The US-Israel war with Iran continues to escalate, with the US government pledging to send more troops and military assets to the Middle East and Tehran expanding retaliatory attacks across the region.
But on Thursday, senior officials under President Donald Trump shifted their focus to another military front: Latin America.
Recommended stories
list of 3 itemsend of list
Since taking office for his second term, President Trump has laid out plans to project American dominance throughout the Western Hemisphere. His control efforts coincide with military operations against alleged criminal networks across the region.
At the first U.S. Counter-Cartels Conference on Thursday, speakers including National Security Advisor Stephen Miller assured reporters that Latin America remains a top military priority for the United States, regardless of events in the Middle East.
“We will not cede an inch of territory in this hemisphere to our enemies or adversaries,” Miller said, adding that the United States “is using hard power, military force and lethal force to protect and defend the American homeland.”
Miller went on to liken drug cartels to armed groups like al-Qaeda and the Islamic State (ISIS), arguing that there is no “criminal justice solution.”
Organized crime, he concluded, “can only be defeated by military force.”
Since President Trump took office last year, his administration has applied what experts call a “global war on terror” approach to Latin America, including referring to drug cartels as “foreign terrorist organizations.”
Figures like Mr. Miller, an architect of President Trump’s hard-line immigration policies, have defended the president’s militaristic approach, even though critics warn it raises human rights and legal concerns.
Last September, for example, the regime began raiding suspected drug smuggling vessels in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific Ocean, in what human rights groups denounced as extrajudicial killings.
Then, in early January, the United States launched an unprecedented operation to kidnap Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro. Since then, it has waged a pressure campaign aimed at weakening Cuba’s communist government.
Just this Wednesday, the Pentagon announced that it had begun a joint operation with the Ecuadorian military “against designated terrorist organizations” in Ecuador, South America.
The announcement signals the possibility of new U.S. military operations in the region, which officials said could include ground operations.
However, President Trump’s expanded military involvement in Latin America and the nascent war with Iran have raised questions about the United States’ ability to sustain such intense military activity.
Ready to “launch a solo attack”
The “American Anti-Cartel Conference” was held as Latin American leaders arrived in South Florida to attend a regional summit hosted by President Trump at his Mar-a-Lago mansion.
Those in attendance also included Trump-allied conservative government officials from Argentina, Honduras and the Dominican Republic.
But despite support from some local governments, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth told the audience that the United States would “take on” Latin American cartels and “stand ready to attack them alone if necessary.”
“But it is our hope, and the goal of this conference, that we all do it together for the benefit of this region,” Hegseth added.
He also praised President Trump’s take on the Monroe Doctrine of 1823, which sought to establish a U.S. sphere of influence in the Western Hemisphere separate from Europe. Administration officials refer to President Trump’s parallel approach as the “Donroe Doctrine.”
Hegseth cast the government’s attacks on alleged drug-smuggling vessels as a cornerstone of President Trump’s efforts to maintain influence in the region.
The U.S. military conducted at least 44 airstrikes against ships in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, killing an estimated 150 known people.
The identities of the victims have not been disclosed, but several family members said fishermen and informal workers were also targeted.
The Pentagon chief said the approach was aimed at “establishing deterrence.”
“If the outcome is simply being arrested and released, that’s an outcome that they had already factored in a long time ago,” Hegseth said.
He also noted that there were “several weeks” in February when there were no strikes against suspected drug smuggling vessels.
He said the pause in attacks was proof that the strategy was successful. However, the break came as the US sharply increased its assets in the Middle East.
Emphasis on “heritage”
Although neither Mr. Hegseth nor Mr. Miller specifically mentioned the war with Iran, they touched on themes present in the administration’s messaging on the war.
For example, President Trump said that the Iranian government has “waged a war against civilization itself.” Meanwhile, there are reports that US military officials have referred to the Bible’s “end times” as a religious basis for war.
These comments reflect the views of his critics, who see Trump embracing Christian nationalism and viewing the Americas as a European-derived “civilization” threatened by outside forces.
At Thursday’s conference, Miller himself cited violence in European history as a justification for modern military action in Latin America.
There was a period in European history during the 18th and 19th centuries when “ruthless methods were used to rape and murder and eliminate people who rebelled against established systems of order and justice,” Miller said.
He also echoed President Trump’s assertion that Europe is facing “civilizational erasure” because of left-wing leadership and immigration.
“The reason many Western nations are in trouble today is because they have forgotten the eternal truths and wisdom they once followed,” Miller said.
Meanwhile, Hegseth described all the countries present at Thursday’s meeting as “scions of Western civilization.”
He said the delegates in attendance faced the test of whether “our country remains a uniquely Western nation, a Christian nation under God, proud of its common heritage of strong borders and a prosperous people ruled by law rather than violence and chaos.”
He added that foreign “invasion” represented an “existential problem” for the region, apparently referring to China’s growing influence as an economic and political partner in the Americas.
