(CNN) — The United States conducted a deadly military strike against an alleged drug boat tied to the cartel Tren de Aragua, President Donald Trump said Tuesday.
The US president said 11 people were killed in the strike in “international waters.” Secretary of State Marco Rubio described the “lethal strike” as taking place in the “southern Caribbean” against “a drug vessel which had departed from Venezuela.”
The use of military force against Latin American drug cartels represents a significant escalation by the Trump administration and could have serious implications for the region.
“Earlier this morning, on my Orders, U.S. Military Forces conducted a kinetic strike against positively identified Tren de Aragua Narcoterrorists in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility. TDA is a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization, operating under the control of Nicolas Maduro, responsible for mass murder, drug trafficking, sex trafficking, and acts of violence and terror across the United States and Western Hemisphere,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
“Please let this serve as notice to anybody even thinking about bringing drugs into the United States of America. BEWARE!” he wrote.
The State Department designated Tren de Aragua, which originated in Venezuela, as a foreign terrorist organization and specially designated global terrorists in February.
The US has amassed a large number of military assets around the Caribbean and Latin America, drawing the ire of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro.
CNN has asked the Venezuelan government for comment.
In remarks before he departed on a trip to Mexico and Ecuador on Tuesday, Rubio said the “counter-drug mission” would continue.
“We are going to wage combat against drug cartels that are flooding American streets and killing Americans,” Rubio said. He said the route from Venezuela was a “common” one.
Asked by CNN about the legal authority for militarily targeting the cartels, Rubio said, “I’m not going to answer for the White House counsel, suffice it to say that all of those steps were taken in advance.”
“The president has designated these as terrorist organizations, which is what they are,” he said.
Trump on Tuesday afternoon said the US military “just over the last few minutes, literally shot out a boat, a drug carrying boat.”
“It just happened moments ago, and our great general, head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff … he gave us a little bit of a briefing,” Trump said.
“There’s more where that came from,” he said, noting that “a lot of drugs” are “pouring into” the US from Venezuela.
A senior defense official confirmed a “precision strike” against an alleged drug vessel in the southern Caribbean, but did not offer further details about the operation.
CNN previously reported that the US military was deploying more than 4,000 Marines and sailors to the waters around Latin America and the Caribbean as part of a ramped-up effort to combat drug cartels, according to two US defense officials — a show of force that has given the president a broad range of military options should he want to target drug cartels.
The Trump administration has taken an aggressive approach to combating Latin American drug cartels, designating many of them as foreign terrorist organizations and specially designated global terrorists.
Tom Karako, a senior fellow of the Defense and Security Department at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said while he didn’t know of an instance of such action being taken against a drug cartel in the past, “on the other hand I’m not sure that we would (know).”
“It would not surprise me in the slightest if there were a dozen instances that we don’t talk about,” he said.
On Friday, Rubio visited the headquarters of US Southern Command, which has responsibility for the deployed assets. The top US diplomat had previously suggested that military action against the cartels was a possibility.
The robust military presence in the region has drawn heated remarks from Maduro. The Trump administration has increased the bounty for the Venezuelan president to $50 million for drug trafficking.
“It is an extravagant threat… absolutely criminal, bloody. They have wanted to move forward with what they call maximum pressure, and in the face of maximum military pressure, we have prepared maximum readiness,” Maduro said Monday, adding that he will not “bow to threats.”
CNN’s Kylie Atwood, Natasha Bertrand, Haley Britzky, Stefano Pozzebon, Ivonne Valdes Garay, Sol Amaya and Lauren Kent contributed to this report.
This story and headline have been updated with additional details.
