Doral, Florida - Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth boasted Thursday that the Pentagon was struggling to find more boats to attack in international waters as part of its supposed anti-drug trafficking campaign.

The US began targeting small boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific in early September, claiming that they were transporting illegal drugs.

Dozens of them have since been destroyed, with at least 150 people killed.

The attacks have been described as extrajudicial killings, which constitute a crime.

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Attending a conference in Florida on fighting drug cartels alongside officials from 18 Latin American countries, Hegseth celebrated the violence.

"Last month, we went a few weeks without targeting a single boat. Why? Well, because we couldn't find a whole lot of boats to sink," he said.

"And that's the whole point, is to establish deterrence from narco-terrorists who have been able to traffic almost unfettered," said Hegseth.

President Donald Trump's administration insists it is effectively at war with what it calls "narco-terrorists" operating in Latin America.

But it has provided no evidence that the vessels it targets are involved in drug trafficking, which at any rate would not constitute a legal justification for the killings.

Relatives of the Trump administration's victims – some of who were simply fishermen – have filed lawsuits alleging that their family members were murdered.

Hegseth has consistently bragged about doing away with rules of engagement and the law of warfare, vowing "maximum lethality, not tepid legality."