Washington – In the past few days, the Trump administration has launched the CIA surveillance flights via Mexico, named drug -like cartels as “foreign terrorists” groups and the opportunity to use troops there to combat organized crime.
Mexico is “essentially managed by the cartels,” said President Trump and insisted that the United States should “wage war” against them.
No administration in modern times has pursued such a militaristic approach to Mexico, a US ally that Trump blames the guilt for the production of the fentanyl, which has killed hundreds of thousands of Americans. His attitude increases in the latest US policy in which the prevention of the rule of law in Mexico has been emphasized, and contradicts Mexico's security strategy, which has derived from the type of violent antitrontations that drove the record levels of bloodshed.
The Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said on Thursday that she would propose a constitutional reform that aims to protect the sovereignty of her nation – a step that corresponds to the growing fear of a US intervention, which many believe that they only believe more violence would trigger.
On February 13, members of the Mexican National Guard will find the entrance to a suspected drug tunnel near the municipal presidency in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico.
(Anadolu about Getty Images)
“Under no circumstances, the Mexican population will accept interventions, interference or another act from abroad that would be harmful to integrity, independence and sovereignty of the nation”. “”
Drones that fly over Mexico are not armed with fatal skills. According to US officials, however, future strikes are an option.
Todd Zimmerman, the special representative of the Drug Enforcement Administration in Mexico city, said in an interview that the decision of the administration this week to describe drug cartels as terrorist organizations is a great message to her leadership that US military actions are on the table .
“You are concerned because you know the power and strength of the US military,” he said. “You know that you could be anywhere anytime – when it comes to it when it comes to – you could be in a car that you could be in a house and you could be evaporated. They saw it in the Afghan and Iraqi wars. So you know the potential that is out there. “
Zimmerman said that the pace of fentanyl production in Mexico has remained “relatively stable” in the past few months. Nevertheless, he praised Sheinbaum that the Mexican military strengthened raids, which led to more drug attacks and increased pressure on the cartels.
Us Marine Corps troops patrol on February 7 from San Diego when the Department of Defense uses 1,600 troops with active Duty on the border near the San Ysidro port.
(Carlos Moreno/Getty Images)
“We have seen an increase in operations since Claudia was taken over as President here, which is a very positive sign,” said Zimmerman.
The hope, he said, is that the cartels “step back from Fentanyl and simply return to what they have always done, namely cocaine and methamphetamines and a little heroin.”
Other experts pointed out that earlier efforts to use the military against drug dealers could not slow down the drug flow to the United States. When the Mexican government declared the cartels against cartels in 2006 and sent soldiers onto the street to combat them, the clearest result was a massive increase in the murders.
“It doesn't work,” said Elisabeth Malkin, deputy program director for Latin America at the International Crisis Group. “An entire constellation of actions is necessary: to carry out proper investigation, to create cases that capture in court, dismantle entire networks instead of just pursuing the great drug king in front of the cameras.”
Mike Vigil, a former head of international operations at the DEA, described Trump's efforts as “all for the show”.
“The military aircraft, the troops on the border, the talk of drones: it's all a flash in the pan,” he said. “It will not have any influence.”
The use of ammunition of multimillion dollar ammunition to go on primitive drug laboratories would be a ridiculous waste of resources, said Vigil.
“You don't talk about sophisticated laboratories. We talk about some tubs, pots and pans, kitchen dishes, ”he said. “And the laboratories are not repaired, they are mobile. They move them around, they are not ready for operation around the clock. And these laboratories can be easily replaced. So you don't get anything. “
The Mexican national guards are preparing for an aircraft at the international airport in Merida, Mexico, on February 4 to travel north to strengthen the country's border with the United States.
(Martin Zetina / Associated Press)
There is talk of drone attacks because other, less striking efforts to combat fentanyl due to the 90-day freezing of the Trump government with regard to foreign help in the Trump government.
Zimmerman said that this includes long -term programs to train Mexican civil servants to find and destroy secret fentanyllabors and to prevent precursor chemicals at the entry in Mexico.
Trump's advance after one solid hand The approach in the region brings him into the contradiction to Sheinbaum, which had sworn to collect more on crime prevention, intelligence and to improve the incorrect judicial system of Mexico.
“We have a security strategy that will work,” she said last year. “What there will not be a war against drugs.”
Sheinbaum had already been forced to mobilize troops to clamp violence in the state of Sinaloa, which was nervous since the conquest of a large cartel leader in summer. And she is under enormous pressure to show Trump that she takes his security concerns seriously in order to avoid too far -reaching tariffs he threatens to impose Mexican goods.
The Mexican military and police patrol in Culiacan, state of Sinaloa, Mexico, in January 2023.
(Martin Urista / Associated Press)
Last month Trump agreed to delay the tariffs after Sheinbaum said that she would send 10,000 troops from the National Guard to the US border to address fentanyl and illegal immigration and found a working group with the United States to combat drug trafficking .
This week, Sheinbaum described the surveillance flights as part of a “cooperation” between the two governments that have been carried out for years on Mexican request.
A US official said that the drone program was carried out in accordance with the Mexican government to provide Mexico the secret services that it takes to use law enforcement against drug operations faster.
Sheinbaum was aware that its own base is sensitive to us and said that working with the CIA does not violate Mexican sovereignty. She also receded an assertion that Trump has repeatedly raised in the past few weeks that Mexico's government has an “unbearable alliance” with organized crimes.
“They want to position us as if we are defending drug cartels or organized crimes, but of course we are not,” said Sheinbaum.
She has also repeatedly questioned the US role in drug trafficking and publicly asked Trump to do more to combat drug use, money laundering and the river of illegal weapons to Mexico.
An idea that she recently called for a media campaign in the United States against drug use, with which president used.
“It was a great conversation because we will spend hundreds of millions of dollars to advertise how bad drugs are so that children do not use them to chew their brain, they destroy their teeth, skin and skin. All of her, ”said Trump this week. “And I thanked her for it.”
And despite Trump's emphasis on militarization, Us officials understand that they cannot do it alone.
For years, the CIA has been following the delivery of forerunner chemicals, which are manufactured for the production of fentanyl from China in the Pacific to the secret laboratory throughout Mexico.
“Just let me tell you a little about how difficult it is to find a fentanyllabor here in Mexico,” said Zimmerman. “It is extremely difficult and the reason is that they are very small. They are in houses, they are in apartments, they are in the backyards, under planning. “
Drones have become an important part of the efforts to find laboratories. US officials also have to rely on their Mexican colleagues to act quickly – before human dealers have the chance to reduce a facility.
The formal name of several drug cartels as global terrorist organizations is intended to give federal authorities more extensive powers to make the financial networks that support the cartels, said US officials.
Six Mexican cartels were among the criminal groups that described new terrorist names. Foreign Minister Marco Rubio said he had the name because the groups are a considerable risk of the security of American citizens and the US economy.
Although the antitrust names do not facilitate a military US intervention from a legal point of view, some could fear that this could help to build a reason for you.
“Basically, there is a message that these organizations are a threat to the United States,” said Malkin. “It lays political foundations for military actions.”
Will Freeman, a scholarship holder for Latin America at the Council for Foreign Relations, said that the conflict between the USA and Mexico in the past few weeks has had to do with a fundamental difference in what every country wants in relation to security. While Trump prioritizes the breakdown of gangs, regardless of the costs, Mexico is largely interested in making communities safer, even if organized crime is still significantly impaired.
“The tension is based on the fact that many Latin American governments concentrate on reducing violence,” said Freeman, “which sometimes means avoiding the cartels and gangs on which.”
Wilner reported from Washington. Linthicum and McDonnell reported from Mexico city.