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PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   36658 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 20, 2025

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Help me understand an argument about the US-Mexico relationship

A friend and old-coworker recently posted in a group chat an article quote

«Trump … mulled sending military special forces into Mexico to fight drug cartels» [I couldn't find the article by quote, but maybe it's from a Mexican source]

They think that if that were to happen “both the general population and government unofficially would side with the narcos (for different reasons).” Radicalization and bad things would follow. Firstly, I thought these things already happened. Was Sicaro not just exaggerated for effect, but complete fiction?

We diverted for a bit into the politics of Mexico under the cartels. It was fun to be reminded that there still are areas not even the military will go into without cartel approval, that AMLO used to visit El Chapo’s mother regularly, that any information given to federal agencies or even directly to the president was pretty much immediately relayed to the cartels. Apparently, cartel-unfriendly political candidates are routinely assassinated. So the state seems to have been completely captured by the cartels. They have also deeply infiltrated the local and federal law enforcement agencies. The cartels have their own military equipment, intelligence agencies maybe, air force?, submaries (not armed though I hope?)

Still, even without local police or federal government involvement (who I understand most are assets of or actual narcos) I assumed the DEA/CIA/FBI still did shit to keep things in check, at least around the border and inside the US. Well actually, cartels are expanding into Colorado these days.

Enter Trump's executive order Designating Cartels and Other Organizations as Foreign Terrorist Organizations and Specially Designated Global Terrorists.

My friend was incensed, thinks that any action by special forces would be war, that the Mexican people and government will rally around the cartels, there would be terrorist attacks and sabotage by cartels/Mexican immigrants.

I’m afraid here is where I lost my cool a little bit. Paraphrasing:

Me

Do what you want in your country, seems like the people voted for this [probably not true given political assassinations/voter intimidation], but imo the US is within its rights to target the cartels that operate around/across the borders.

M. Bridge

If the USA starts a war with the neighbor to the South, that will not go well for anyone

Me

Not a war, just a special military operation ;)
This won't be a "war" because the Mexican military won't do shit
I imagine there might be an ultimatum delivered to the cartels, escalating to raids and precision bombing of cartel compounds/assets.

M. B

surely you're joking

Me

Why are the cartels so precious to Mexicans that an attack on them is an attack on their country and their pride?

M. B

because narcos have weapons, money and more

Me

and they also have military equipment, submarines, and more
But much worse signals intelligence, no f-35s, precision bombs or satellites, etc

M. B

that's still war

Me

Actually it's not war, there's just this new American cartel called "forces especiales" that has weapons, money, and more and that has the support of the president and that operates across the US-Mexico border
But if the Mexicans want to call it war then so be it

M. B

🤦

Me

I hope that cooler heads will prevail; Lebanon did not call it war when Israel fought and decapitated Hezbollah

M. Oldschool

There's actually an ex-Mexican special forces cartel trained by the CIA in insurgency/counter insurgency tactics that became the most violent cartel.

Me

[Mugatu: I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!]
I understand that Mexico is a cartel-run state, but why should America's cartel, the actual US government/military, not insist that they fuck off our borders
"we'll feel bad and consider going to war with you if you don't allow our muderous kidapping raping drug-and-people-trafficking home team do whatever it wants?"
Is that the argument?

I guess what I want to know is, Am I The Asshole?

Obviously violating Mexico's sovereignty would be an act of war. But of course we also violated Pakistan's sovereignty to get bin Laden and they didn't choose to go to war over it.

The United States has a lot of leverage over Mexico. I would not be surprised if any military operations run against the cartels happened with the nominal cooperation of the Mexican government. I am pretty sure already cooperate with the Mexican government against the cartels using military assets (Coast Guard) and civilian ones (DEA, including I think boots on the ground) so the real difference from what I see it is that Trump might do stuff like airstrikes and SOF raids that are higher visibility than sharing intel and joint law enforcement work.

Worth noting that the Mexican government might benefit considerably from being "forced to accept" the United States eradicating the cartels. What I find most interesting, though, is what I rarely see talked about: the anti-China angle. Isn't a lot of the really bad stuff like fentanyl manufactured at industrial capacity in China and then shipped to Mexico and smuggled into the US? (Can someone more knowledgable than me chime in?) It seems like stopping that pipeline should be the priority, and if Mexico won't cooperate portside the US Navy can probably do it without violating their sovereignty through VBSS actions.

If it's true that a lot of the hard drugs are Chinese manufactured and we don't start stopping shipping offshore that will tell you something (not sure exactly what, but something!)

Inspecting containerised shipping at sea seems tricky.

I think it is! And inspecting it might be more of a challenge than simply performing the interception, but I dunno. Maybe there's a Coast Guard type on here who can enlighten us as to the details.

I would say the main challenge is just space. Container shops are very densely packed. You would probably need specialised shipping to lift the containers off the original ship onto the interceptor to inspect them, needing to store multiple containers at a time so you can get to the ones one the bottom.

The second problem is that AFAIK containers are sealed to prevent theft by dockers and crew. In fact, this was one of the reasons for containerising shipping in the first place. Unsealing then may be difficult, and would cause trouble with the original buyers.

I would say that it’s almost certainly better to track the containers to the regional distribution centres where they’re opened, and inspect them there, which is probably what’s already done. Of course, then you aren’t in international waters any more. You could force them to a friendly port but that’s an act of war, or at least of piracy.

I would say that it’s almost certainly better to track the containers to the regional distribution centres where they’re opened, and inspect them there, which is probably what’s already done. Of course, then you aren’t in international waters any more. You could force them to a friendly port but that’s an act of war, or at least of piracy.

Yes, good point. But if (as I suspect) Mexico will be cooperative, then the thing to do would simply be to ramp up port inspections.

Which I do think would be personnel-intensive!

How do you plan on the inspectors actually cooperating with the US, instead of saying they are and taking bribes?

I assume (perhaps incorrectly) that the US already has a lot of people in Mexico, so presumably if we're the ones who start to care, suddenly, then part of our strategy might involve directly inserting more oversight law enforcement advisory personnel. At a minimum just putting added political pressure on Mexico will probably produce nonzero results – I seem to recall that we've been able to twist arms down there in the past.

To be clear, I am not pretending that would be a piece of cake. In some ways, just bombing stuff would be simpler and more satisfying. I think on balance RandomRanger is correct that the bulk of US effort should be focused internally (and by that I am including at the border).

For truly out-of-the-box thinking, I have some retarded galaxy-brained ideas involving extraterritorial governance and PMCs, but I'm not sure there's really any genuine need that would justify those sorts of extreme solutions.

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