{"id":467465,"date":"2026-02-14T03:24:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T03:24:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/467465\/"},"modified":"2026-02-14T03:24:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T03:24:08","slug":"3-dead-as-us-launches-new-strike-on-suspected-drug-boat-in-caribbean","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/467465\/","title":{"rendered":"3 dead as US launches new strike on suspected drug boat in Caribbean"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a target=\"_self\" class=\"e1yy41x40 ef9u0v01 css-1ankfgb ecgc78b0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.scmp.com\/topics\/united-states?module=inline&amp;pgtype=article\" title=\"\" data-qa=\"BaseLink-renderAnchor-StyledAnchor\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">US<\/a> military said on Friday it killed three alleged drug traffickers in a strike on a boat in the Caribbean.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The attack raises the death toll from the Trump administration\u2019s strikes on alleged drug boats to 133 people in at least 38 attacks carried out since early September in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cThree narcoterrorists were killed during this action. No US military forces were harmed,\u201d US Southern Command said in a statement on social media.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">A video linked to the post shows a boat moving through the water before exploding in flames.<\/p>\n<p>President <a target=\"_self\" class=\"e1yy41x40 ef9u0v01 css-1ankfgb ecgc78b0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.scmp.com\/topics\/donald-trump?module=inline&amp;pgtype=article\" title=\"\" data-qa=\"BaseLink-renderAnchor-StyledAnchor\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Donald Trump<\/a> has said the US is in \u201carmed conflict\u201d with cartels in Latin America and justified the attacks as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs.<img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"A combination of screen grabs from a video posted on February 5 shows a vessel before (top) and during a US anti-narcotics strike. Photo: X\/US Southern Command\/AFP\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/aaa2e551-55bc-4427-97b3-e533b67627fa_e0304210.jpg\" title=\"A combination of screen grabs from a video posted on February 5 shows a vessel before (top) and during a US anti-narcotics strike. Photo: X\/US Southern Command\/AFP\"\/>A combination of screen grabs from a video posted on February 5 shows a vessel before (top) and during a US anti-narcotics strike. Photo: X\/US Southern Command\/AFP<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">But his administration has offered little evidence to support its claims of killing \u201cnarcoterrorists\u201d, prompting heated debate about the legality of the operations that have expanded from the Caribbean to the Pacific.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The US military said on Friday it killed three alleged drug traffickers in a strike on a boat&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":467466,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,217355,2724,23662,60187,12,217353,153145,3140,3,18231,86601,1572,217352,21,19,22,20,25,57442,217354,24],"class_list":["post-467465","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-american-campaign","tag-associated-press","tag-caribbean","tag-caribbean-sea","tag-donald-trump","tag-drug-traffickers","tag-eastern-pacific-ocean","tag-latin-america","tag-news","tag-nicolas-maduro","tag-pacific","tag-pete-hegseth","tag-south-american","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-us-military","tag-us-southern-command","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/467465","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=467465"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/467465\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/467466"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=467465"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=467465"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=467465"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}