US military campaign in Latin America enters a new phase after a year of strikes on alleged drug-running boats

A fast boat carrying 11 people huddled aboard was crossing the Caribbean Sea from Venezuela on September 2 of last year. A missile blew it apart. Nine occupants died instantly. Two others survived, clinging to the wreckage of the vessel. Three quarters of an hour later, while the two castaways were still trying to save themselves on the shattered hull, a second air-launched projectile finished them off. The first U.S. military campaign in Latin America in decades had just begun. A year later, that air-and-sea operation now threatens to expand and become the spearhead of an ever-broader U.S. military reach in the region.

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