Washington. U.S. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth announced yesterday the deployment of the new aircraft carrier Gerald Ford, considered the largest in the world, and three destroyers to the Southern Command operational zone, which covers Central America, the Caribbean and South America, with the goal of"dismantling transnational criminal organizations and combating drug trafficking," hours after confirming a new attack by his military against a vessel in international waters in the region.
The Gerald Ford has five destroyers in its strike group, but only three will be deployed to the southern hemisphere. One of those ships is currently in the Mediterranean, in a port in Croatia. There was no word on how long it will take them to reach South America.
Significant sum of military power
The aircraft carrier's deployment will significantly increase the Pentagon's military resources in a region that has already seen a significant increase in U.S. presence in the waters off Venezuela and Colombia, where more than 6,000 sailors and marines are already deployed on eight warships.
The entire Ford strike group includes nearly 4,500 sailors and nine squadrons of aircraft assigned to the carrier.
The announcement came after the U.S. military attacked another vessel in international waters off the Caribbean on Thursday night after claiming, without evidence, that it was transporting drugs, killing six people.
Hegseth asserted, without presenting evidence, that the boat was operated by the Aragua Train with the intention of justifying the deaths, which after the recent attack rose to 43 since the beginning of its attacks against vessels in the region.
The secretary stated that Pentagon intelligence services"knew the vessel was involved in narcotics smuggling.
"If you are a narco-terrorist smuggling drugs into our hemisphere, we will treat you like we did with Al Qaeda," the Secretary of War reiterated.
“Whether by day or by night, we will track your routes, pursue your people, hunt you down, and kill you,” he stressed.
The Pentagon released a black and white video showing a boat traveling at normal speed until it explodes.
This is Washington's tenth bombing in South American waters. Eight of them took place in the Caribbean, near Venezuela, and two of the most recent attacks took place in the eastern Pacific, near Colombia.
Hegseth claimed the boat attacked was operated by the Tren de Aragua gang. This is the second time the Trump administration has linked one of its operations to a cartel that originated in a Venezuelan prison. The Republican administration claimed that at least four of the boats attacked in the operations, which began on September 2, originated in Venezuela.
Clandestine Methods
Celso Amorim, former foreign minister and current special advisor to Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, expressed Brazil's concern about the use of force by the United States in Latin America, as well as its clandestine methods, such as the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) to overthrow governments in the region.
He warned that these actions"could indeed have profound and very serious consequences. It won't be limited to the countries where they occur. There's a threat of external intervention, (...) people are already dying. I don't know if they're drug traffickers, but there's no evidence that they are. It's very dangerous," the Brazilian official stressed.
