The U.S. military is sending an aircraft carrier to the waters off South America in the latest escalation of military firepower to a region. A Pentagon spokesman said Friday that the USS Gerald R. Ford and its strike group would deploy to the U.S. Southern Command region to “bolster U.S. capacity to detect, monitor, and disrupt illicit actors and activities that compromise the safety and prosperity of the United States." The USS Ford is port in Croatia and it was not clear how long it would take for the strike group to arrive. Earlier Friday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the military had conducted the 10th strike on a suspected drug-running boat, killing six people.
