The News
The US military has ramped up its surveillance of Mexican drug cartels after Washington designated them terrorist groups.
The presence of spy planes in international airspace around the Baja peninsula has sparked controversy in Mexico, with the country’s defense secretary saying he had not been informed of the flights’ purpose.
The US terrorist designation gives federal authorities extraordinary powers aimed at combating the cartels, which could have unintended consequences for communities that depend on the cross-border economy.
Anyone suspected of having contact with cartels — knowingly or not — “could be accused of collaborating with terrorists, from avocado producers in Michoacán that pay to stay alive, to the US gun industry,” a Bloomberg columnist wrote.
SIGNALS
The US and Mexico can’t agree on how to fight narcotrafficking
The US and Mexico have both pledged to stamp out cartel violence, but their strategies are at odds, Bloomberg noted: “Both countries can’t even agree on where fentanyl comes from.” Trump’s hardline approach effectively conflates two of Washington’s most deep-seated ideological wars: Drugs and terror, El País argued, adding that is in danger of pulling in some of Mexico’s most vulnerable. Local people who pay off gangs to stay alive, for example, would technically be in breach of the US terrorist designation, putting them at greater risk of law enforcement action. “Without a unified strategy, the insecurity challenge will only grow,” Bloomberg wrote.
US should aim for collaborative military intervention: Analyst
Donald Trump’s executive order indicates a “gloves-off” approach to fighting Mexican cartel violence, a Latin America analyst at the Council of Foreign Relations argued in The New York Times, but a thought-out strategy to implement that seems to be lacking. Organized crime is a threat because it is profit-driven, Freeman argued: “Simply sending more troops to the border is unlikely to do much of anything to dent their business model,” he said: Mexico’s largest cartels are thought to have business offshoots across more than 40 nations, giving them “almost bottomless resources” to get round restrictions imposed by Washington or Mexico City alone. Instead, Washington should pursue a security treaty with Mexico and Canada to tackle the problem as a united front, he argued.