President Donald Trump said the U.S. military conducted a strike against a vessel carrying drugs on Tuesday, killing 11 people onboard.
Trump said the vessel was controlled by “Tren de Aragua Narcoterrorists,” and was hit in international waters after it left Venezuela, in a post on Truth Social.
Tren de Aragua was designated a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. Department of State earlier this year. In his post Trump said the group was “responsible for mass murder, drug trafficking, sex trafficking, and acts of violence and terror across the United States and Western Hemisphere.”
“The strike occurred while the terrorists were at sea in International waters transporting illegal narcotics, heading to the United States,” he said. “The strike resulted in 11 terrorists killed in action. No U.S. Forces were harmed in this strike. Please let this serve as notice to anybody even thinking about bringing drugs into the United States of America.”
He finished the post by adding, “BEWARE! Thank you for your attention to this matter!!!!!!!!!!!”
The post included a video of the strike.
Earlier on Tuesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the U.S. military attacked a drug vessel after it departed from Venezuela in the South Caribbean Sea.
“Today the U.S. military conducted a lethal strike in the southern Caribbean against a drug vessel which had departed from Venezuela and was being operated by a designated narco-terrorist organization,” Rubio posted on social media.
Tuesday’s strike appears to be the first of its kind in the area.
Rubio confirmed the strike after President Donald Trump announced it during a press conference in the Oval Office.
“There’s more where that came from,” Trump said, regarding the attack on the vessel. “We have a lot of drugs pouring into our country (and have been) coming in for a long time, and these came out of Venezuela.”
Why did the U.S. enter waters near Venezuela?
In the last few days, the U.S. military has built up a strong presence in the Atlantic Ocean near Venezuela, deploying three Aegis guided-missile destroyers and other warships to threaten maritime narcotic traffickers. The operation includes more than 4,000 sailors and marines.
The Trump administration has made extensive efforts to pressure Venezuelan officials over the illicit drug trade.
Last week, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control labeled the Venezuelan organization Cartel de los Soles (Cartel of the Suns), as a “Specially Designated Global Terrorist group" that “is headed by Nicolas Maduro Moros and other Venezuelan high-ranking individuals in the Maduro regime who corrupted the institutions of government in Venezuela, including parts of the military, intelligence apparatus, legislature, and the judiciary, to assist the cartel’s endeavors of trafficking narcotics into the United States.”
The U.S. and many other countries do not recognize Maduro as the legitimate president of Venezuela.
During a press briefing last week, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the Maduro regime is not the legitimate government of Venezuela, but rather “a narco terror cartel.”
“Maduro is not a legitimate president. He is a fugitive head of this drug cartel. He has been indicted in the United States for trafficking drugs into our country. And it is the utmost responsibility of this president in this administration to prevent the illicit flow of drugs into our country and to protect citizens from those deadly poisons,” she added.
Ahead of strike, Maduro spoke out against military build-up
In a news conference on Monday, Maduro said that he was the winner of the country’s presidential elections last year, despite contrary evidence, per The Associated Press. He also said Venezuela was at “maximum preparedness” if attacked by the U.S.
“In the face of this maximum military pressure, we have declared maximum preparedness for the defense of Venezuela,” Maduro said of the deployment of U.S. warships, which he labeled as “an extravagant, unjustifiable, immoral and absolutely criminal and bloody threat.”
Last month, the U.S. Department of State also upped the reward for information leading to the arrest and/or conviction of Maduro to $50 million. It was previously set at $15 million in 2020.
“On August 7, 2025, the Department announced the further increase in the reward offer to up to $50 million after the Department of Treasury sanctioned Cartel of the Suns as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist on July 25, 2025,” the department said. “As leader of Cartel of the Suns, Maduro is the first target in the history of the Narcotics Rewards Program with a reward offer exceeding $25 million.”