Mexico's president lashed out this week at what he called “spying” and “interference” on the part of the United States in Mexico. The statement was made in response to U.S. prosecutors announcing charges against 28 members of the Sinaloa Cartel for smuggling large amounts of fentanyl into the United States. Among those charged were the three sons of El Chapo.
Just a thought, but El Presidente can back up a few steps.
President Andrés Manuel López Obrador suggested Monday that the case had been built on information gathered by U.S. agents in Mexico, and said "foreign agents cannot be in Mexico." This is just another statement or stance by the Mexican President that shows an apparent desire to ruin what relationship still exists between the U.S. and Mexico.
First of all, Mr. President, there was very little investigation done on your soil to begin with because you have created an almost impossible atmosphere in which to do so. You bend and run when a cartel raises its fist and we certainly would not except any assistance in such an investigation.
If you would like to know where a majority of the “intelligence” came from, it would be from the interviews and interrogations of the thousands we have captured coming across the border carrying the fentanyl that you say doesn’t exist in your country!
Obrador , who would be wise to NOT appear to side with the largest cartel in the world, the Sinaloa Cartel, said the investigation was abusive, arrogant interference that should not be accepted under any circumstances. It causes one to ponder just what was being interfered with… the smooth operation of criminal activity in your country? Sorry we interrupted. Why didn’t you?
I am reminded of how well the President has handled his own issues in the past such as when he personally ordered the release of one of El Chapo’s sons after a brief detention. When Ovidio Guzman was arrested, mayhem exploded causing Obrador a lot of embarrassment and after only a few hours he ordered Guzman’s release because his security forces were over-run by the cartel in the streets.
This would be the same President that was elected based on campaign promises of “hugs not drugs” and assured the world that cartels were not in control of any part of Mexico under his watch. He is correct unless you look at how he caved to Sinaloa when he realized the Sinaloa Cartel was larger than his own army and that between Sinaloa and New Jalisco, the President has very little control.
When accosted by the facts that the cartels are in control, Obrador continually says these allegations are false based on the fact that there is nowhere in Mexico that cartels exist without there being the existence of law enforcement as well.
The existence of law enforcement in cartel territory has historically never impeded a cartel’s growth or success in the past.
Not only does Obrador refuse to admit that cartels are controlling any part of his country, he also continues to vehemently deny that fentanyl is coming from Mexico or that cartels are behind its creation and trafficking. López Obrador describes fentanyl - a synthetic opioid that causes about 70,000 overdose deaths annually in the United States - as a U.S. problem, claiming it is not even made in Mexico.
El Presidente does not appear to have cable nor has he ever watched a National Geographic documentary. The ridiculous claim is coupled with his follow up statement that if American families hugged their children more and kept their adult children at home that there would be no fentanyl problem in the United States.
Obrador made comment that the security of the Mexican people takes precedence over any further cooperation with the United States in regard to the war on drugs which is admirable except that the security of the Mexican people is being threatened by those cartels we are trying to go after. Obrador is completely unaware that his lack of intention to go after the cartels is going to only further the dangers to his own people.
I would put forth that when the Ovidio Guzman situation developed so quickly, Obrador got scared really fast suddenly realizing that the position he had campaigned for came with larger issues than he realized. He is acting like someone that was beaten badly in a certain neighborhood once and so would rather take the long detour than to ever enter that neighborhood again.
Obrador, who ran and won in 2018 on the Morena ticket, has been constantly shown the intricacies of leadership he obviously was never prepared for. The Movimiento Regeneracion Nacional (National Regeneration Movement), or MORENA is a an anti-neoliberal and populist party. The party, founded by Obrador, is primarily a group focused on the acceptance of different lifestyles and focuses on issues such as expanding diversity.
The demeanor of the group seems wildly different from that of the cartels who have begun to move larger shipments of fentanyl into the United States, have partnered with the Chinese for product supplies and manufacturing support, have been amassing greater amounts of weapons and funds and have begin human testing to develop new types of stronger fentanyl while feeding those who cross them to tigers!
While denying that fentanyl is made in Mexico, Obrador has repeatedly acknowledged finding dozens of labs where fentanyl is produced in Mexico and with Chinese precursor chemicals, mainly in the northern state of Sinaloa.
So why the double talk? Has president Obrador finally reached the point that he would rather threaten the United States than take a strong stand in his own country against cartels that may be stronger than the government itself? What does this say for the future of Mexico? What does this mean for the future of our Homeland Security and Border Patrol endeavors when by our own admission, we are not in control of the border at present?
Several weeks ago I wrote on the issue of designating cartels as terrorist organizations and at the same time, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador rebuked calls from some U.S. lawmakers advocating military action in Mexico against drug cartels, describing the proposals as threats to Mexican sovereignty. While the calls were offers to add our strength to Obrador’s fight, it became obvious that Obrador really was not in a fight but rather ignoring the scope of the problems in his own backyard.
“We are not going to permit any foreign government to intervene in our territory, much less that a government’s armed forces intervene,” Lopez Obrador said during a regular news conference. “In addition to being irresponsible, it is an offense to the people of Mexico,” López Obrador said adding that Mexico “does not take orders from anyone.” Except Obrador has already proven that Mexico does indeed take orders.
In March of 2022, Obrador announced that he would consider a request by convicted drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman to return from the United States to complete his sentence on humanitarian grounds. The message from El Chapo was described as an "SOS" by one of his attorneys. The Sinaloa cartel founder has appealed to President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador for help due to alleged "psychological torment" that Guzman says he is suffering in a U.S. prison.
A recent deadly cartel kidnapping of a group of US citizens who had crossed into northern Mexico also has sparked a push for the US military to intervene to address drug gang-related violence in Mexico.
It is obvious that Obrador has become delusional denying that fentanyl is coming from Mexico, is made in Mexico or even used in Mexico.
“Here, we do not produce fentanyl, and we do not have consumption of fentanyl”.
Mexico’s drug cartels have turned fentanyl production into one of their biggest moneymakers. A 2021 raid by the Mexican army on a lab in Culiacan, the capital of Mexico’s Sinaloa state, revealed an operation producing tens of millions of fentanyl pills monthly for the Sinaloa cartel.
Sinaloa, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, and other cartel groups have been flooding the border with shipments of fentanyl. Last year, the Drug Enforcement Administration seized more than 379 million doses of fentanyl, but it’s clear that a sizable portion of what the cartels smuggle makes it over the border and into U.S. cities and towns.
Perhaps López Obrador’s lies are a way of deflecting attention from the failure of his “hugs, not bullets” approach toward combating the cartels. After his election in 2018, López Obrador promised Mexicans that he could eradicate the cartels by eradicating poverty. He put in place a series of social programs aimed at lifting up his country’s impoverished masses, with the hope of wiping out the root causes of cartel violence.
The policy hasn’t worked at all, and the cartels have flourished largely unchecked. Every year, cartel violence claims the lives of thousands of Mexicans, many of them students, politicians and journalists. Under López Obrador, Mexico’s murder rate remains at near-record levels. The number of cartel drug labs under López Obrador has also soared.
President Obrador could accomplish a few things before the end of his term if he would quit screwing around and took off the kid gloves and blinders. Mexico is not beyond help, but it is getting closer and as the cartels “own” more and more the country and grow increasingly stronger, there is only one outcome and that will be the need for the United States military to assemble when Mexico is no longer Mexico.
It is not far-fetched to imagine the country to our south split into three or four smaller warring faction countries all with their eyes on our border and a nation of consumers. With Chinese partnerships in place already, anything is possible, isn't it?
Comments