated claim on his personal social media account. He asserted that “some top cartel drug-traffickers” in the region “have decided to cease all narcotics operations INDEFINITELY due to recent (highly effective) kinetic strikes in the Caribbean.” However, no supporting details or evidence were provided for this declaration.
Additional reporting by The Associated Press.
