Trump’s War on Drug Cartels Expanding — Guatemala Agrees to Joint Strikes

President Donald Trump ordered a sweeping expansion of his administration’s war on drugs. Officials unveiled a new multi‑front strategy aimed at dismantling cartel networks “wherever they operate, on land or at sea,” according to senior defense and homeland security officials. This includes an agreement with Guatemala for the U.S. to carry out “joint strikes” to target drug trafficking groups inside Guatemala.

The directive marks one of the most aggressive escalations of U.S. counter‑narcotics operations in decades, building on the administration’s earlier maritime interdiction campaign that has already destroyed dozens of cartel‑linked vessels and seized record quantities of narcotics before they reached American shores.

Following a high-level meeting with Trump administration officials in January, Guatemalan officials announced a “strong alliance,” the New York Times reported. This led to a meeting on the USS Nimitz aircraft carrier where officials agreed to allow U.S. troops on Guatemalan soil to train their armed forces.