Pentagon Chief Says US Plans Land Strikes on Drug Networks with Latin American Partners
PANAMA CITY, August 14, 2026 – US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said in Panama that the United States plans to strike drug traffickers on land in Latin America, extending a campaign it already carries out in international waters against suspected smuggling boats, Metro Libre reported.
The administration of President Donald Trump launched aerial strikes last September against suspected drug boats in the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific, an operation that has left at least 215 people dead to date, according to the report.
Hegseth said the land operations fall within the efforts of a 19-country alliance led by Trump, but could be extended to wherever drug-trafficking groups operate.
He told reporters travelling with him in Panama that in the short term Washington expects to deploy, alongside its allies, an operational capacity similar to the one seen in the boat strikes, describing it as “the same effect on land” and citing work with Ecuador, Colombia and other partners.
The Pentagon chief made the remarks on Wednesday night at an unidentified location in the Panamanian jungle, where he travelled for the annual multinational military exercises hosted by around 20 countries.
Hegseth said trafficking organisations are targets in the same way as ISIS or Al Qaeda, and that the warning extends from cocaine trafficking in the region to fentanyl in Mexico, as well as remnants of the Colombian guerrillas, which he called legitimate targets. Mexico, where powerful criminal organisations operate, is not part of the alliance.
The Anti-Cartel Coalition of the Americas brings together countries including Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Honduras and Peru. Hegseth defended the lethality of the strikes on suspected drug boats, which jurists and human rights organisations say may constitute extrajudicial executions, saying the networks would be destroyed rather than put through judicial processes.
Why it matters
Panama is hosting the regional security agenda where this policy shift is being announced, and any expansion of strikes onto land would reshape security cooperation across the isthmus.
What happens next
Partner governments have not detailed how joint land operations would be authorised, and legal challenges to the maritime strikes remain unresolved.
