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The U.S. military has apprehended survivors following a drone strike on a suspected drug-smuggling vessel in the Caribbean on Thursday, according to reports.
Two officials from the U.S., speaking to The Associated Press, confirmed that this operation was the sixth of its kind under the Trump administration’s intensified focus on intercepting drug cartel-operated smuggling boats.
One of the officials mentioned that this strike targeted what is thought to be a semi-submersible or fully submersible craft, resulting in at least one fatality and leaving two individuals alive.
President Donald Trump has been using military force against Venezuelan drug boats, with the latest strike capturing two survivors from a suspected smuggling craft.
This incident is the first recorded instance of survivors since the U.S. initiated its series of lethal operations against suspected drug vessels.
The future actions regarding the detained individuals remain uncertain, and Fox News Digital has sought responses from the State and Defense Departments for further information.
The Thursday strike brings the death toll from the Trump administration’s military campaign against vessels in the region to at least 28. The operations began last month and are part of Trump’s broader effort to dismantle transnational cartels by force.
The U.S. has been escalating strikes on drug boats near Venezuelan waters. (@realDonald Trump/Truth Social; Jesus Vargas/Getty Images)
On Friday, War Secretary Pete Hegseth announced a new counter-narcotics Joint Task Force within U.S. Southern Command.
The task force aims to “crush the cartels, stop the poison and keep America safe,” Hegseth wrote last week on X, formerly Twitter. “The message is clear: If you traffic drugs toward our shores, we will stop you cold.”
On Tuesday, Trump highlighted a separate strike that killed six suspected smugglers aboard a vessel off the coast of Venezuela.
“Venezuela is a big purveyor of drugs,” Trump told reporters later that day in the Oval Office, accusing the country of sending its “criminals” into the United States.
