More than 200 people have been killed in over 60 boat strikes in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific as the Trump administration now says it wants to extend its lethal anti-cartel campaign from the sea to land in Latin America. The boats, the administration says, were ferrying drugs off Latin America’s Caribbean and Pacific coasts. The body count keeps climbing. So does the reach of the apparatus.
Who Has the Power
Pete Hegseth, Trump’s defense secretary, announced last week during a visit to Panama that Colombia, Guatemala and Honduras had agreed to allow the U.S. to carry out joint military operations against criminal groups on their soil, following Ecuador, which launched similar missions with the U.S. in March. Guatemala has denied reaching such an agreement. That denial matters, because the whole project depends on governments signing up to Washington’s security priorities while pretending the arrangement is something else.
Hegseth spelled out the logic in a military drill in the jungle in Panama. “It will be like you saw with the strikes on the drug boats. Same effect on land. And so we’re working with Ecuador. We’re working with Colombia. We’re working with partners to bring the fight to the (designated terrorist organizations) on land,” he said. He also declared, “Anywhere you traffic drugs or you threaten the American people or our partners, you are a target just like ISIS or al-Qaida.”
That’s the language of empire dressed up as security. The article says the expansion marks a new phase in the Trump administration’s campaign to pressure governments across Latin America to align with its security priorities and assert “American dominance over the Western Hemisphere.” Voters across the region are increasingly embracing Trump-aligned leaders, giving Washington more willing partners, while critics warn the widening U.S. military campaign risks civilian casualties and a backlash against the U.S. that could outlast the Republican administration.
Michael Shifter, a Latin America expert at the Inter-American Dialogue think tank, said, “What’s going on is an attempt to legitimize the increased use of the U.S. military in the region. It projects power, demonstrates military superiority and enables Washington to impose its agenda. This is not cooperation, it’s obviously a very asymmetrical relationship.”
Who Pays the Price
The U.S. military has operated in Latin America for generations, supplying allies with weapons, intelligence and training to fight drug trafficking, while leaving a fraught legacy of support for military coups and dictatorships. Since Trump returned to office in January 2025, Washington has pursued its most interventionist approach to the region in decades. The people living under these operations are the ones left to absorb the damage when the great powers decide they need a new theater.
The administration has designated 20 Latin American criminal groups as “foreign terrorist organizations,” sent U.S. forces into Venezuela to capture its president and involved CIA agents in drug lab busts in Mexico. It has killed more than 200 people in over 60 boat strikes in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, offering little evidence that those targeted were “narco-terrorists” and drawing questions about the strikes’ legality. The state calls it enforcement. The dead don’t get a hearing.
William LeoGrande, a Latin America specialist at American University, said sustained U.S. combat operations alongside local forces would be “new and different,” testing deep-rooted sensitivities over national sovereignty and the presence of U.S. troops. That sensitivity isn’t abstract. It’s what happens when foreign power shows up with guns and calls it partnership.
What They Call Cooperation
Hegseth provided few details about what joint operations with Colombia, Guatemala and Honduras would look like. In Colombia, where Trump-backed Abelardo de la Espriella took office this month, Hegseth raised the prospect of U.S. forces joining strikes against armed groups including the National Liberation Army, or ELN, Colombia’s last major guerrilla group. Hegseth said de la Espriella had requested greater U.S. military involvement.
On Saturday, following a drone attack by the ELN on troops, de la Espriella vowed the rebels would “pay a high price.” That’s the familiar script: more force, more escalation, more people caught in the middle while leaders trade threats and call it order.
Ecuador has emerged as the clearest case of direct U.S. military involvement, launching joint raids with Washington despite voters overwhelmingly rejecting foreign military bases in a November 2025 referendum. A New York Times investigation found that one strike on an alleged drug lab in March instead destroyed a cattle farm. So much for precision. So much for the clean story sold to the public.
The push to extend such agreements has gained the most traction among Trump’s ideological allies in the region, conservative leaders elected on promises of aggressive crackdowns on crime in recent months. Guatemala stands out as an exception. Its progressive government has worked closely with Washington on security despite political differences. President Bernardo Arévalo has denied agreeing to joint anti-drug operations, saying they would be illegal without congressional approval.
Honduras, Colombia and Ecuador did not respond to requests for comment on Hegseth’s remarks. Mexico is a notable outlier from the new U.S. anti-trafficking alliance. The article said Mexico is a major source and transit point for fentanyl and other drugs entering the U.S. Progressive President Claudia Sheinbaum has cooperated closely with Washington on security but resisted mounting pressure for a U.S. military role in fighting cartels on Mexican soil.
Adam Isacson, a defense analyst with the Washington Office on Latin America, said, “Ultimately, the United States will have to define what ‘joint operations’ means in each of these countries. It may discover pretty quickly that this is something most governments — even governments on the right — are quite uncomfortable with.”
Observers question whether a more militarized approach would produce lasting security gains. Shifter said the campaign may serve partly as a show of force, building on the capture of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as the Trump administration seeks to offset foreign policy setbacks elsewhere, including in the Middle East. Others warn the strategy risks civilian casualties, particularly in Colombia, where armed groups operate among civilian populations and often function as de facto authorities in areas beyond the state’s reach.
Jeremy McDermott, co-director of the Colombia-based investigative organization InSight Crime, said military strikes are more likely to force those groups to adapt. “The U.S. bombs an ELN camp in Colombia or in Venezuela, what is the first thing the ELN are going to do? They’re going to dismantle all their camps and move into the villages and towns,” he said.
Isacson put the political pressure in plain terms: “All of these presidents, no matter how far right they are, face pressure to do something about security and to make a show of pursuing the ‘bad guys’ who are making people feel unsafe. There is broad agreement on that. But they also know there is only so much sovereignty they can cede before public opinion begins turning against them.” That’s the trap. Leaders perform toughness, Washington gets its foothold, and ordinary people live with the fallout.