The US military announced on Monday that its forces blew up another boat in the Eastern Pacific Ocean, marking the third US strike this year against small vessels allegedly running drugs in the waters of Latin America.
US Southern Command said the attack killed two “narco-terrorists,” a term the Trump administration uses to describe extra-judicial executions at sea for an alleged crime that doesn’t receive the death penalty in the US. The command also said that one person survived the attack and that it “immediately notified US Coast Guard to activate the Search and Rescue system for the survivor.”
As usual, the command offered no evidence to back up its claim that the boat was carrying drugs, something the Trump administration has never done for any of the strikes.
According to Antiwar.com’s count, the strike brings the total number of boats the US has destroyed in the bombing campaign that started in early September to 39, and the number of people executed to 121.
Airwars, which takes into account people who survived the initial attack but are presumed to have died, has recorded a total of 130 deaths. All of the people killed are recorded as civilians since they are non-combatants and posed no threat to the US military at the time of the attacks.
The bombing campaign against boats began on September 2 with an attack in the Caribbean near the coast of Venezuela, and at the end of October, the campaign expanded into the Eastern Pacific Ocean, where now the majority of strikes have been launched.
