U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio stood by Washington’s ongoing military strikes against suspected drug-trafficking vessels while visiting Ecuador on Wednesday, arguing that criminal cartels would overrun regional governments if allowed to operate unchecked.
Following talks with Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa, Rubio said organized crime groups in Latin America have in some cases grown stronger than the states meant to govern them, and that failing to confront them risks leaving entire territories ungovernable. He likened the threat to a disease that keeps spreading until nothing of the state remains, and credited a newer generation of conservative regional leaders with taking a tougher line against these networks — cooperation he said has kept multiple countries from collapsing into failed states.
While in Ecuador, Rubio also formally designated the local gang Los Tiguerones a terrorist organization and announced sanctions against seven former Ecuadorian officials accused of taking payoffs from major cartels — among them Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generación, Los Choneros and Los Lobos, all previously labeled terrorist groups by Washington — in return for manipulating judicial, electoral or other government processes.
His comments come as scrutiny intensifies over the administration’s strikes on trafficking boats across the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, a campaign the Pentagon says has killed upward of 200 people. Human rights groups, along with fishing communities and relatives of those killed, have raised concerns that some vessels were struck without solid evidence linking them to trafficking. Analysts have separately questioned whether the strikes are actually curbing the amount of narcotics reaching American shores.
Rubio rejected the idea that the operations put fishermen at risk, pointing to a recent shift in approach in which joint U.S.-Ecuador missions have pulled crews off targeted boats before sinking them — a method used in at least six interceptions since late August. He said each strike decision weighs the specific threat posed by a vessel, its location and relevant local laws, and added that lasting success against these groups depends on cutting off their money, not just destroying their boats.
The Ecuador stop is one leg of a broader regional trip for Rubio, who is also set to visit Colombia and Peru to strengthen security ties under a U.S.-backed regional initiative known as the “Shield of the Americas.”
