In March of this year, American officials showed a video capturing a powerful explosion that they believed destroyed a drug cartel base in rural Ecuador. However, local residents claim that their farm, located in the remote village of San Martin in the north of the country, was affected. Sources close to the newspaper reported that U.S. military personnel were not directly involved in the operation but provided a helicopter for its execution.
The farm owner and other locals denied rumors of weapons being on the property. They stated that the attack was part of an extensive multi-day operation by Ecuadorian military forces, who earlier that same week burned two abandoned buildings nearby and also dropped bombs on one of the houses.
Ecuadorian authorities claimed that weapons caches and other "evidence of illegal activity" were found in the destroyed homes. Nevertheless, the publication notes that the military did not provide any evidence to support their claims, whereas they usually publish photographs of seized drugs and weapons after operations.
It is worth reminding that in early 2025, Donald Trump announced tougher measures against drug trafficking, designating several Latin American drug cartels as terrorist organizations and authorizing military action against them. Since September 2025, more than 40 vessels, allegedly used for drug trafficking, have been sunk in the Caribbean Sea, resulting in over 150 fatalities.
