The Trump administration carried out a U.S. military strike Friday against a vessel off the coast of Venezuela carrying narcotics, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth announced.
Four individuals aboard the ship, described by the Pentagon as “narco-terrorists,” were killed in the operation.
The strike comes a day after President Donald Trump notified Congress that the U.S. is now engaged in hostilities with drug cartels.
In a formal memo, Trump classified cartel members and associates as unlawful combatants, granting the president wartime authority to target them militarily.
This designation allows the U.S. to conduct strikes, detain cartel members indefinitely without trial, and prosecute them in military tribunals.
Hegseth confirmed that U.S. intelligence verified “with 100% certainty” that the vessel was transporting drugs.
He described the strike as occurring in international waters near Venezuela while the vessel was actively moving substantial amounts of narcotics toward the U.S., per the Conservative Brief.
“Our intelligence, without a doubt, confirmed that this vessel was trafficking narcotics, the people onboard were narco-terrorists, and they were operating on a known narco-trafficking transit route,” Hegseth said. “These strikes will continue until the attacks on the American people are over.”
Friday’s operation is at least the fourth U.S. strike on vessels accused of transporting drugs from Venezuela in recent months.
The administration asserts these operations are necessary to disrupt narcotics flow into American cities.
Critics, however, warn that targeting boats so close to Venezuela risks escalating tensions and potentially triggering a broader conflict with Caracas. Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has repeatedly objected to U.S. military activity in the region.
Earlier this week, Trump issued a memo framing the actions as part of a non-international armed conflict against designated terrorist organizations, comparing cartel operations to al-Qaeda and other Islamist groups targeted since 2001.
The memo directs the War Department to “conduct operations against them pursuant to the law of armed conflict” and asserts that the U.S. must act in self-defense and in defense of others against ongoing cartel attacks.
The designation marks a significant expansion of presidential authority over military operations targeting criminal organizations. Experts have raised concerns about the legality of the strikes.
Matthew Waxman, a former national security official in the George W. Bush administration, called the actions “a very, very far stretch of international law and a dangerous one.” He noted that the designation effectively allows the U.S. to kill or detain cartel members without trial.
The administration has conducted three other strikes in the Caribbean in the past month, reportedly targeting vessels originating from Venezuela. These operations reflect a new, aggressive approach under Trump’s “America First” policy, emphasizing proactive measures to stop drugs from reaching U.S. streets.
The White House has not clarified how far it intends to extend its authority over cartel-targeting operations or whether Congress will intervene to restrict or authorize these military actions.
The strikes demonstrate the administration’s willingness to treat drug cartels as military threats, potentially setting a precedent for future operations in international waters.
