US forces have struck a second vessel alleged to be carrying drugs in the Pacific Ocean, amid an escalating US campaign against seaborne drug smuggling.
Three people were killed and no US forces were harmed in the strike on Wednesday, Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said. It comes a day after the US struck another boat in the Pacific, killing two people.
Both vessels were believed to be carrying drugs along known trafficking routes in international waters, Hegseth added.
The strikes are the eighth and ninth against suspected drug boats since 2 September – but the first in waters of the Pacific Ocean. Most US strikes have been in the Caribbean Sea.
“Today, at the direction of President Trump, the Department of War carried out yet another lethal kinetic strike on a vessel operated by a Designated Terrorist Organization,” Hegseth posted on X.
“These strikes will continue, day after day. These are not simply drug runners—these are narco-terrorists bringing death and destruction to our cities,” Hegseth continued.
The post was accompanied by a video that appears to show a boat catching fire after being struck by a US bomb.
Floating items are then seen in the water, before they appear to be targeted by a second airstrike.
US President Donald Trump said he has the legal authority to continue bombing boats in international waters, but said he may go to the US Congress if he decides to expand targets to land.
“We’re allowed to do that, and if we do (it) by land, we may go back to Congress,” Trump said to reporters in the Oval Office on Wednesday.
He said his administration was “totally prepared” to expand the anti-drug operations on land, which would mark a significant escalation.
At least 37 people have been killed in the US strikes on alleged drug boats, including a recent strike on a semi-submersible vessel in the Caribbean.
Two men survived a strike last week, and were repatriated to Colombia and Ecuador.
Ecuador’s government later released one man – identified as Andrés Fernando Tufiño – saying there was no evidence of wrongdoing. The other man, from Colombia, reportedly remains hospitalised.
News of the strike comes as tensions rise between the Trump administration and the Colombian government of President Gustavo Petro, whom Trump has characterised as “a thug and a bad guy”.
“He better watch it or we’ll take very serious action against him and his country,” Trump said. “He has led his country into a death trap.”
On Sunday, Trump denounced Petro as an “illegal drug leader” who is “strongly encouraging the massive production of drugs, in big and small fields, all over Colombia.”
Trump added that the US will no longer offer subsidies to Colombia, which has historically been one of its closest allies in Latin America.
Both Colombia and nearby Ecuador have significant Pacific coastlines that experts have said are used to funnel drugs north towards the US through Central America and Mexico.
US estimates from the Drug Enforcement Agency, or DEA, indicate that the vast majority of cocaine bound for US cities passes through the Pacific.
Drug seizures in the Caribbean – where the bulk of confirmed US strikes have so far taken place – account for a relatively small percentage of the total, although US officials have warned it is rising.
To date, US officials have offered few details on the identities of those killed in the strikes or what drug trafficking organisations they allegedly belong to.
Around 10,000 US troops, as well as dozens of military aircraft and ships, have been deployed to the Caribbean as part of the operation.
