The U.S. military strikes on alleged drug boats transporting alleged “narco-terrorists” in the Pacific Ocean on Monday were a key focus of President Claudia Sheinbaum’s Wednesday morning press conference.
Two days after the lethal, contentious — and quite possibly illegal — strikes occurred in international waters, many unanswered questions remain. Information from the Mexican Navy indicates that at least one of the strikes occurred in international waters off Mexico’s southern Pacific coast.
The only official U.S. government information on the attacks comes from a single social media post by Secretary of War Pete Hegseth.
Yesterday, at the direction of President Trump, the Department of War carried out three lethal kinetic strikes on four vessels operated by Designated Terrorist Organizations (DTO) trafficking narcotics in the Eastern Pacific.
The four vessels were known by our intelligence… pic.twitter.com/UhoFlZ3jPG
— Secretary of War Pete Hegseth (@SecWar) October 28, 2025
Sheinbaum acknowledges that US attack occurred off Mexico’s coast
Sheinbaum said that a U.S. military strike on at least one of the alleged drug boats occurred in international waters off the coast of Mexico.
“There had been [U.S. attacks on boats] further south but now it was in the location, in latitude and longitude, of our country,” she said.
“We don’t agree with these interventions,” Sheinbaum added.
The U.S. attack on the alleged drug boats claimed 14 lives, according to Hegseth. He said on social media site X on Tuesday that there was one survivor and that Mexican authorities “assumed responsibility for coordinating the rescue.”
Hegseth said that the strikes occurred in the “eastern Pacific,” but didn’t provide the exact location.
The Mexican Navy said Tuesday that it was carrying out a search and rescue mission 400 miles southwest of Acapulco, indicating that the boat the survivor was on was off the coast of Mexico when it was attacked.
Sheinbaum said Wednesday that the navy “failed to rescue” the survivor, leaving their fate unclear.
On social media on Wednesday morning, José Díaz Briseño, a U.S.-based correspondent for Mexico’s Reforma newspaper, wrote that “thanks to Mexico’s Navy we know that one of the Pentagon’s lethal strikes vs an alleged drug boat this week occurred close to Mexico’s exclusive economic zone in the Pacific.”
Sheinbaum: We don’t want ‘these kinds of operations’ in Mexico’s exclusive economic zone
Sheinbaum spoke out in favor of arresting suspected drug traffickers at sea, rather than killing them.
“We have a model, a protocol, that has produced a lot of results. If, in international waters, the United States sees a boat that is allegedly carrying drugs, an agreement is reached and either the Mexican Navy or U.S. government institutions [should] intervene to arrest the alleged criminals,” she said.
Sheinbaum said that she had asked her foreign affairs minister, Juan Ramón de la Fuente, to convey the message to the U.S. ambassador to Mexico, Ron Johnson, that what the Mexican government wants is for the aforesaid protocol to be improved “within the framework of the security agreements we have with the United States.”
De la Fuente and Mexico’s Navy Minister Raymundo Pedro Morales met with Johnson on Tuesday.
Sheinbaum said that the ambassador “agreed in principle” with Mexico’s position.
However, she noted that he has to discuss the issue with “different authorities of the U.S. government.”
“But in principle he agreed with promoting the continuation of a protocol” favoring the arrest of suspected drug traffickers, Sheinbaum said.
She stressed that “we do not want there to be a violation of our sovereignty, nor for there to be these kinds of operations in … [Mexico’s exclusive] economic zone.”
Sheinbaum explained that another reason why her government opposes military strikes of the kind the U.S. military has been conducting in both the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific Ocean is that there could be Mexicans on board the boats that are targeted.
Hegseth said on X that 14 people had been killed in “three lethal kinetic strikes on four vessels operated by Designated Terrorist Organizations (DTO) trafficking narcotics in the Eastern Pacific.”
However, he didn’t say where the victims came from or where the vessels departed and where they were headed. Hegseth didn’t provide any specific evidence to support his claim that the boats were carrying “narco-terrorists,” saying only that “the four vessels were known by our intelligence apparatus, transiting along known narco-trafficking routes, and carrying narcotics.”
Recent U.S. military strikes on alleged drug boats have killed a total of 57 people.
The New York Times reported on Tuesday that “a broad range of experts in laws governing the use of armed force have said the strikes are illegal.”
The Times also wrote that the Trump administration “has offered tenuous legal rationales” for its attacks “while releasing little evidence to support its smuggling allegations.”
Mexico seeking information from US about victims of strikes
Sheinbaum said that her government is asking the Trump administration to provide details about the nationalities of the people killed in, and the survivor of, the military strikes in the Pacific Ocean on Monday.
Mexico searches for lone survivor of US strikes on alleged drug boats that killed 14
Asked whether the survivor, if rescued, would be handed over to the U.S. government, the president said that her government would have to look at the relevant Mexican and international laws.
Earlier this month, the United States repatriated two survivors of a strike in the Caribbean Sea to their home countries of Colombia and Ecuador.
U.S. President Donald Trump said earlier this month that his government was “totally prepared” to start targeting alleged drug traffickers on land as well.
So far in 2025, the Trump administration has designated 10 Western Hemisphere crime groups, including six Mexican cartels, as foreign terrorist organizations.
Sheinbaum has ruled out the possibility of U.S. armed forces targeting Mexican cartels on Mexican soil.
“Mexico is a free, independent and sovereign country, and no foreign government would dare to violate our sovereignty,” she said in August when asked whether a U.S. strike against Mexican cartels was a possibility.
By Mexico News Daily chief staff writer Peter Davies (peter.davies@mexiconewsdaily.com)
