US Southern Command on Tuesday announced that its forces launched three separate strikes on alleged drug-running boats in the waters of Latin America the night before, blowing up three small vessels and killing at least 11 people.
The command said that two of the boats were targeted in the Eastern Pacific Ocean, where eight people were killed, and one vessel was struck in the Caribbean Sea, killing three. SOUTHCOM described the dead as “narco-terrorists,” a term the Trump administration uses to justify extra-judicial executions for an alleged crime that doesn’t receive the death penalty in the US.
SOUTHCOM said that the strikes were launched at the direction of Gen. Francis L. Donovan, the commander of SOUTHCOM, who replaced Adm. Alvin Holsey, the former commander who stepped down after reportedly voicing concerns about the bombing campaign.
As usual, SOUTHCOM offered no evidence to back up its claims that the boats it blew up were carrying drugs, something the Pentagon hasn’t done for any of the vessels since the campaign began on September 2.
According to Antiwar.com’s count, the three strikes bring the total number of people killed in the boat strikes to 135 and the number of vessels that have been blown up to 43.
The monitoring group Airwars has kept a tally that includes survivors who have likely died. Based on the group’s latest numbers, at least 144 people have been killed in the strikes. 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 US military campaign in Latin America, dubbed “Operation Southern Spear,” also involved the attack on Venezuela to kidnap Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, which killed at least 83 people, including at least four civilians.
