Video: U.S. Reports New Strike on Suspected Drug Cartel Boat off Venezuela
The U.S. military reports that it has struck an additional suspected drug cartel boat off Venezuela earlier today, Friday, October 3. The announcement came after word leaked of a White House briefing memo to the U.S. Congress declaring that the country is in a “non-international armed conflict” with South American drug cartels.
Pete Hegseth posted a video and a brief report to social media Friday morning. It shows a small boat, which they said was in international waters near Venezuela, being tracked, struck, and left burning on the surface. The U.S. says four males aboard the boat were killed by the strike.
Hegseth asserts that the boat was transporting substantial amounts of narcotics headed to the United States. “Our intelligence, without a doubt, confirmed that this vessel was trafficking narcotics,” the message asserts. It says the vessel was operating on a known narco-traffic transit route and calls the individuals aboard “narco-terrorists.”
Earlier this morning, on President Trump's orders, I directed a lethal, kinetic strike on a narco-trafficking vessel affiliated with Designated Terrorist Organizations in the USSOUTHCOM area of responsibility. Four male narco-terrorists aboard the vessel were killed in the… pic.twitter.com/QpNPljFcGn
— Secretary of War Pete Hegseth (@SecWar) October 3, 2025
The strike comes as the U.S. Southern Command reported at the beginning of the week that U.S. forces working with allies seized or disrupted more than one million pounds of cocaine during counterdrug operations in the past 12 months. They valued the drugs at an estimated $11.34 billion and said they could have been 377 million potentially lethal doses.
This was the fourth or fifth strike the White House and Hegseth have acknowledged since the start of September. The first, which came on September 2, is the most controversial as it reportedly killed 11 people, leading to questions about whether it could have been a migrant boat. The U.S. confirmed a second strike on September 15 and a third on September 19, each of which it said killed three individuals. No proof was provided that the boats were loaded with drugs and that they were operated by cartel members.
The notification to Congress required under the National Defense Authorization Act was first reported by The New York Times and has subsequently also been seen by CBS News. The organizations report more forceful language, including “armed attacks” and “unlawful combatants,” used to describe the actions in mid-September.
U.S. law requires the notifications and prohibits the military from deliberately killing civilians. Congress has not authorized the use of lethal force, although the Trump administration is now telling Congress it has determined that the U.S. is engaged in an armed conflict with the drug cartels, which the White House has designated as terrorist groups.
It comes as there have also been reports of a U.S. military buildup in Puerto Rico and the Caribbean. Venezuela asserts the U.S. is attacking with unconfirmed reports that the U.S. is preparing to strike Venezuela's harbors and airbases.
Hegseth, in his message today, said the strikes will continue until the attacks on the American people are over.