Washington, DC — The Trump administration’s military strike on a small boat in the Southern Caribbean Tuesday — that reportedly killed 11 alleged drug smugglers — was an illegal and deeply troubling act that marks a dramatic escalation in the US’s failed drug war in Latin America, directors of the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) said today. It appears to portend further unilateral military strikes against suspected drug traffickers under the pretext of fighting “terrorism,” despite the absence of congressional authorization to conduct these strikes and the risk of eventual military confrontation with one or more countries in the region. 

Tuesday’s military attack, carried out in the wake of a major US military build-up in the South Caribbean, also appears to be the latest of a series of increasingly belligerent measures targeting the Maduro government in Venezuela. President Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio alleged that the boat came from Venezuela and was operated by Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang that the Trump administration has tried to associate with Maduro (despite a contrary assessment by US intelligence agencies) and which was designated a “foreign terrorist organization” at the beginning of the second Trump administration. Since the attack, the administration has intensified their threats against the Maduro government: Defense Secretary Hegseth stated that regime change is on the table — and that “we’re prepared with every asset that the American military has” — while another official told Axios that “this could be Noriega part 2,” in reference to the 1989 US invasion of Panama that led to the ouster of President Manuel Noriega and the killings of hundreds, and possibly thousands, of Panamanians.    

“The missile strike was basically an extrajudicial killing and illegal under US and international law, as well as treaties that the United States has signed. Trump has appointed himself judge, jury, and executioner when it comes to anyone that his administration arbitrarily considers to be a ‘terrorist,’” CEPR Co-Director Mark Weisbrot said.

Under the US Constitution, only Congress has the power to declare war, Main noted, and legal experts note that the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) that the US government has used to justify military actions in many countries in the Middle East, South Asia, and elsewhere as part of the Global War on Terror would not apply to US military attacks on Mexican cartels or Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua or the “Cartel de los Soles.” 

“The incident recalls the Ahuas Massacre in Honduras in 2012, in which four local rural villagers ― including two pregnant women ― were killed and four others wounded in a DEA-led counternarcotics operation,” CEPR Director of International Policy Alex Main said. “In that episode, US officials obfuscated and covered up what happened, and blamed the US’s Honduran partners for the shootings. Now, the US is unilaterally and unapologetically murdering alleged drug traffickers and ‘terrorists’ with missiles.

“The Ahuas Massacre set a terrible precedent, in that it was an ‘extrajudicial massacre’ that no one was held accountable for, even after a joint investigation by the Offices of Inspector General of the Department of Justice and the Department of State determined that DEA had led the operation and that US officials had subsequently misled congressional offices and investigators about what had happened,” said Main, who — together with human rights experts Annie Bird and Karen Spring — investigated the massacre shortly after it happened.

Main noted that, as egregious as the Ahuas DEA killings may have been, this military strike — which the Trump administration has proudly publicized — reaches a whole new level of murderous lawlessness. It sends a clear signal to people and governments throughout the region that there will be no limit to the scope of US action under the auspices of Trump’s new war on “narco-terror.” The US may decide to conduct a military strike at any time, anywhere, against anyone it deems a “terrorist.” Immediately following the strike on Tuesday, President  Trump said “there’s more where that came from.”

Notably, the Trump administration has designated other criminal groups in the region as “terrorists,” including some in Haiti and ― on Thursday ― the Choneros and Lobos gangs in Ecuador. The administration has also designated Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua and Cartel de los Soles as “terrorist” groups controlled, at least in part, by high-level Venezuelan officials, despite the FBI’s own assessment that the former is decentralized and not headed by Venezuelan government officials, and despite experts’ research showing that the latter is at most, a marginal player with no hierarchical structure, and possibly an invention. The Trump administration has repeatedly warned that it may carry out military strikes on cartels in Mexico as well.

A number of Members of Congress have condemned the military strike on the boat, including Reps. Ramirez (D-IL), Omar (D-MN), “Chuy” Garcia (D-IL), and Senator Rand Paul (R-KY). In response to the US military buildup in the Caribbean, and Trump administration threats directed at the Maduro government, Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Greg Casar filed a request for an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act that would prohibit the US from using military force in, or against, Venezuela unless Congress decides that it may do so. The amendment has been co-sponsored by eight other House members so far, including Reps. Joaquín Castro (D-TX), Doggett (D-TX), McGovern (D-MA), Norton (D-DC), Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), and Velázquez (D-NY).

Leaders across Latin America have also expressed opposition to unilateral US military action in the Caribbean. Colombian President Gustavo Petro warned: “If this [strike] is true, it is murder anywhere in the world,” adding: “We’ve spent decades capturing civilians who transport drugs without killing them.” A statement from a majority of the governments of Latin America and the Caribbean “express[ed] … deep concern about the recent extra-regional military deployment in the region,” and reaffirmed commitments by its member states “based on principles such as: the prohibition of the threat or use of force, the peaceful settlement of disputes, the promotion of dialogue and multilateralism, unrestricted respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity, non-interference in the internal affairs of States and the inalienable right of peoples to self-determination.”

“It’s remarkable that Secretary Rubio seems to be taking so much ownership for this,” Main said. “Just two days after this illegal action, he met with high-level officials in Ecuador, vowing to conduct more such operations elsewhere in the region. And it’s Rubio who has really put himself forward as perhaps the Trump administration’s main voice advancing this policy.”

For Main, it recalls Rubio’s leading role in the first Trump administration’s Latin America policy. While Rubio was a senator then and not an administration official, he has been credited with driving much of the approach to Venezuela at the time, characterized by the US recognition of opposition figure Juan Guaidó as “president,” support for Guaidó’s ill-fated April 2019 coup d’etat attempt, and generally the “maximum pressure” strategy that ramped up deadly economic sanctions against Venezuela, leading to tens of thousands of deaths and a mass exodus of people from Venezuela.

Today, in another chilling move, the Trump administration announced a deployment of F-35 stealth fighter jets to Puerto Rico. While this has been presented as part of the administration’s regional counternarcotics efforts, the aircraft is typically associated with high-end military operations like bombing campaigns.

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