Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced that the U.S. military carried out three strikes Monday in the waters of the Eastern Pacific against boats suspected of carrying drugs, killing 14 and leaving one survivor.
The announcement, made on social media Tuesday, marks a continued escalation in the pace of the strikes, which began in early September spaced weeks apart. This was the first time multiple strikes were announced in a single day.
Hegseth said Mexican search and rescue authorities “assumed responsibility for coordinating the rescue” of the sole survivor but didn’t say if that person would stay in their custody or be handed over to the U.S.
In a strike earlier in October which had two survivors, the U.S. military rescued the pair and later repatriated them to Colombia and Ecuador.
Hegseth posted footage of the strikes to social media in which two boats can be seen moving at speed through the water. One is visibly laden with a large amount of parcels or bundles. Both then suddenly explode and are seen aflame.
The third strike appears to have been conducted on a pair of boats that were stationary in the water alongside each other. They appear to be largely empty with at least two people seen moving before an explosion engulfs both boats.
Hegseth said “the four vessels were known by our intelligence apparatus, transiting along known narco-trafficking routes, and carrying narcotics.”
The death toll from the 13 disclosed strikes since early September is now at least 57 people.
In his announcement of the latest strikes, Hegseth also continued to draw parallels between the military’s actions against drug trafficking and the war on terrorism following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
He claimed that cartels “have killed more Americans than Al-Qaeda, and they will be treated the same.”
President Donald Trump has also justified the strikes by asserting that the United States is engaged in an “armed conflict” with drug cartels and proclaiming the criminal organizations to be unlawful combatants, relying on the same legal authority used by President George W. Bush’s administration for the war on terrorism.
However, the Trump administration has shown no evidence to support its claims about the boats, their connection to drug cartels, or the even the identity of the people killed in these strikes.