US Strikes on Alleged Drug Vessels Kill Eight in Eastern Pacific, Raising Legal and Political Questions

The United States military says it has killed eight men in a series of airstrikes on three small boats in the eastern Pacific Ocean, the latest and deadliest action in a rapidly expanding maritime campaign that the Trump administration frames as a war on “narco‑terrorists” but that critics warn may amount to unlawful extrajudicial killings.

Image Illustration. Photo by Leo_Visions on Unsplash

Three Boats, Eight Dead in International Waters

US Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) said it carried out “lethal kinetic strikes” on Monday, December 15, against three vessels transiting known narcotics routes in the eastern Pacific, acting under orders from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. According to the command, the boats were operated by groups it labels as “Designated Terrorist Organizations” and were engaged in drug trafficking along established smuggling corridors. The strikes took place in international waters and were executed by Joint Task Force Southern Spear.

SOUTHCOM said all eight people killed were adult men and described them as “narco‑terrorists,” specifying that three were aboard the first boat, two on the second and three on the third. No survivors or arrests were reported, underlining that this was an exclusively lethal operation at sea.

Short, grainy black‑and‑white video clips released on social media by SOUTHCOM show small vessels skimming across the water before they are engulfed in explosions, but the Pentagon has not publicly released evidence that the boats were carrying narcotics or belonged to terrorist‑designated organizations.

Part of a Wider Maritime Airstrike Campaign

The attacks form part of a broader series of US airstrikes on small boats in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific launched in September 2025 under what officials describe as an effort to disrupt maritime trafficking routes from Latin America. As of mid‑December, US forces have conducted at least 25 strikes on 26 vessels, killing 95 people, according to a compiled tally of official statements and media reports. Most of the targets have been small fishing craft, high‑speed “go‑fast” boats and semi‑submersible vessels typically used by drug traffickers.

The latest operation brings the number of people killed in the boat campaign to at least 94 or 95, depending on whether one missing survivor is counted as presumed dead. In October, a separate set of strikes on four vessels in the eastern Pacific killed 14 suspected traffickers in a single day, highlighting the sharp escalation of lethal force at sea since September 1, when the first widely publicised attack destroyed a boat allegedly departing Venezuela and killed 11 people. That opening strike was described by the US government as a “kinetic” action on a drug boat linked to Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua crime syndicate.

From Drug War to "Narco‑Terrorism"

The Trump administration has framed the boat strikes as part of a wider campaign to combat both drug cartels and terrorism in the Western Hemisphere. Officials say many of the targeted vessels are operated by organizations that Washington has formally labeled as terrorist, including the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua and Colombia’s National Liberation Army (ELN).

President Trump has repeatedly argued that the US is in an “armed conflict” with drug cartels and that destroying suspected smuggling vessels far from US shores is justified to protect Americans from synthetic opioids such as fentanyl. In a recent interview, he claimed that each destroyed boat saves an average of 25,000 American lives—a figure for which the administration has provided no public evidence.

In parallel, Trump signed an executive order this year designating fentanyl a “weapon of mass destruction,” a symbolic move that allows broader coordination between the Pentagon, intelligence agencies and law‑enforcement in targeting drug networks. The administration has also ordered the largest US naval buildup in the Caribbean in decades and announced a blockade on sanctioned Venezuelan oil tankers, moves that have intensified tensions with President Nicolás Maduro’s government in Caracas.

Scrutiny Over Evidence and Legality

While the Pentagon asserts that intelligence confirms the boats were “engaged in narco‑trafficking,” it has so far offered no public proof that the latest three vessels were carrying drugs or weapons. That lack of transparency is fueling calls from lawmakers and rights advocates for independent investigations into how targets are chosen and whether those aboard had any chance to surrender.

Legal scholars say the administration’s rationale—that drug traffickers aligned with foreign groups can be treated as combatants in a global armed conflict—pushes the boundaries of international humanitarian law, which normally limits states’ authority to kill to clearly defined battlefields and combatants. Some experts have warned that strikes on unflagged or lightly armed civilian‑type vessels in international waters could violate the UN Charter’s prohibition on the use of force and international human rights norms against arbitrary deprivation of life if those on board are not participating in an armed conflict at the time of attack.

Growing Political and Public Debate

The strikes have become a flashpoint in Washington. Members of Congress from both parties have demanded access to full, unedited video of earlier attacks, including a controversial September 2 operation in which two survivors of an initial strike were reportedly killed in a follow‑up attack. Defense Secretary Hegseth has said the footage is classified and will not be released publicly, deepening suspicions among critics that the rules of engagement may have been breached.

Public opinion on the campaign is sharply divided. A Harvard CAPS/Harris poll conducted in early October found that about 71% of respondents supported sinking boats believed to be trafficking drugs from South America, suggesting broad backing for aggressive interdiction at sea. But a Reuters/Ipsos survey a month later reported that 51% of Americans opposed “killing suspected drug traffickers abroad without judicial process,” while only 29% supported it, indicating deep unease about targeted killings outside traditional war zones.

Drug Flows and the Effectiveness Question

Even as the US military leans more heavily on lethal force at sea, the scale of maritime drug trafficking remains immense. In April 2025, the US Coast Guard offloaded nearly 44,550 pounds of cocaine and 3,880 pounds of marijuana, valued at about $510 million, after 11 interdictions in international waters of the eastern Pacific alone. A separate Coast Guard operation in March offloaded more than $517.5 million worth of seized narcotics from the region, underscoring how lucrative and persistent the trade remains despite repeated interdictions and arrests.

Analysts say that, while blowing up individual boats imposes immediate costs on criminal networks, it is unclear whether the airstrike campaign will significantly reduce the flow of cocaine and synthetic opioids to the United States over the long term. Cartels have historically adapted quickly to enforcement pressure—shifting routes, using new types of vessels or recruiting more couriers—while the underlying demand for drugs in consumer countries remains high.

An Unresolved Test of Law, Policy and Strategy

For now, the December 15 strikes that left eight men dead are both a continuation and an escalation: the latest in a string of lethal operations justified as necessary to blunt the deadly impact of narcotics, but undertaken far from any conventional battlefield and largely shielded from public scrutiny.

As Congress presses for more information, human‑rights lawyers question the legal foundations and families in Latin America search for missing relatives, the campaign against alleged drug vessels in the Pacific and Caribbean has become a live test of how far the United States is willing to stretch the concept of armed conflict in the name of fighting drugs—and how much oversight Americans are prepared to demand when their government claims the authority to kill at sea.