The Pentagon on Friday announced the deployment of an aircraft carrier to Latin America to target drug trafficking organizations, marking a significant U.S. military buildup in the Latin American region.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hesgeth directed the USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier and its strike group to the area of responsibility in order to “detect, monitor, and disrupt illicit actors and activities that compromise the safety and prosperity of the United States homeland and our security in the Western Hemisphere,” Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement.
“These forces will enhance and augment existing capabilities to disrupt narcotics trafficking and degrade and dismantle” transnational criminal organizations, known as TCOs, according to Parnell….