Hegseth: Caribbean Boat Strike Was “Opening Salvo” Against Venezuelan Cartels

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth says the US military strike that blew up a small boat in the southern Caribbean wasn’t a one-off — it’s the start of a broader campaign aimed at Venezuelan crime syndicates the Trump administration now brands “narcoterrorists.”

Appearing on “Fox & Friends,” Hegseth claimed the boat’s occupants were members of Tren de Aragua and that officials “knew exactly who was in that boat” — but he offered no evidence. President Trump, in a Truth Social post, said the “kinetic strike” in international waters killed 11 suspects and involved no US casualties. He warned anyone “even thinking” of shipping drugs to the US to “BEWARE!”

The operation marks a sharp break from traditional interdictions — and arrives with muscle. In recent weeks, the administration surged at least seven warships, a fast-attack submarine, and 4,500 sailors and Marines to waters just outside Venezuela’s maritime boundary, a deployment Hegseth called a “clear demonstration of military might.” He added that anyone designated a narco-terrorist “will face the same fate.”

The legal and factual basis remains murky. The White House says Trump signed a still-secret July directive authorizing military force against select Latin American cartels designated as terrorist groups. Around the same time, Washington labeled Tren de Aragua a terrorist organization and cast Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as its kingpin — a claim Maduro denies and that some US intelligence reporting has not fully substantiated. Caracas dismissed the strike video as AI fakery; Hegseth said he watched the mission live.

The risks are obvious. Venezuela has put forces on alert and threatened to mobilize militias, calling the US buildup the gravest external threat in a century. Regionally, the show of force dovetails with Washington’s push for tougher cooperation on migration and trafficking — even as Trump’s tariff threats and hard-line rhetoric sour ties with some Latin American leaders.

The administration is moving drug war tactics from Coast Guard cutaways to Pentagon firepower — with little public evidence and high potential for escalation. Whether this pressure campaign stays a maritime interdiction mission or slides toward “Noriega 2.0,” as one official suggested, now hinges on what comes next at sea — and in Caracas.

The New York Times, Al Jazeera, FOX News, and Axios contributed to this report.