WASHINGTON — The U.S. military announced on Wednesday that it had struck a boat earlier in the day that it suspected of ferrying drugs in the eastern Pacific, killing four people.

In a post on social media, U.S. Southern Command said that the strike, conducted at the direction of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, had targeted a boat sailing along a “known narco-trafficking route” and that four male “narco-terrorists” had been killed in the attack. The New York Times could not independently verify the strike or the intelligence cited by the military.

The strike, the 26th announced by the U.S. military, brings the total number killed to at least 99 since the Trump administration began bombing boats in September. The attacks have drawn the ire of legal experts and many members of Congress, who contend that the strikes amount to extrajudicial killings and, potentially, war crimes.

The boat strike Wednesday is the latest in a ratcheting escalation between the United States and Venezuela. The United States has amassed thousands of troops and dozens of warships in the Caribbean Sea. In recent days, it announced a blockade aimed at Venezuela’s oil industry, and Venezuela ordered its navy to escort oil tankers coming from its ports.

In Congress earlier Wednesday, the House rejected a Democratic-led measure that would have tried to rein in the Trump administration’s campaign against boats suspected of carrying drugs.

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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By Adam Sella/Kenny Holston
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