[ad_1]
Washington — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Friday that the U.S. carried out another strike on a vessel allegedly operated by the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua that he said was trafficking drugs in the Caribbean Sea.
Hegseth said on social media that the strike killed all six men who were on board, and took place in international waters. He said it is the first strike to take place at night.
“The vessel was known by our intelligence to be involved in illicit narcotics smuggling, was transiting along a known narco-trafficking route, and carrying narcotics,” he wrote. Hegseth included in his social media post a video, marked unclassified, of the vessel as it was hit.
This latest strike appears to be the 10th carried out by the Trump administration against alleged drug trafficking boats over the past several weeks, which have now led to more than 40 deaths. The first several took place in the Caribbean Sea, but this week, the administration’s campaign broadened into the Pacific Ocean.
Department of War
Hegseth announced two other strikes Tuesday and Wednesday, both of which he said occurred in the Eastern Pacific. In his social media posts, the Defense secretary has alleged that the vessels were operated by a “designated terrorist organization,” but did not name the group.
The administration told Congress earlier this month that the U.S. is in a “non-international armed conflict” with drug cartels and argued that the narcotics they bring into the country illegally is killing tens of thousands of Americans annually, which it said constitutes an “armed attack.”
While Hegseth has claimed that the targeted vessels are moving along a “known narco-trafficking route,” Sen. Mark Kelly, a Democrat from Arizona, told “Face the National with Margaret Brennan” that the routes through the Caribbean are predominantly used to traffick cocaine to Europe, not the U.S.
The senator also said that when the administration briefed Congress on the strikes, they “had a very hard time explaining to us the rationale, the legal rationale for doing this and the constitutionality of doing it.”
President Trump told reporters at the White House on Thursday that his administration would continue to provide information to Congress on the strikes, but wouldn’t seek a declaration of war.
“I think we’re just going to kill people that are bringing drugs into our country. Okay? We’re going to kill them. You know? They’re going to be like, dead,” he said.
The president also suggested that there could be land strikes next, and may inform Congress about such a step.
“The drugs coming in by sea are like 5% of what they were a year ago, less than 5%. So now they’re coming in by land,” Mr. Trump said. “And even the land is a concern, because I told them, that’s going to be next. You know, the land is going to be next. And we may go to the Senate, we may go to the Congress and tell them about it. But I can’t imagine they’d have any problem with it.”
[ad_2]