US military says it killed five 'narco-terrorists' in an eastern Pacific boat strike, pushing the campaign's toll past 240
A go-fast vessel erupts into a fireball in the eastern Pacific, in a strike US Southern Command described as targeting "narco-terrorists" — though no evidence was provided identifying the five killed or their cartel…
Tuesday's strike by Joint Task Force Western Hemisphere targeted a go-fast vessel on established narco-trafficking routes in the eastern Pacific. Five people aboard were killed, all described by the military as narco-terrorists. The US military posted unclassified footage of the strike on X. No drugs have been produced as evidence, and relatives of victims from earlier strikes have maintained that those killed were fishermen with no ties to cartels.
Since September 2025, the Trump administration has conducted more than 70 such strikes, with definitive evidence of drug trafficking absent from most operations.
Legal experts and rights groups contend that the strikes constitute extrajudicial killings, carried out against individuals who posed no immediate threat to the United States.
The Pentagon's own watchdog announced in May that an investigation is planned into whether the military adhered to established targeting rules throughout the campaign.
