The Pentagon announced on Thursday that the U.S. military had carried out another deadly strike against a vessel suspected of transporting illegal narcotics, killing four men in the eastern Pacific, as questions grow over the legality of these operations.
The video of the new strike was posted on social media by U.S. Southern Command, based in Florida, along with a statement saying that, under the direction of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, “Joint Task Force Southern Spear conducted a lethal kinetic strike against a vessel in international waters operated by a Designated Terrorist Organization.”
“Intelligence confirmed that the vessel was transporting illegal narcotics and transiting along a known drug-trafficking route in the Eastern Pacific. Four male narco-terrorists onboard were killed,” the statement said.
Footage showed a massive explosion suddenly overtaking a small boat as it moved across the water, followed by an image of a burning vessel with thick black smoke rising above it.
This is the 22nd strike the U.S. military has carried out against vessels in the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean, bringing the death toll to at least 87 since September, when the campaign began.
The first publicly reported strike in nearly three weeks comes as the Pentagon and the White House continue struggling to answer questions regarding the legal basis for the campaign to kill suspected drug smugglers. U.S. lawmakers have pledged to investigate the first such strike, in September, during which two survivors clinging to debris were reportedly killed in a follow-up attack.
Hegseth has faced growing criticism over the 2 September strike following a Washington Post report claiming that the defense secretary had verbally ordered the military to “kill them all.” On Thursday, a Democratic lawmaker introduced articles of impeachment against Hegseth, citing the boat strike and a report finding he had violated rules by sharing information about an attack on Signal — though such an impeachment effort is unlikely to succeed.
The U.S. admiral who commanded the strike told lawmakers on Thursday that no such order was given to kill everyone on board. However, Jim Himes, a Democratic congressman from Connecticut, described footage of the September strike — reportedly showing two survivors clinging to wreckage — as “one of the most disturbing things I have seen during my time in public service.”
“You have two individuals in clearly dire condition, with no means of movement, on a destroyed vessel,” Himes said.
The administration has argued that the U.S. is at war with drug traffickers and that such strikes are lawful under the rules of war, but most legal experts reject this reasoning.
