Jamaica and the United States have taken another step towards closer military cooperation, signing an agreement governing the temporary deployment of military personnel in each country for mutually agreed activities.

The agreement, known as a Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA), is being presented as part of a wider push by both countries to work more closely against organised crime, drug trafficking, and other security threats in the Caribbean.

According to a joint media release issued by the Jamaican and United States governments on Thursday, the agreement covers activities including military training, joint operations, and disaster response. Jamaica is now among more than 120 countries that have similar agreements with the United States.

The signing came just days after United States Secretary of War Pete Hegseth met Jamaica’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of National Security and Peace Dr Horace Chang during the Americas Counter Cartel Coalition Forum in Panama on August 12.

At that meeting, Hegseth publicly thanked Jamaica for working with the US on what he described as a new military partnership aimed at narcoterrorists moving through the Caribbean.

“Yes, we have meetings; yes, we will coordinate; but ultimately this is about the operations we can conduct together jointly to protect individual sovereignty and the entirety of the hemisphere,” he said during the conference.

That remark provides important context for the new agreement. The SOFA announcement comes as the United States pushes countries in the region to move beyond discussions and towards joint action against drug-trafficking organisations and other criminal networks.

Hegseth told the coalition that the forum was intended to be operational, with participating countries working together on activities that could protect their territories and the wider hemisphere.

For Jamaica, the arrangement builds on a relationship that is already extensive.

The Jamaican and US governments said their armed forces have worked together for decades through joint military exercises, professional exchanges, humanitarian operations, and disaster response activities.

That relationship has also been receiving renewed attention this year. In February, Jamaica’s Chief of Defence Staff Vice Admiral Antonette Wemyss-Gorman joined defence chiefs from 34 countries at the first Western Hemisphere Chiefs of Defence Conference in Washington, where regional security cooperation was a major focus.

Beyond the battle against organised crime, the agreement opens the door to deeper Jamaica-US cooperation on regional security, and responding to disasters.

“This SOFA… is a message to the criminal organisations in the region that the United States Armed Forces and JDF (Jamaica Defence Force) are committed to deepening and expanding their cooperation, including in their efforts to fight criminal organisations and narcoterrorists who traffic guns, drugs, and people,” both governments said in the joint statement.

The agreement also aligns with Prime Minister Dr Andrew Holness’s push for greater international cooperation against criminal networks.

Addressing the 11th Biennial Jamaica Diaspora Conference in Montego Bay on June 16, Holness said criminal organisations were becoming increasingly transnational, with links extending into the Jamaican Diaspora.

He said Jamaica had therefore increased cooperation with other countries and security forces to ensure that criminals have “no place to hide”, pointing specifically to expanded cooperation with the United States in operations against lottery scamming and the illegal importation of firearms.

Holness has also previously said Jamaica has identified guns from the US as a major contributor to the island’s crime problem and has called for greater US action to stem the flow of firearms into the country.

In discussing Jamaica’s wider maritime security needs, he noted that the country’s maritime area is about 22 times the size of its land mass, making effective surveillance difficult.

He has also pointed to recent international operations against firearms trafficking as evidence of the importance of cross-border cooperation.

Holness said in June that expanded cooperation with the US had contributed to high-profile operations targeting illegal firearm imports into Jamaica, alongside action against lottery scamming networks.

The two governments said the agreement provides a “modern and predictable framework” for cooperation and reaffirms their commitment to regional security, defence cooperation, and disaster response.