At least 65 people have been killed so far in US attacks on suspected drug smugglers at sea.
"These narco-terrorists are bringing drugs to our shores to poison Americans at home – and they will not succeed," Hegseth writes on X.
"The Department will treat them exactly as we treated al-Qaeda. We will continue to track them, map them, hunt them, and kill them," he writes.
The US has recently repeatedly attacked boats in the Pacific Ocean and especially in the Caribbean Sea. According to Washington, the ships have been involved in drug smuggling.
Recently, Donald Trump also gave the CIA the go-ahead to carry out covert operations inside Venezuela.
