WASHINGTON: The United States has opened a new front — this time against drug cartels. President Donald Trump has announced a military campaign targeting “narco-terrorists,” following a series of US military strikes on suspected smuggling boats in the Caribbean Sea. The move has sparked intense debate over its legality under both US and international law.
According to US defense officials, at least four strikes have been conducted in international waters near Venezuela, killing 21 people aboard high-speed “go-fast” boats. The operations form part of what Trump has called a “war on cartels”, in which he has designated several transnational drug networks — including Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua cartel — as “global terrorist organisations.”
Trump’s new ‘war on cartels’
Speaking at Naval Station Norfolk, Trump praised the Navy for “blowing the cartel terrorists the hell out of the water.” He claimed that the strikes had “completely stopped” drug shipments entering the US by sea and hinted at expanding operations inland.
“They’re not coming in by sea anymore, so now we’ll have to start looking about the land,” Trump said, later adding from the White House that the campaign had halted drug trafficking from South America. “There’s no drugs coming into the water. And we’ll look at what phase two is.”
Administration officials told Congress that Trump had classified drug cartels as unlawful combatants, declaring the US to be in a “non-international armed conflict” with them — a move intended to justify military force without formal congressional authorisation.
Venezuelan backlash
Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has condemned the US strikes as “heinous crimes” and warned that he may declare a state of emergency if the US expands military action.
Caracas has since conducted large-scale military drills, mobilised local militias, and deployed Russian-made fighter jets under a campaign it calls the “defence of the nation.”
The US has meanwhile bolstered its presence in the region, deploying eight warships, one submarine, and F-35 fighter jets to Puerto Rico, bringing thousands of sailors and marines to the Caribbean.
Washington has also doubled its bounty on Maduro to $50 million, accusing him of facilitating fentanyl-laced cocaine shipments to the US through cartel alliances. Maduro insists the campaign is part of a broader American plot to “overthrow his government,” a charge Trump has denied.
Legal experts question justification
Human rights and international law experts have sharply criticised the strikes, warning that they may amount to extrajudicial killings.
Sarah Yager, Washington director at Human Rights Watch, said:
“US officials cannot summarily kill people they accuse of smuggling drugs. The problem of narcotics entering the United States is not an armed conflict, and US officials cannot circumvent their human rights obligations by pretending otherwise.”
Salvador Santino Regilme, an international relations scholar at Leiden University, told Al Jazeera that the strikes likely violate Article 2(4) of the UN Charter, which prohibits the use of force against another state unless in self-defence or with UN Security Council authorisation.
“Drug trafficking, even when transnational, does not constitute an armed attack under international law,” Regilme explained. “Unless Washington can prove the traffickers were conducting or imminently threatening a large-scale armed attack attributable to Venezuela, these actions undermine the Charter’s prohibition on the use of force.”
Celeste Kmiotek, senior staff lawyer at the Atlantic Council, added that outside a recognised armed conflict, lethal action without judicial process may amount to arbitrary deprivation of life. She noted that there is no congressional authorisation — such as an AUMF (Authorisation for Use of Military Force) — that covers anti-drug operations in Venezuela.
How the US defends it
The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) has reportedly issued a classified opinion asserting that the President can use lethal force against a wide range of cartels deemed an “imminent threat” to US citizens.
According to CNN sources, the OLC opinion appears to authorise open-ended military action against a secret list of groups, allowing the President to treat drug traffickers as enemy combatants and target them without judicial oversight.
Legal analysts warn that such a broad interpretation could dangerously expand executive war powers.
Sarah Harrison, a former Pentagon lawyer now with the Crisis Group, said:
“If the OLC opinion authorising strikes on cartels is as broad as it seems, it gives the President the power to wage war far beyond what Congress authorised after 9/11. By this logic, any drug-trafficking group — large or small — could be treated as having attacked the United States and be met with lethal force.”
Bottom line
While the Trump administration argues that its actions fall within the scope of self-defence and counterterrorism, most legal experts disagree, saying the strikes lack a solid legal foundation under both US and international law.
Unless Washington can demonstrate that these operations were in response to an imminent armed threat, the campaign risks setting a dangerous precedent — one where the executive branch can declare war unilaterally, targeting non-state actors across borders under the banner of national security.
