Trump's Military Kills 5 More People in ‘Lawless' Boat Bombing Campaign

The United States military has killed five more people suspected of drug smuggling in the latest boat bombing operation that many international law experts consider to be acts of murder.

In a Sunday social media post, US Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) announced it had "conducted two lethal kinetic strikes on two vessels" that it had deemed to be run by "designated terrorist organizations." As with the dozens of other boat bombings the Trump administration has conducted since last September, the military did not provide evidence that the vessels were involved in drug trafficking.

"Intelligence confirmed the vessels were transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific and were engaged in narco-trafficking operations," SOUTHCOM said. "Two male narco-terrorists were killed, and one narco-terrorist survived the first strike. Three male narco-terrorists were killed during the second strike."

SOUTHCOM said that it had alerted the US Coast Guard to conduct a search and rescue operation of the lone survivor of the two strikes, although it provided no further details of his well-being.

According to NPR, the US has now killed at least 168 people with its strikes on suspected drug boats, which began in September and have since continued despite being denounced by human rights organizations such as Human Rights and Amnesty International.

Brian Finucane, senior adviser with the US Program at the International Crisis Group, took note of the latest boat strike by remarking, "The lawless killing spree at sea continues."

A coalition of rights organizations led by the ACLU last year sued the Trump administration to demand it release documents that provide legal justification for its boat-bombing campaign.

The groups said that the Trump administration’s rationales for the strikes deserve special scrutiny because their justification hinges on claims that the US is in an “armed conflict” with international drug cartels akin to past conflicts between the US government and terrorist organizations such as al-Qaeda.

The groups argued there is simply no way that drug cartels can be classified under the same umbrella as terrorist organizations, given that the law regarding war with nonstate actors says that any organizations considered to be in armed conflict with the US must be an “organized armed group” that is structured like a conventional military and engaged in “protracted armed violence” with the US government.

Before President Donald Trump's Pentagon began conducting the lethal boat strikes last year, drug trafficking in international waters was treated as a criminal offense, with law enforcement agencies and the US Coast Guard intercepting boats suspected of carrying drugs and arresting suspects.

Trump's bombings of boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific have been called "extrajudicial killings" by advocacy groups including Amnesty International.