Big Problem in Mexico - Breakdown of Order

[Dale00]

Worse than we thought...

You may have read the news just a few days back: the Mexican military captured not one but two of El Chapo’s sons in the heart of Culiacán, the Sinaloan capital. One son freed himself—which is to say his entourage and retainers at hand overpowered and killed the soldiers at hand—and then, in a decisive riposte, seized the entire city center of Culiacán to compel the liberation of his brother.

The forces that emerged were in the literal sense awesome and awful. Heavy weaponry that would be familiar on any Iraqi, Syrian, or Yemeni battlefield was brought to bear. More and worse: custom-built armored vehicles, designed and built to make a Sahel-warfare technical look like an amateur’s weekend kit job, were rolled out for their combat debut. Most critically, all this hardware was manned by men with qualities the Mexican Army largely lacks: training, tactical proficiency, and motivation.

Then the coup de grace: as the Chapo sons’ forces engaged in direct combat with their own national military, kill squads went into action across Culiacán, slaughtering the families of soldiers engaged in the streets.

Cowed and overmatched—most crucially in the moral arena—the hapless band of soldiers still holding the second son finally received word from Mexico City, direct from President AMLO himself: surrender. Surrender and release the prisoner.

It’s an absolutely extraordinary episode even by the grim and bizarre annals of what we mistakenly call the post-2006 Mexican Drug War. The Battle of Culiacán stands on a level above, say, the Ayotzinapa massacre, or the Zetas’ expulsion of the entire population of Ciudad Mier. Killing scores of innocents and brutalizing small towns is one thing: seizing regional capital cities and crushing the national armed forces in open fighting in broad daylight is something else.

“Drug War” is a misnomer for reasons the Culiacán battle lays bare. This is not a mafia-type problem, nor one comprehensible within the framework of law enforcement and crime. This is something very much like an insurgency now—think of the eruption of armed resistance in Culiacán in 2019 as something like that in Sadr City in 2004—and also something completely like state collapse. The cartels may be the proximate drivers but they are symptoms. Underlying them is a miasma of official corruption, popular alienation, and localist resentments—and underlying all that is a low-trust civil society stripped of the mediating mechanisms that make peaceable democracy both feasible and attractive.

https://claireberlinski.substack.com/p/on-mexican-state-collapse-a-guest

 

[Snattlerake]

Now that was a journalist.

 

[Glocktogo]

This was the second defeat of the Mexican military in as many weeks by narco-terrorists. If they're so stupid as to not have gunships on station when they roll into enemy held territory, I can't really work up much sympathy for them.

 

[RETOKSQUID]

And yet, we have politicians here that either dont have the brain cells necessary to understand that this sort of event is exactly why we need to secure our borders, or worse, just don't give a rats ass.

 

[dennishoddy]

"This is important because Americans have not had to think seriously about this for nearly a century: there is a place on the map marked Mexico, but much of it is governed by something other than the Mexican state. That’s been true for years."

Absolutely true. The Mexican Government is just there as a puppet government. Any attempt to suppress the drug cartels results in violence that the Mexican government can't defeat if the cartel doesn't want them to. Border towns are controlled by the cartels to enhance their ability to move drugs across our borders.
We spent three months Jan-Mar, 2 miles from the Mexican Border town of Nuevo-Progreso. One of our camping buddies was retired from the McAllen Tx Border Patrol Sector, another a retired FBI Special Agent. They told us that going to Progreso which is controlled by the Cartel was perfectly safe if one just stayed legal. (not trying to buy illegal drugs, etc) The water is ok to drink, all the meat, vegetables etc is bought in the US and imported to the restaurants so the tourists won't get sick and get a bad reputation which is exactly the opposite of what is happening in the Mexican government controlled city's where LEO are corrupt and fish for bribes from tourists. You can't drink the water and you can't eat the fresh vegetables.
There are US trained Dentists and Pharmacists up and down those streets with offices that contain equipment that those on the other side of the American border would be jealous to have in their practices. Dental implants that would cost many thousands of dollars each are done for around $800. Pharmaceutical drugs that cost a thousand dollars a month in the US go for less than a hundred dollars on the Mexican side. People from all over travel down there to take advantage of those services.....all controlled by the cartels.
It's sad to say, but the cartels have brought stability to the places they control.

 

[Snattlerake]

This was the second defeat of the Mexican military in as many weeks by narco-terrorists. If they're so stupid as to not have gunships on station when they roll into enemy held territory, I can't really work up much sympathy for them.

Should have been nipped in the bud decades ago. You could see this coming. A few spooky's and a few A-10s should do the trick.

 

[Tanis143]

"This is important because Americans have not had to think seriously about this for nearly a century: there is a place on the map marked Mexico, but much of it is governed by something other than the Mexican state. That’s been true for years."

Absolutely true. The Mexican Government is just there as a puppet government. Any attempt to suppress the drug cartels results in violence that the Mexican government can't defeat if the cartel doesn't want them to. Border towns are controlled by the cartels to enhance their ability to move drugs across our borders.
We spent three months Jan-Mar, 2 miles from the Mexican Border town of Nuevo-Progreso. One of our camping buddies was retired from the McAllen Tx Border Patrol Sector, another a retired FBI Special Agent. They told us that going to Progreso which is controlled by the Cartel was perfectly safe if one just stayed legal. (not trying to buy illegal drugs, etc) The water is ok to drink, all the meat, vegetables etc is bought in the US and imported to the restaurants so the tourists won't get sick and get a bad reputation which is exactly the opposite of what is happening in the Mexican government controlled city's where LEO are corrupt and fish for bribes from tourists. You can't drink the water and you can't eat the fresh vegetables.
There are US trained Dentists and Pharmacists up and down those streets with offices that contain equipment that those on the other side of the American border would be jealous to have in their practices. Dental implants that would cost many thousands of dollars each are done for around $800. Pharmaceutical drugs that cost a thousand dollars a month in the US go for less than a hundred dollars on the Mexican side. People from all over travel down there to take advantage of those services.....all controlled by the cartels.
It's sad to say, but the cartels have brought stability to the places they control.

This is explained very well in Fast 5. If you want to control a populace, you give them things they can't get themselves. When you control that, you control them.