Overview
- U.S. Southern Command, the Pentagon’s regional headquarters for Latin America, said its forces hit a small boat in the Caribbean and killed three men Sunday in the latest maritime strike.
- SOUTHCOM posted a short video of the blast and said the vessel was run by designated terrorist groups along known smuggling routes, though it has offered no public proof the boat carried drugs.
- The action forms part of more than 50 announced strikes since September that destroyed dozens of boats and left at least 180 to 181 people dead, with six strikes in a little over a week killing 17.
- Democrats, human-rights groups, and U.N. experts question the legality of the killings, and House Democrats filed impeachment articles last week accusing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth of breaking the law of armed conflict.
- President Donald Trump says the U.S. is in armed conflict with cartels to curb drug flows and overdose deaths, a broader push that followed a major force build-up in the region and the January detention of Nicolás Maduro.