Joint Task Force Southern Spear conducts two strikes on alleged drug boats, killing five

On Dec. 31, 2025, Joint Task Force Southern Spear conducted two successive "lethal kinetic strikes" on vessels that U.S. Southern Command said were "operated by Designated Terrorist Organizations" and transiting "known narco-trafficking routes." SOUTHCOM said the strikes killed three people aboard the first vessel and two aboard the second — five in total. The command did not disclose the body of water, made no evidence public, charged no one, and reported no attempt at interdiction or arrest; the only material released was video of the boats and explosions posted to social media. These were the 34th and 35th strikes of the campaign, following three more the previous day, and brought the administration's announced tally to 35 strikes and at least 115 people killed since Operation Southern Spear began in early September.

Fox News, Stars and Stripes, and CNN independently reported the Dec. 31 double strike and its five-person death toll, attributing the operation to SOUTHCOM and the Department of War under Operation Southern Spear; the Just Security timeline situates it within the running campaign. The strikes occurred amid escalating U.S. military pressure on Venezuela, days before U.S. forces captured President Nicolás Maduro on Jan. 3, 2026. As with every strike in the series, no government filing, court process, or public evidence accompanied the killings.

The Standing records this as the chronologically earliest strike in its archive of the Southern Spear campaign — the use of lethal military force to kill people on the basis of unproven trafficking allegations, with no judicial process, no charges, and no attempt at arrest (extrajudicial actions), carried out by uniformed forces redirected to a counter-narcotics mission framed in political "armed conflict" terms (politicization of uniformed services).