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The Borderline Spectator
Mexican Cartel 2.0
The cartels’ greed and love of violence undercuts even their insatiable desire for profit.
The public and press that take notice of the drug cartels south of the border are under the impression that these organizations, located primarily in north and central Mexico, are powerful but of limited number. Seven to eight named cartels, however, actually become double that number when major operational units are counted from within the organizations. Furthermore, even this structure is in flux as geographical and product lines are contested.
The allegiances of smaller gangs tend to shift as the battling for turf and power alters the criminal terrain. In recent months the working arrangements among various cartels have shifted as federal police and elite military forces combined with the internecine warfare among and within the narcotics enterprises to force the creation of new alliances. The battles among the several interested parties — such as for control of transit centers like Monterrey — tend to be influenced by the casualty rate sustained in the increasingly widespread defensive campaigns protecting and expanding area dominance. However, these manifestations have devolved more into simple vicious “gang-banging” than strategically calculated business feuds.
From a tactical standpoint there is also a growing problem of product backlog. In addition to the indigenous drug cultivation and processing, the drugs continue to flow into Mexico from Central America and the northern tier of South America. The use of semi-submersibles both in the Caribbean and Pacific has opened up the possibility of foreign freighters being used as “mother-ships” to act as floating harbors for the relatively short-range semi-subs and their cargoes. The reliance on this form of partial underwater shipment was highlighted just last week when one “semi” was captured by the U.S. Coast Guard in the Caribbean carrying seven tons of cocaine worth about $180 million. A total of 3-4 dozen semi-submersibles have been caught in the Pacific during the last five years.
An increasing problem for the traffickers is that secure storage facilities are becoming overburdened as product flow northward to the United States and Canada is inhibited by border surveillance and the drug organization conflicts. The latter is the key to the Mexican-based narcotics trade. Cartel chiefs getting killed receive considerable publicity upon their deaths or capture, but it is the high casualty rate among the operational lieutenants and their immediate subordinates that creates the most trouble. These losses are utilized by rival groups as leverage in encouraging elements of the opposition to shift sides and rally to the banners of former opponents.
While the ATF was preoccupied with the sources of gun-running in order to be able to target pressure points within the cartels, they might have been more successful if they had pursued the real estate market in California and the Southwestern U.S. Two of the biggest problems in cartel operation have been investing the profits in a secure manner and obtaining safe facilities in which to store drug products and house illegal migrants — both thought of in the same mercantile sense by the “wholesalers.”
A joint SWAT task force with explicit warrants recently “hit” a formerly foreclosed middle-class home in West Phoenix as part of a year-long program conducted against houses in heavily foreclosed districts. Allegedly, these houses have been bought at bargain rates by intermediaries for the cash-rich drug combines. It is impossible to estimate how many of the current flood of foreclosed homes has been purchased through third parties by entrepreneurs with illicit trafficking connections, but local police obviously have been paying attention to this aspect of the real estate market.
In spite of the publicity that continues to be given to violence in Mexico, in resort areas such as Acapulco, modern urban hubs such as Monterrey and simple agricultural regions and towns, the tourist flow into Mexico proceeds only marginally abated. U.S. and Canadian citizens still drive their cars and RV’s across the border in search of the usually moderately priced vacations that Mexico affords. In spite of State Department warnings, this phenomenon occurs even as the American Embassy in Mexico City for security reasons no longer allows its officers and their families to travel to the northern states of the country.
The economics of the drug trade changes with any increased effort to inhibit transport of their products. The aggressive effort by DEA and Customs & Border Patrol agents has created a serious increase in “business costs” in the field of narcotics commerce. Some of the difference in cash flow has been made up by extortion rackets, kidnapping for profit, and, of course, human trafficking.
The increase in intra-criminal wars has severely impacted the efficiency of the business already under attack from the Mexican military and law enforcement. While the latter has received justifiable criticism at various times in the past, there is no doubt that recent heroic work of some of their elite units has put the cartel operations under stress.
Meanwhile, American politicians trying to take credit for the elevated pressure on the cartels are having a field day. This is nonsense. Any wounding of the narcotics trade is due to the many years of hard work by operational law enforcement forces in the field.
The truth is that the cartels’ greed and love of violence undercuts even their insatiable desire for profit over which they constantly battle. And while the Mexican economy is kept in the black by this murderous battle for criminal commercial supremacy, the North American customers do their best to cook, smoke, snort and inject the products as fast as the supplies can be shipped to them.
About the Author
George H. Wittman writes a weekly column on international affairs for The American Spectator online. He was the founding chairman of the National Institute for Public Policy.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (36) | Leave a comment
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Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 11.4.11 @ 7:19AM
Good article.
However, when I read "cartel's greed and love of violence" I though the article was going to be about the Democratic Party and SEIU.
David W| 11.4.11 @ 9:28AM
Wouldn't it be nice if Americans could handle life without the need to smoke, snort and inject (or drink)? Think where we might be as a people.
Mike Hawk| 11.4.11 @ 11:25AM
Americans can and do. It's the leftist drones that can't
USA dopers are to blame| 11.5.11 @ 8:58PM
Mr. Hawk, I wouldn't be so sure of that. There is so much narcotics volume coming across to the USA and Canada via the southern border and our port cities. Someone is consuming it, buying it. Correction: Actually, A LOT of someones. Probably people you know. Yes, most assuredly.
It's sick. Why can't people get "high" just sitting outside and enjoying a sunrise or sunset?
Moe Blotz| 11.4.11 @ 10:34AM
No one has a need to smoke, snort, inject, or drink, those are personal choices. Temptation has to be there so that we can resist it. Without the bad examples, what do you have to compare with for the good of your children? Think of where we might be as a nation without liberals driving G*d out of American life.
TrueBlue| 11.4.11 @ 11:22AM
Nothing wrong with drinking in moderation. Jesus did turn water into wine after all. Also, light meads and ales were the primary drink of the Dark/Middle Ages for a reason, it was safer to drink than water.
It's the moderation part that people seem to have a problem with, and not just with alcohol. A LOT of things that are considered "unhealthy" these days are only that way because many people are unable to eat/drink in moderation.
Jillian Galloway| 11.4.11 @ 1:18PM
..and marijuana has been used by humans for more than ten thousand years.
More proof that experiencing alternative states of mind is a natural behavior can be found in wild animals which are observed to go out of their way to ingest substances that'll allow them to experience an alternative reality for a period of time. If wild animals are doing it then you can be well sure that our ancient ancestors were doing it! The drive to get high is as natural as the drive for food, shelter and sex.
Foxfier | 11.4.11 @ 5:45PM
*sigh* Nice claim, since recorded history is generally reckoned at half that.
Bonus: even the medical MJ supporters only claim it was used in Egypt about 3000 years ago, and the first signs of cultivation (for the fibers, not getting high) are only 6000 years old.
Foxfier | 11.4.11 @ 5:47PM
(By the way-- while Chinese medicine made use of the cannabis plant medically up to nearly the current day, they were using the seeds. Which are noted for lacking THC.)
Patrick| 11.6.11 @ 1:02AM
Look at what you just did! You made an OWSer cry!
Dixie Pixie| 11.4.11 @ 11:09AM
Conservatives smoke and drink.
Socialist / Liberals use illegal drugs.
That explains the Liberals drug-addled thinking.
Mike Hawk| 11.4.11 @ 11:28AM
Most of the cigarette smokers I know are Liberals. Conservatives prefer a good cigar or a bowl of fine pipe tobacco. I do not consider an occasional cigar or pipe-full as smoking.
Dixie Pixie| 11.4.11 @ 12:16PM
Greetings Mike
To add another amusing side bit, not only does the Federal consider both to be smoking but the second-hand smoke is considered deadly to infants and newborns several households away, as proven by the Federal Courts.
Conclusion, The Federal Government is owned and operated by drug-addled Liberals and is insane until proven otherwise.
Say Baptist| 11.4.11 @ 11:29AM
Consider that the administration is causing a shortage of vaccines and other drugs, and consider that St Hillary caused a shortage of childhood vaccines in her first year as first lady, shouldn't these people be able to make it impossible to have controlled substances?
Quartermaster| 11.4.11 @ 6:10PM
Sure. Just put price controls on all illegal drugs. Or, let FedGov deal the stuff and undercut the cartels until they die. Give it to all the lefties and watch numbies forget to vote.
Sounds like a plan to me.
Dixie Pixie| 11.4.11 @ 12:01PM
The American Ruling Class particularity the Political Elite has created the dumbest government in American history in that the Federal government can no longer learn from experience.
Apparently the Federal Government learned nothing from the Probation experience.
With the Federal Government in charge, illegal drugs are widely available, low cost and easily procured.
And as an added bonus, Mexico is permanently destabilized and the world gets multiple multibillion dollar crime empires of international scope.
With the current Federal programs the legal drugs will soon be impossible to find but the illegal drugs will be cheap and easy to acquire.
Slacker| 11.4.11 @ 12:36PM
I need to smoke, snort, or inject something to counteract the bad experience of reading the author's opinion.
The notion of wounding the narcotics trade is nonsense. The business climate for drug cartels is inconsequential because demand for their products is limitless. When law enforcement buts one cartel they simultaneously do the other cartels a favor. The killing of one kingpin opens the door for the next guy.
What irks me most is the notion that someone desrves any credit for what is going on. Our government runs the war on drugs about as well as anything else, which is to say, shitty.
Ask yourselves, when the consumption happens here, why fight the drug war in Mexico? Answer: Our conniving government knows the public will not tolerate enforcement at home so they outsourced the fight to Mexico. Mexico fights our war on drugs and in return we allow illegal immigration (and the resulting repatriation of billions back to Mexico). The whole deal is a stinking fraud.
Every single DEA agent could occupy themselves full time by making arrests on our college campuses. It would be easy picking. It isn’t done because we can’t have Mom and Dad forking over 100k so Junior can concurrently earn both a degree and felony.
Call a spade a spade. Middle class white people are the biggest drug consumers (by volume). The irony is the day middle class white people start being busted for drug possession will be day the public says enough of the war on drugs. The DEA understand this and they certainly don’t want to lose a good gig. They took guidance from landscapers and outsourced the whole endeavor to Mexicans.
Don’t kid yourselves. There is no honor on either side.
Trust no govt authority figure| 11.7.11 @ 10:47AM
I agree with Slacker. 100 pro-cent. Gracias, dude.
It could and should be the BUST of all time: Descend on every campus with 6,000 or more.
Squeeze the shit out of the undergrad and grad "users." They either fess up to their suppliers or "throw away the key." (make 'em think that's possible)
The round up on the campuses? Don't stop in the dorms and cheap student apartments. Professors homes. The deans. The head administrator, the Alumni Director, and, yes, the prez, too.
Everybody squeals. Must answer - "Who's your provider?"
Chase the providers down. Raids. And repeat -- either narc on your bosses and providers or hanging from gallows by sundown on the third day. Yes, hanging is too kind for career drug "providers." And just keep working the way up the chain of distribution.
That our law enforcement agents and agencies, the DEA, DOJ, state attorneys general et al DON'T do this tells you all you need to know about honesty and integrity.
EdSnate| 11.4.11 @ 12:49PM
Slacker, I call B.S. on "Middle class white people are the biggest drug consumers (by volume).
Prove it.
Foxfier | 11.4.11 @ 5:49PM
Maybe if you include "beer" as a drug....
Moe Blotz| 11.6.11 @ 12:00PM
Beer is considered to be brain food, after all it made Bud wiser.
Slacker| 11.4.11 @ 6:57PM
According to 1999 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse of the major racial/ethnic groups, the rate of drug use is highest among the American Indian/Native American population (10.6%) and those reporting mixed race (11.2%), followed by African Americans (7.7%), Hispanics (6.8%), whites (6.6%). The lowest rates are found among the Asian population. (3.2%). Look it up if you don’t’ believe me.
Now you have to admit 6.6% of the white population is a whole lot more consumers than 7.7% of the black population, or 6.8% of the Hispanic population. Whites are buying most of the illegal drugs simply because they are the dominant demographic (for now).
But, are they middle class? Well, who has disposable income for recreational drugs?
Let’s look at the popular drugs.
Cocaine: Expensive stuff. Only the upper middle class and better can afford regular coke binges or sustain an addiction. The upper middle class is predominately white. Remember until the emergence of crack, blow was considered relatively harmless. Whitey all the way from the get go. The blacks jacked this one up for everybody.
Crack: Cheap. For the underclass. Crack is an outlier and I admit it does not fit my analysis.
Heroin: See cocaine. Upper class whites, rich people. Part of Jazz scene I admit but, oddly blacks not longer do jazz.
Marijuana: Popular with all but, the mainstream drug of middle class whites. Walk through a college dormitory and draw your own conclusions. Ever see a black or Hispanic hippie? The rednecks in Kentucky are still middle class whites...just barely.
Methamphetamine: Midwestern small town drug of choice. The favorite of blue collar white trash and bikers. Blue collar white trash and bikers are still middle class.
White folks love drugs.
Foxfier | 11.4.11 @ 7:51PM
Problem: the survey
http://www.oas.samhsa.gov/WebOnly.htm#NSDUHtabs
in question doesn't ask how MUCH one uses, just if one has used in the last month, or last year.
Also, you make the mistake of assuming that legally reported income is the same as disposable income.
Mac Jehoff| 11.6.11 @ 12:02PM
Love is the drug that I need some more.
Jillian Galloway| 11.4.11 @ 1:12PM
Prohibitionists, like President Obama, like to label marijuana a "harmful substance", however marijuana is far LESS harmful than beer and wine which are LEGAL, and is also far LESS harmful than the federal marijuana prohibition which fuels the cartels, provides the incentive for most of the atrocities they commit and draws drug dealers into our communities and around our children!
It is outrageous to have the federal government ban stores from selling legally-grown marijuana to adults when this ban *doesn't* prevent people from buying, selling and using marijuana, and *does* make marijuana readily accessible to children by creating large profits for drug dealers where otherwise there would be NONE.
Patrick| 11.6.11 @ 1:21AM
Funny, since it has been proven in numerous medical journals the benefits of red wine. Further, studies have shown marked decrease in heart disease in post-menopausal women who consume a liter of beer a day.
Wine, beer, and the often forgotten mead were often used to draw out the restorative properties of many herbs since antiquity, as the essential oils and alkaloids of some herbs are not water soluble. Wine and beer were valued as irreplaceable remedies for common illnesses, with numerous ancient treatises enumerating their benefits, now known to be for the nutritional properties of yeast as well as the antiseptic properties of alcohol.
Yes, alcohol can be destructive and can be abused. This does not, however, hide the fact that you are rationalizing away the ill effects of your vice just like every other junkie.
gary siebel| 11.4.11 @ 5:12PM
What exactly is a "semi-submersible?" An overloaded boat awash to the gunnels? A Disney ride? A Bond movie toy? Sounds cool; where do we get one?
Prohibition was a failure before, and it is again. California could take care of it's budget deficit in a matter of weeks if they legalized and taxed marijuana.
Alcohol has ruined the lives of billions; marijuana has ruined the lives of -- who? Anyone care to step forward with the claim that marijuana ruined their life? And in case you didn't know, huge numbers of Repubs smoke the bud, or have at least tried it. Ever been to Texas? That's where the Mexican crap goes. The west coast doesn't need it; they grow higher quality stuff.
Dixie Pixie| 11.4.11 @ 9:21PM
A semi-submersible is a partial submarine that can dive below the surface but just below it.
This is done to minimize a radar or sonar contact by Coast Guard or DIA patrol craft.
It has to have constant contact with the air above, as they are diesel powered boats without independent battery power.
However they are not true submarines as they can not dive below the surface more than a few feet or the water pressure would crush them.
A semi-submersible has only a small conning tower or snorkel and periscope assembly showing above the surface of the water.
Thus the radar signature is miniscule and the sonar signature is lost in the wave clutter on the surface.
There are no other use for a semi-submersible other than smuggling, so the mere existence of such a craft is an indication of an smuggling operation.
POST American| 11.4.11 @ 11:39PM
---------------------FINAL WORD----------------------
In this age of full-spectrum, pervasive
cyber surveillance ---is ANYONE still NOT
aware the government and Globalist banking
establishment ----ARE the drug business?
In 2011, nothing, but nothing, moves through
this country, much less crosses the border,
without 'authorization' and monitoring.
markenoff| 11.5.11 @ 5:43PM
Fight drug trafficking. Build the wall.
markenoff| 11.5.11 @ 5:43PM
Fight human trafficking. Build the wall.
markenoff| 11.5.11 @ 5:44PM
A shovel ready stimulus project. Build the wall.
markenoff| 11.5.11 @ 5:44PM
If you build it they can't come. Build the wall.
Inaction reveals cowardice| 11.5.11 @ 9:02PM
This past week I read that there are officially 70 (maybe 72) journalists dead just in year 2011 in the Mexican war. Yes, it is a war. And 11 who are missing now for over at least a month. Yes, they are most likely dead, too. Sadly.
Just in year 2011. And there are still 58 days in the year to go. So expect the death toll to rise.
These are journalists who are true pros and dedicated; they've put it all on the line. And they pay the ultimate price.
All they want to do is share the truth. Uncover the lies.
When is American going to wake up. Calderon sucks. He's weak, corrupt, feckless.
THIS IS WAR. C'mon the time for words is done. Action. BLOW the cartels away! Forever.
See no evil - (USA pretenders)| 11.5.11 @ 9:10PM
This is the truth about what is happening. You want to know about what gutsy, truly corageous reporters and bloggers do? Read here:
http://www.borderlandbeat.com/
Bookmark this. This is the truth. And note that probably one of these courageous reporters/bloggers here (using the pennames that they must to try to survive) will probably be dead before you unwrap your Christmas presents this December 25th.
This is insane. And it is right in the USA backyard. And AMERICANS are to blame because tonight lots of coke, crack, heroine, pot, meth, and speed will be consumed. Probably within minutes of where you live.
Pay attention to this site: BorderLandBeat.com
These people who do this deserve our utmost respect.
Who has the guts to fix this?
Kenneth Olsen | 11.7.11 @ 10:35PM
"For a government to declare a vice to be a crime,
and to punish it as such, is an attempt to falsify the very nature of things. It is as absurd as it would be to declare truth to be falsehood, or falsehood truth."
- Lysander Spooner
Some people like to scapegoat others much more than they care about liberty. Casualties are the predictable result, and the numbers of casualties grows and grows as the drug warriors pat themselves on the back for their blood-soaked virtues.