Pentagon quietly moves MQ-9 Reaper drones into South America

The Pentagon is moving MQ-9 Reaper drones into Colombia and Ecuador, according to the New York Times, with two Reapers already operating in Ecuador and Colombian officials having outlined plans to receive three more. The aircraft are being transferred from Africa, where counterterrorism missions have wound down, to a continent where the US military has had no sustained drone presence.

The transfers follow a year of broadening joint military activity between Washington and its southern partners. Ecuador's president Daniel Noboa was the first regional leader this year to allow joint US military operations on his soil, a decision that has drawn scrutiny because Ecuador's constitution bars foreign military bases — a prohibition voters reaffirmed in a referendum last year. Colombia's new right-wing president, Abelardo De La Espriella, has launched an aggressive military campaign against leaders of groups said to be involved in cocaine trafficking, and both countries are now partnering with US forces against what officials call narcoterrorist groups.

The likely mission is intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance: tracking cartel leaders and supporting potential strikes on the ground. The legal framing matters — counternarcotics operations carry broader authorities than counterinsurgency, and the White House has identified the Maduro government in Venezuela as a target of pressure campaigns. Congress has been largely absent from the debate.

The backdrop is a rightward political shift across South America, with Brazil heading to a runoff later this month between right-wing candidate Flávio Bolsonaro and incumbent Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. And the fleet being repositioned is itself diminished: at least 45 Reapers, roughly a quarter of the US inventory, were reportedly lost in the Iran conflict. A drone force a quarter smaller than it was a year ago is now being stretched across a second hemisphere — with the Venezuela operation as the unspoken destination on the flight plan.