The U.S. military on Wednesday killed another four people accused by the Trump administration of trafficking narcotics by sea, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced, as the administration’s lethal campaign continued to expand.
Mr. Hegseth said on social media that the strike took place in international waters and was directed at a boat that he said was operated by a “designated terrorist organization” in the eastern Pacific Ocean.
Wednesday’s strike came two days after the deadliest known set of strikes since President Trump authorized the military to begin targeting people aboard boats in the seas of Latin America last month. On Monday, Mr. Hegseth said, 14 men were killed in three strikes on four boats. More than 60 people have been killed in the U.S. campaign in total.
The president has named and targeted a number of drug cartels as “narco-terrorists” and maintains that they are now enemy combatants who can be killed at will.
“The Western Hemisphere is no longer a safe haven for narco-terrorists bringing drugs to our shores to poison Americans,” Mr. Hegseth said in his social media post. He said the Pentagon “will continue to hunt them down and eliminate them wherever they operate.”
The defense secretary’s announcement was accompanied by a 22-second video of a boat that was apparently struck and engulfed in flames.
Mr. Hegseth did not provide geographic details, beyond saying that the strikes took place in the eastern Pacific. After launching a series of strikes in the Caribbean Sea near the coast of Venezuela, the Trump administration has more recently directed the U.S. military to strike boats in the eastern Pacific, off the coast of Colombia.
A broad range of outside experts in laws governing the use of armed force have said the campaign is illegal because the military is not permitted to deliberately target civilians — even criminal suspects — who are not directly participating in armed hostilities. But the Trump administration has asserted that the president has the power to “determine,” without any authorization from Congress, that drug cartels and those who work for them are enemy combatants.
Eric Schmitt, Charlie Savage and Megan Mineiro contributed reporting.
Helene Cooper is a Pentagon correspondent for The Times. She was previously an editor, diplomatic correspondent and White House correspondent.
Robert Jimison covers Congress for The Times, with a focus on defense issues and foreign policy.
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