Marines board, sink alleged drug ship off Ecuador

U.S. forces boarded and then later sank an alleged “floating refueling station” on Friday, U.S. Southern Command said. The raid is the latest incident of direct U.S. military action in and around Ecuador in the last two weeks in coordination with the country’s government.

The USS San Antonio tracked and interdicted the ship in international waters. Sailors and Marines from Littoral Combat Force-24 launched from the San Antonio and boarded the ship. They searched the vessel without incident, SOUTHCOM said. According to the U.S. military, the ship provided fuel for drug trafficking boats operating in the eastern Pacific.

The operation was done in coordination with Ecuador’s government. According to SOUTHCOM, the ship was operated by the Los Choneros organization, a drug trafficking group based out of Ecuador. Last week, the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned several people and companies allegedly linked to Los Choneros and Los Lobos, two groups the U.S. government designated as foreign terrorist organizations last September.

After the boat was captured, the crew onboard was taken back to Ecuador, SOUTHCOM said, before the ship was sunk. Video of the sinking released by SOUTHCOM mirrors similar footage of strikes on alleged drug boats in the eastern Pacific and Caribbean.

Gen. Francis Donovan, the head of SOUTHCOM, said that Friday’s operation dealt a “decisive blow to a narco-terrorist operation responsible for moving significant amounts of drugs through the region.”

The operation comes a week after the governor of Ecuador’s Esmeraldas province said that Green Berets from the Army’s 7th Special Forces Group (Airborne) were conducting joint operations against cartels in the region near the Colombian border. Ecuador’s defense minister also shared news that two U.S. ships, which turned out to be the USS San Antonio and the Arleigh Burke-class destroyer USS Gridley, were arriving to help assist going after drug boats near the port city of Manta. After a two-month pause, the U.S. restarted airstrikes on alleged small drug boats on Aug. 23, sinking one ship in the eastern Pacific.

Since the start of the summer, the U.S. has stepped up diplomatic and military pressure in Latin America, targeting narcotics networks. Littoral Combat Force-24, comprising roughly 1,300 Marines from the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, deployed to the Caribbean earlier this year. Troops are based out of Puerto Rico and the USS San Antonio. Its mission was described as taking on “networks utilized by Designated Terrorist Organizations and narco-terrorists,” the term the Trump administration is using for drug traffickers. That military effort has largely centered around airstrikes on small boats allegedly transporting drugs in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, with some instances of U.S. troops seizing and searching some ships. The Coast Guard has maintained its ongoing interdiction mission, even as the Pentagon has carried out dozens of airstrikes on small boats.

The San Antonio sailed into the area last week with the USS Gridley. Both are assigned to Joint Task Force Western Hemisphere, the successor to Joint Task Force Southern Spear. Joint Task Force Western Hemisphere is operating in support of the Americas Counter Cartel Coalition, a U.S.-led partnership in Latin America to go after drug cartels. Operations in Ecuador have been the first significant campaign by the coalition.