US military kills three in Pacific as death toll from alleged drug boat strikes rises to 186

Three people died on Sunday in the latest US military strike on a boat in the eastern Pacific Ocean, according to a post by the US Southern Command which also claimed the vessel was ferrying drugs.

This strike is part of a controversial campaign, initiated in early September, targeting suspected drug-trafficking vessels across Latin American and Caribbean waters. The operations have now resulted in at least 186 fatalities, with no military evidence that any destroyed vessels carried illicit drugs.

A Southern Command video on X showed the boat moving swiftly before an explosion left it in flames. The command reiterated its assertion of targeting alleged drug traffickers along known smuggling routes.

The attacks began as the U.S. built up its largest military presence in the region in generations and came months ahead of the raid in January that captured then-Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. He was brought to New York to face drug trafficking charges and has pleaded not guilty.

President Donald Trump has said the U.S. is in “armed conflict” with cartels in Latin America and has justified the attacks as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs into the United States.

Critics have questioned the overall legality of the boat strikes as well as their effectiveness, in part because the fentanyl behind many fatal overdoses is typically trafficked to the U.S. over land from Mexico, where it is produced with chemicals imported from China and India.

Another strike last Sunday on an alleged drug boat in the Caribbean sea, which was confirmed by the U.S. military, resulted in the deaths of another three individuals.

And on Wednesday 15 April, four people were killed in an alleged drug boat strike in the eastern Pacific Ocean.

The military said all the vessels were “operated by Designated Terrorist Organizations” and that intelligence confirmed they “were transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific and were engaged in narco-trafficking operations” but did not provide evidence.

A number of Democratic lawmakers have described them as “illegal” and “reckless,” pointing out that the administration has failed to publicly provide evidence that those killed were indeed traffickers. A few GOP lawmakers have agreed.

“We don’t blow up boats off Miami because 25 per cent of the time suspicion is wrong,” Kentucky Senator Rand Paul said in October. “We shouldn’t do it off Venezuela either. These are small outboards with no fentanyl and no path to Florida.”

Human rights groups and U.N. officials have also characterized the U.S. military’s offensive in Latin America as illegal under international law. Amnesty International called it “murder — plain and simple.”