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WASHINGTON — <\/span>U.S. military forces boarded a sanctioned tanker in the Indian Ocean after tracking the ship from the Caribbean Sea as part of an oil quarantine meant to squeeze Venezuela<\/a>, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Monday. <\/p>\n Venezuela had faced U.S. sanctions on its oil and relied on a shadow fleet of falsely flagged tankers to smuggle crude into global supply chains<\/a>. Following the U.S. raid to apprehend then-President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro<\/a> in early January, several tankers fled the Venezuelan coast, including the ship that was boarded in the Indian Ocean overnight.<\/p>\n Hegseth vowed to eventually capture all those ships, telling a group of shipyard workers in Maine on Monday that \u201cthe only guidance I gave to my military commanders is none of those are getting away.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t care if we got to go around the globe to get them; we\u2019re going to get them,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n Later Monday, the U.S. military said it had carried out another deadly strike on a vessel<\/a> accused of trafficking drugs in the eastern Pacific Ocean.<\/p>\n U.S. Southern Command said the strike killed two people, while one person survived. Southern Command said it had notified the U.S. Coast Guard to activate its search and rescue system for the survivor. A video linked to the post shows a boat moving through the water before exploding in flames. <\/p>\n Monday\u2019s attack raises the death toll from the Trump administration\u2019s strikes on alleged drug boats to 130 people.<\/p>\n The Trump administration has seized seven tankers<\/a> as part of its broader efforts to take control<\/a> of the South American country\u2019s oil. Unlike those previous actions, the Aquila II has not been formally seized and placed under U.S. control, a defense official said. <\/p>\n Instead, the ship is being held while its ultimate fate is decided by the U.S., according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing decision-making.<\/p>\n The Aquila II is a Panamanian-flagged tanker under U.S. sanctions related to the shipment of illicit Russian oil. Owned by a company with a listed address in Hong Kong, ship tracking data shows it has spent much of the last year with its radio transponder turned off, a practice known as \u201crunning dark\u201d commonly employed by smugglers to hide their location<\/a>.<\/p>\n It was one of at least 16 tankers that fled the Venezuelan coast last month, according to Samir Madani, co-founder of TankerTrackers.com, who said his organization used satellite imagery and surface-level photos to document the ship\u2019s movements. According to data transmitted from the ship Monday, it is not currently laden with a cargo of crude oil.<\/p>\n The Pentagon’s post on X said the military \u201cconducted a right-of-visit, maritime interdiction\u201d on the ship. <\/p>\n \u201cThe Aquila II was operating in defiance of President Trump\u2019s established quarantine of sanctioned vessels in the Caribbean,\u201d the Pentagon said. \u201cIt ran, and we followed.\u201d <\/p>\n A Navy official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss military operations, would not say what forces were used in the operation but confirmed the destroyers USS Pinckney and USS John Finn as well as the mobile base ship USS Miguel Keith were operating in the Indian Ocean.<\/p>\n In videos the Pentagon posted to social media, uniformed forces can be seen boarding a Navy helicopter that takes off from a ship that matches the profile of the Miguel Keith. Video and photos of the tanker shot from inside a helicopter also show a Navy destroyer sailing alongside the ship. <\/p>\n Since the U.S. ouster of Maduro<\/a> in a surprise nighttime raid on Jan. 3, the Trump administration has set out to control the production<\/a>, refining and global distribution of Venezuela\u2019s petroleum products. Officials in President Donald Trump\u2019s Republican administration have made it clear they see seizing the tankers as a way to generate cash<\/a> as they seek to rebuild Venezuela\u2019s battered oil industry and restore its economy. <\/p>\n Trump also has been trying to restrict the flow of oil to Cuba<\/a>, which faces strict economic sanctions by the U.S. and relies heavily on oil shipments from allies like Mexico, Russia and Venezuela. <\/p>\n Since the Venezuela operation, Trump has said that no more Venezuelan oil will go to Cuba and that the Cuban government is ready to fall. Trump also recently signed an executive order that would impose a tariff<\/a> on any goods from countries that sell or provide oil to Cuba, primarily pressuring Mexico because it has acted as an oil lifeline for Cuba.<\/p>\n ___<\/p>\n Associated Press writer Patrick Whittle in Bath, Maine, contributed to this report.<\/p>\n ___<\/p>\n This story has been corrected to show that the name of the destroyer is the USS John Finn, not the USS Johnson.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n