US military strikes 4 boats in the Pacific, killing 14, in ramp-up of campaign against alleged drug trafficking
By Zachary Cohen, CNN
(CNN) — The US military conducted strikes against four more boats in the eastern Pacific Ocean on Monday, killing 14 people on board the vessels, with one survivor, according to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.
It marked the first time multiple strikes were conducted on the same day as part of the Trump administration’s accelerating campaign against boats allegedly involved in drug trafficking. According to Hegseth, Mexican authorities have assumed responsibility for coordinating the search and rescue of the survivor.
There were three strikes in the Pacific on Monday — with one hitting two boats at once — and bringing the number of known strikes carried out by the US military on alleged drug-smuggling vessels to 13 since the start of September. To date, those operations have destroyed 14 boats and killed 57 people — with three survivors.
Last week, the US military conducted its first round of strikes in the eastern Pacific Ocean, which appeared to mark an expansion of the campaign as previous strikes had targeted boats in the Caribbean Sea.
Earlier this month, a US strike against a vessel in the Caribbean also did not kill everyone on board. In that case, the US Navy initially detained two survivors, but the Trump administration quickly repatriated the two men back to their home countries of Ecuador and Colombia.
The situation set up a dilemma because it was unclear what legal authority the US military would be able to cite to detain the survivors indefinitely.
The president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, said during her daily news conference Tuesday that her government was informed about the Monday strike and about the potential survivor this morning. She added that the events occurred in international waters.
Sheinbaum said she instructed the foreign minister, Juan Ramón de la Fuente, to meet with the US ambassador to Mexico, Ron Johnson, “and we will give them the information with the Navy secretariat about this survivor, if it is the case that there was indeed a survivor.”
The Trump administration has produced a classified legal opinion seeking to justify lethal strikes against a secret and expansive list of cartels and suspected drug traffickers, CNN has reported.
The opinion is significant, legal experts previously told CNN, because it treats drug traffickers as enemy combatants who can be summarily killed without any kind of judicial review.
Hegseth said the boats targeted by the three latest strikes Monday were “being operated by a Designated Terrorist Organizations trafficking narcotics in the Eastern Pacific.”
“The four vessels were known by our intelligence apparatus, transiting along known narco-trafficking routes, and carrying narcotics,” Hegseth added.
“Eight male narco-terrorists were aboard the vessels during the first strike. Four male narco-terrorists were aboard the vessel during the second strike. Three male narco-terrorists were aboard the vessel during the third strike, ” Hegseth wrote on X. “All strikes were in international waters with no U.S. forces harmed.”
This story has been updated with additional information.
CNN’s Mauricio Torres contributed to this report.
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