US attacks on vessels for alleged drug trafficking have killed at least 117 people
The US Army carried out an attack on yet another vessel allegedly involved in drug trafficking in the Eastern Pacific Ocean on Friday, killing two people and leaving one survivor, according to US Southern Command.
“On January 23, under the direction of Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, Joint Task Force Southern Spear conducted a lethal kinetic strike against a vessel operated by Designated Terrorist Organizations,” SOUTHCOM wrote in the X.
The Coast Guard told CNN in a statement that it was notified by SOUTHCOM and is coordinating search and rescue operations for the survivor.
in attacks on suspected drug trafficking vessels as part of a campaign, called Operation Southern Spear, that the Trump administration said was aimed at reducing narcotics trafficking.
The pace of US attacks has slowed this year. The most recent attack by the armed forces occurred on December 31, killing 5 people.
Friday’s attack marks the first known attack on suspected drug trafficking boats since the U.S. military operation that captured Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro in Caracas and took him to New York to face criminal charges. Maduro pleaded not guilty to the charges earlier this month.
Publicly, American officials have stated that the aim of the boat attacks is to disrupt the flow of drugs into the United States, but Trump administration officials have previously acknowledged privately that the aim is to depose Maduro.
Previous attacks left survivors
US military strikes against suspected drug trafficking boats, including an attack on December 30 in which an unspecified number of people abandoned the vessel.
The Coast Guard for these people three days later.
Last October, the US rescued two survivors of an attack on a submarine in the Caribbean and then to their home countries of Ecuador and Colombia. Two other crew members died in that attack.
The controversial first US military strike in the operation, , also left survivors. When an initial attack on the suspected drug trafficking boat failed to sink it, the military realized it killed two survivors who .
Democratic lawmakers have pressed the Trump administration for answers about the double attack, including demanding that the video be released to the public, with some suggesting that the US military may have committed a war crime by killing the survivors.
