On 18 June, the US Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) carried out a lethal strike on a vessel in the eastern Pacific Ocean, killing three men it described as “narco-terrorists”. The operation, directed by SOUTHCOM commander General Francis L. Donovan under the Joint Task Force Southern Spear, targeted a boat that intelligence assessments said was transiting known narcotics-smuggling routes and operated by designated terrorist organisations. The military released a brief video showing the vessel erupting in flames after being hit, but did not provide public evidence that the boat was carrying narcotics or identify the organisations involved. No US personnel were harmed. The strike is the latest in a campaign that, according to tallies by news agencies and official announcements, has now killed at least 211 people since the Trump administration began targeting alleged traffickers in September 2025.

Washington maintains that the United States is in an “armed conflict” with Latin American drug cartels, which it has formally designated as terrorist groups. President Donald Trump has argued that the strikes are a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs into the US and reduce fatal overdoses, claiming that narcotics flows have dropped by 94 per cent since the operations began. The administration has told Congress that those killed are “unlawful combatants” and that lethal strikes can be conducted without judicial review, citing a confidential Department of Justice legal finding. The White House has also defended a follow-up strike in September, in which two survivors of an initial attack that killed nine others were struck again while clinging to wreckage, as an act of “self-defence” to ensure the vessel’s destruction, conducted in accordance with the laws of armed conflict.

The campaign has drawn sharp criticism from multiple quarters. The United Nations has condemned the strikes, stating that counter-narcotics operations are a law enforcement task, not a military one, and has called on Washington to halt the attacks. Colombian President Gustavo Petro has argued that some of those killed may have been innocent and that targeting low-level operatives is an ineffective strategy; capturing cartel leadership, he said, would be more effective. In the US Congress, Democratic senators on Thursday demanded that the Pentagon release “unedited video” of the strikes, while legal scholars and human rights groups have questioned the overall legality of using lethal military force against suspected traffickers outside a traditional battlefield. Critics also note that the fentanyl responsible for many US overdose deaths is predominantly trafficked over land from Mexico, manufactured with chemicals imported from China and India, raising doubts about the maritime campaign’s effectiveness.

The Pentagon’s internal watchdog announced in May that it plans to evaluate whether the military followed the established six-phase Joint Targeting Cycle in carrying out the strikes, though the review will not assess their legality. The scrutiny has intensified as the pace of operations continues: a strike on 16 June killed one person and left two survivors, and a separate operation last week killed the alleged leader of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. With no public evidence released to substantiate the narcotics links of targeted vessels, and with survivors sometimes handed back to their countries of origin after brief detention, the legal and political debate over the campaign is set to deepen. The next known step is the inspector general’s evaluation, for which no completion date has been announced.