President Donald Trump on Friday announced another lethal military strike on an alleged drug-trafficking vessel in international waters that he said was affiliated with a designated terrorist organization.
In a social media post, Trump said the strike targeted a vessel operating in US Southern Command’s area of responsibility – which includes Central America, South America and the Caribbean – and killed three male “narcoterrorists” onboard.
“On my Orders, the Secretary of War ordered a lethal kinetic strike on a vessel affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization conducting narcotrafficking in the USSOUTHCOM area of responsibility,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Intelligence confirmed the vessel was trafficking illicit narcotics and was transiting along a known narcotrafficking passage enroute to poison Americans.”
According to the president, no US forces were harmed during the operation.
“STOP SELLING FENTANYL, NARCOTICS, AND ILLEGAL DRUGS IN AMERICA, AND COMMITTING VIOLENCE AND TERRORISM AGAINST AMERICANS!!!,” the president said.
Trump attached a video of the strike to his post.
Friday’s announcement marks the military’s third known fatal strike on an alleged drug boat this month, as the Trump administration escalates its fight against narcotics trafficking.
Earlier this week, Trump said the US military killed three people in a strike on a vessel in international waters near South America, allegedly “transporting illegal narcotics” from Venezuela.
Details on the location of the strike or the method of attack remain unclear. In a video Trump posted on Monday, a small boat is seen in open water before being hit, triggering a plume of black smoke — similar to footage released in Friday’s social media post.
Asked later Monday for evidence the vessel was carrying drugs, Trump responded, “We have proof. All you have to do is look at the cargo that was spattered all over the ocean, big bags of cocaine and fentanyl all over the place.”
A separate US military strike earlier this month killed 11 people in the Caribbean allegedly tied to the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang. The Trump administration has provided little detail regarding the action. When pressed in the days after the first strike, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth declined to provide specifics but said the US had “the absolute and complete authority to conduct that.”
CNN reported last week that Defense Department officials did not present conclusive evidence that the targets of the first attack were members of Tren de Aragua, and that the briefers could not determine exactly where they were headed. A source also told CNN that the briefers said the boat turned around at one point, which raises more questions about whether it posed an immediate threat.
“There is no evidence – none – that this strike was conducted in self-defense,” Sen. Jack Reed, ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said last week. “That matters, because under both domestic and international law, the US military simply does not have the authority to use lethal force against a civilian vessel unless acting in self-defense.”
Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio both signaled that more activity could be coming; Rubio said during a trip to Mexico and Ecuador after the first strike that the US is “going to wage combat against drug cartels that are flooding American streets and killing Americans.”
This story has been updated with additional details.
CNN’s Haley Britzky contributed to this report.
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