President Donald Trump announced on Truth Social Friday that he ordered a lethal strike on a vessel linked to a designated terrorist organization “conducting narco-trafficking” in the U.S. Southern Command’s area of responsibility.
The strike, carried out on a vessel confirmed by intelligence to be trafficking illicit narcotics, left three narco-terrorists dead, Trump said in the post, along with a video showing the moment the boat was struck and became engulfed in flames.
“On my Orders, the Secretary of War ordered a lethal kinetic strike on a vessel affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization conducting narcotrafficking in the USSOUTHCOM area of responsibility,” Trump posted to his Truth Social account Friday evening.
“Intelligence confirmed the vessel was trafficking illicit narcotics, and was transiting along a known narcotrafficking passage enroute to poison Americans.”
“This morning, on my Orders, U.S. Military Forces conducted a SECOND Kinetic Strike against positively identified, extraordinarily violent drug trafficking cartels and narcoterrorists in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility,” Trump posted to Truth Social on Monday.
Nicolás Maduro, Venezuela’s president, during a press conference at Miraflores Palace in Caracas, Venezuela, July 31, 2024. (Gaby Oraa/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Earlier this month, a U.S. military strike blew apart a Venezuelan drug boat in the southern Caribbean, leaving nearly a dozen suspected Tren de Aragua narco-terrorists dead.
In February, the Trump administration also designated drug cartel groups like Tren de Aragua, the Sinaloa Cartel and others as foreign terrorist organizations.
