Eight alleged "narco-terrorists" were killed Monday in U.S. strikes on three suspected drug vessels in the eastern Pacific, defense officials announced.
U.S. Southern Command said in a social media post that the strikes, among about two dozen conducted in the region since early September, were ordered by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
Killed were three people in the first vessel, two in the second and three in the third, Southern Command said. The boats were allegedly being operated by U.S-designated terrorist groups in international waters, and Southern Command said they were using known narco-trafficking routes and engaged in narco-trafficking.
The new strikes come amid rising tensions between the U.S. and Venezuela and increased scrutiny of a so-called double tap strike by the U.S. on Sept. 2 that killed the survivors of an initial strike on an alleged drug boat.
The attacks are the 23rd through 25th known strikes on suspected drug boats by U.S. forces in the eastern Pacific and the Caribbean; they have killed at least 94 people.
The Trump administration has defended the strikes, saying they're critical in preventing the flow of fentanyl, the synthetic opioid often made with chemicals from China and trafficked through Mexico, into the country. Fentanyl is the nation's leading cause of overdose deaths.
"The declared intent is to stop lethal drugs, destroy narco-boats, and kill the narco-terrorists who are poisoning the American people,” Hegseth said on X last month. “Every trafficker we kill is affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization.”
On Monday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order designating fentanyl and its core precursor chemical as weapons of mass destruction.
