Six people have been killed after a U.S. military strike targeted a vessel in the Caribbean Sea, in what Washington describes as part of a widening campaign against drug trafficking.
War Secretary Pete Hegseth said the operation, ordered by President Donald Trump, was a “lethal kinetic strike” on a Tren de Aragua (TdA) boat in neutral waters. The Venezuelan-based group is accused by the US of running transnational criminal operations.
Hegseth warned that “narco-terrorists” in the region would be treated “like Al-Qaeda,” vowing continued attacks on suspected traffickers. The strike follows a similar US operation in the Pacific earlier this week and underscores Trump’s pledge to dismantle what he calls Venezuela and Colombia’s “narcotics pipelines.” Both nations have strongly condemned the actions, dismissing the US justification as a pretext for control over regional resources.
Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro told media that the US campaign “is not about drug trafficking” but about seizing Latin America’s energy and mineral wealth. Trump, meanwhile, claimed recent US operations have slashed maritime drug flows to “about five percent of what they were a year ago,” hinting that land-based strikes could follow soon.
Overnight, at the direction of President Trump, the Department of War carried out a lethal kinetic strike on a vessel operated by Tren de Aragua (TdA), a Designated Terrorist Organization (DTO), trafficking narcotics in the Caribbean Sea.
The vessel was known by our… pic.twitter.com/lVlw0FLBv4
— Secretary of War Pete Hegseth (@SecWar) October 24, 2025
“lethal kinetic strike” on a Tren de Aragua (TdA) boat in neutral waters.
Nice euphemisms for murder….
Another dodgy video with dodgy intel in a slowly being ratcheted up campaign aimed at regime change in Venezuela