Zetas headed to the white market

On a few occasions I have been invited to talk about the evolution of the Zetas, from elite bodyguards for Osiel Cardenas to a powerful criminal organization in their own right.

Two men now control the Zetas, Miguel Triveño, and Heriberto Lazcano.

Lazcano is the undisputed head of the Zetas and known to keep a cool head and think strategically. Triveño is more like a traditional Mexican drug lord with his ostrich skin boots, big cowboy hat, gilded pistol, and country-time apparel. Both men will kill on a moment's notice, but between the two, I believe that Lazcano has a mind for business and a long-term strategy for his visions of what the Zetas are today and what they are evolving into for tomorrow.

He doesn't want to go out like his former boss Osiel, who was extradited to the United States, never to be heard from again. And he certainly doesn't need to go down like one of his captains, El Hummer, who was found unguarded in a house in Reynosa.

My argument has focused on the idea that the Zetas are moving out of the black market, into gray and while market activities. From traditional drug and human trafficking and kidnapping and extortion, the Zetas have moved into the gray market of protection. I believe that Lazcano's men will offer protection to anyone who is willing to pay for it - from criminals who work for the Beltran-Leyva or Carrillo Fuentes organizations, to well positioned businessmen. In both cases, the client needs protection from other criminals, the police, and everyone in between.

And the Zetas have long demonstrated that this protection is something that they do best.

On 6 December 2009, a Dallas Morning News article further backed up my argument for the Zetas movement into the white, or legal, side of business in Mexico and abroad. The Gulf Cartel, and the Zetas by extension, have always invested in small businesses, which help launder money. But this article takes this consideration a slight step farther, and I think their sources are right.

Here's an excerpt:

"Aside from money laundering, the Zetas are seeking legitimacy from those they have terrorized over the years…Investigators and civic leaders say the Zetas are trying to position themselves to become movers and shakers, even political players, in communities where they have a major presence."

At the head of this strategy is "La Compania" - a term the Zetas started using for themselves in mid-2009 (maybe sooner) to differentiate less violent activities from the criminal branding already well established by the Zetas brand.

Looking ahead, I would not be surprised to see clean cut, respectable looking businessmen working for the Zetas as the group moves from looking and acting like Triveño and more like Lazcano.

And if law enforcement is worried now, they've got a lot to consider looking toward a future where a group as sophisticated, organized, and ruthless as Los Zetas goes from hiring bullet slinging thugs to clean-cut business mans. The evolution will be slowly and difficult to detect, but I think it's already underway with a long road to go yet.

Juarez could be the most violent city in the world

Mexico's Citizen Council for Public Security and Justice has issued a report just ahead of today's presidential address in Mexico (Calderon's version of the State of the Union) that underlines insecurity in Ciudad de Juarez, Mexico.

Juarez, according to the report, is more dangerous than Caracas, Cape Town, Baghdad, and Medellin.

August killings reached 300, surpassing a record set in July, with 267.

In 2008, a homicide rate of 130 killings for every 100,000 inhabitants was recorded, and Juarez accounted for nearly half the killings in Mexico in 2008.

So far this year, a total of 1,481 murders have been recorded, compared to a total of 1,623 murders for all of 2008. There were only 320 murders in 2007...

From the Dallas Morning News:

A poll published Tuesday in Mexico City's Reforma newspaper seems to indicate continuing support for his policy.

The poll showed that 37 percent of Mexicans believe the government is winning the battle against organized crime and that 20 percent do not. Moreover, 82 percent said they approve of the use of the military against drug traffickers, although 49 percent said they believe the military is involved in human rights violations.

The nationwide poll of 1,500 people had a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.

Ye Gon is Exhonerated in US Federal Court

Zhenli Ye Gon, the Chinese-Mexican who was arrested in Maryland in late 2007 on charges of "selling 500 grams or more" of methamphetamine in the United States, is one step closer to freedom.

On 28 August, a federal court judge dropped the drug trafficking charges, claiming there was not enough evidence to prosecute the case.

One affidavit filed with a US Disctrict Court claimed that Ye Gon had imported some 87 tons of restricted chemicals into Mexico "for the express purpose of manufacturing pseudoephedrine/ephedrine" - the precursor chemicals for methamphetamine.

In October, 2008, as federal prosecutors worked to gather evidence, they warned the judge that they "were having difficulties" gathering needed evidence from other governments (such as Mexico).

Ye Gon was the owner of a house discovered in March 2007 by the Drug Enforcement Administration and Mexican Federal Police where they found US$207 million dollars stacked like bricks in the house. At the time, the DEA noted that it was the organization's largest cash bust in history.

Further investigation revealed that Ye Gon had actually accumulated US$305 million in pseudoephedrine sales.

Ye Gon must now fight his extradition to Mexico, where he will face justice for money laundering and organized crime.

Zetas in Belize and Texas

A contact in Mexico told me this morning that according to his 2008 research, 67 "operational Zeta bases" were located on the Mexican border with Belize.

He went back in April 2009, and counted 78 operational bases that "specialized in criminal activity".

The border between Mexico and Belize is an underreported transit zone, one more likely to be used as the Guatemalan military works with the Mexicans to seal Guatemala's northern border in the Peten department (more on the Peten here, here and here).

Moving to Texas, a San Antonio paper reported today that the FBI is circulating to local and state authorities a report that gives a vague reference to the presence of a Zetas cell in Texas, complete with a ranch, inside Texas, where Zetas train others in the art of kidnapping, such as how to run a car off the road to kidnap the driver and/or passengers, surveillance, small groups tactics, etc.

The Zetas continue to evolve, and may even have become something of a criminal brand. It will be interesting to see how this news in Texas pans out.

We already know what will happen (or already has happened) in Belize - a new transshipment route from the Caribbean into southern Mexico...

Honduras: "En route to a failed state"

Friends with NARBPO sent over a translated piece of an interesting editorial out of Honduras. The title "En route to a failed state" indicates, at least, that some people in Honduras are looking at a bleak future.

I would aruge that these spikes in violence are a combination of an ongoing street gang problem and spillover from Mexico.

Here's the translation El Heraldo (5/14/09):

The slaughter of seven workers Tuesday in the town of Arizona (no connection with state of Arizona in the U.S.) , Department (read : state) of Atlantida, on the same day that various more persons were assassinated in different events in the country, is a bloody indication of the increase in criminality to levels never before seen. One day before, on Monday, four policemen lost their lives, two in Olancho and two in Tegucigalpa, which once again manifests that insecurity affects everyone equally, even law enforcement agents. It’s unacceptable that every time more and more Hondurans of all social classes are victims of assassinations, extortions, robberies and all type of criminal acts and that the immense majority of the cases remain an absolute mystery and go unpunished. If the political and administrative chaos continues and nothing is done to combat organized crime, which each time carries out more daring activities, we shall go from being a poor and underdeveloped nation to being a failed state.

That .50 cal anti-aircraft weapon

I just came across an article here, that breaks down some of the curious details surrounding the seizure of a anti-aircraft machine gun found mounted in the bed of a pick up truck.

Here's the more relevant section:

One of the most worrisome weapons yet was seized this week just south of Nogales, Ariz.: a powerful gun mounted on the back of an SUV and protected by a thick metal shield. Police said it belonged to one of the Beltran Leyva drug gangs.

Mexican and U.S. authorities disagree on just what type of gun it was. Federal police coordinator Gen. Rodolfo Cruz maintains it was .50-caliber anti-air craft machine gun. ATF, the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said it was an unmodified .50-caliber semiautomatic rifle made by TNW, a U.S. firearms manufacturer.

ATF investigators traced the gun - along with seven others seized at a house in Sonora state on Monday - to suppliers in the United States, said Bill Newell, special agent in charge of the ATF in Arizona and New Mexico.

While crudely built, the truck-mounted rifle would give traffickers a powerful advantage against lightly armed police, Newell said: A gunman could protect a whole convoy with sweeping fire while protected by the metal shield.

"Imagine being a two- or three-man police team at a rural checkpoint and these guys roll up with this thing," Newell said. "You'd be slightly intimidated, wouldn't you?"

Why doesn't anyone worry about Guatemala?

I don't spend much time reading the Guatemala Times, but I have to admit, they did a great job on making a list of interesting and perhaps important events related to the country's on going security crisis. You can find it here.

Here's more:

The Southern Pulse network (now with its database and new website finally in beta testing) has learned that one in four immigrants crossing from Guatemala to Mexico are stopped, detained, and deported. Simply put, the Mexico/Guatemala border is less patrolled and much, much less secure that the US/Mexico border.

Couple that fact with the fact that Ecuador, Nicaragua, and now Honduras have all relaxed visa requirements for a number of countries, including China, Iran, and Russia (see? some diplomacy has paid off for these international "bad boys"), and you've got basically an open sieve into Mexico from just about every sketchy country in the world...

Enter Alvaro Colom, the embattled president of Guatemala (pictured above, thanks Guat. Times).

He's a chain smoker, runs around with a 12-man security detail, and recently dealt with a scandal that blew up when he discovered that his chief of intelligence had bugged his bedroom, living room, and office - only to turn around and sell the intel to Mexican organized crime. Alvaro Colom's political party is littered with old school organized criminal elements who are in bed with Mexican organized crime, and his police are just as corrupt as the guys in Mexico.

More detail here and here.

Now, consider Colom's limited budget, limited number of trusted personnel, and double-dish security issues with both organized criminals and street gangsters running amock.

What will happen if Calderon manages to put too much heat on the DTOs in Mexico?

As we've already seen, there is a clear and well documented spillover, and not north but south. Guatemala is today a serious issue, and if there is any state in the Americas that is close to failure, it is Guatemala, not Mexico. Why doesn't the US government see this?

Why doesn't mainstream media talk about it? Probably because its too far away from US borders. The truth is, however, that if Guatemala becomes a failed state, both Mexico and the US will suffer. I sincerely hope it does not come to that.

Pen and Pad with Napolitano

In a recent pen and pad secession with DHS Chief Janet Napolitano, a journalist asked a very good question:

Is that part of the problem, Madam Secretary, that the Mexico portfolio, you know, touches on so many agencies? Is the Administration at all thinking about housing them all, you know, particularly, you know, security, so that it’s not State and Department of Justice and Homeland Security but sort of creating a Mexico Security Czar?

This is entirely true. We have the DHS coming in with CBP and ICE. There is the DOJ with the DEA, the FBI, and the ATF. There is the DOS, which runs the Merida Initiative, and there is the White House - where an number of Obama-backed initiatives are born and passed along to others to implement.

Her answer:

You know, I don’t know about that. I mean a lot of the issues I deal with involve many agencies. I mean that’s just the problems of today don’t really match up with government, you know, organizations of — that we have in a way. They — they — and so one of my tasks is to be able to work with my colleagues on the Cabinet, with the White House, and with others and to recognize, you know, there are things Homeland Security will be doing, there are things that are going to impact the Department of State, impact DOJ and so forth, and that’s — that’s — you know, that — that’s the effort that’s going on now, is to make sure that we all know what each other is doing and are speaking with a consistent voice.

But — but if I had to sum up where we are, it’s that this issue’s getting top attention in multiple departments of the U.S., that planning is well underway and that we are having extensive discussions with our federal colleagues within Mexico and it is really focused on assisting the Mexican Government with their fight against the cartels. One facet of that assistance is looking at what we can do to stop cash and guns, and you guys didn’t ask me about cash which is kind of interesting, from going south.

One aspect of it is supporting our state and local law enforcement along the border and being ever prepared to respond with more resources should we see spill-over violence in the way I described it to you occurring...

I don't think a Mexican Drug Czar is the answer, but we can certainly make sure that the lines separating different agencies stay in place.

Operation Armas Cruzadas, the anti-gun smuggling program operated by ICE, is a good example. ICE agents are not arms experts. They are not well equipped to build a solid case against errant arms dealers, and they don't have the local knowledge (in places like Arizona and Texas) where most arms are legally purchased before slipping into the gray market.

With the exception of the X Caliber case (see below post), which was a fluke, the ATF has long demonstrated expertise when combatting gun smuggling. When ICE comes in with its own arms smuggling operation, it muddies the waters, creates conflict on the ground among agents, and further complicates the mission. This is just one example. Moving forward, I would argue that the one item that will most quickly deep six our efforts to control the border, to stop arms and cash from moving south, and to stop drugs from coming north, will be our inability to manage one large communications nightmare between so many agencies.

What was lost with Reyes' Death - one year ago

Colombia's weekly news magazine, La Semana, recently published an interesting and insightful piece about the five things the FARC lost with Raul Reyes' death.

At the time of his death, one year ago on 1 March, 2008, Reyes was considered the FARC's number two leader; he commanded a considerable amount of respect around the world as a moderate, well spoken, and deeply committed member of the FARC's leadership council.

What was lost:

1. The FARC lost Reyes' international contacts. Reyes was close with a number of older members of Germany's Stasi - secret police from the Communist days in Eastern Germany. Through many of these contacts, Reyes was able to procure arms through the black market.

He was also the FARC's spokesman with many international organizations, and was responsible for rallying international support for the FARC's position when it came to negotiating with the Colombian government.

2. Many of the organizations that kept in touch with the FARC through Reyes were exposed when the Colombian government reviewed files recovered from his computer. These groups were subsequently forced to retreat from their supportive role, further isolating the FARC on the international stage, especially in Europe.

3. Also through a thorough review of Reyes' files, the Colombian government learned how the FARC communicated on both a domestic and international level. The guerrilla organization's communications protocols, what the leaders knew, and what the leaders didn't know was also disclosed. Without this knowledge, the deception used to rescue Ingrid Betancourt and the US captives, among others, would not have been possible.

4. The information on Reyes' computer also alerted the Colombian diplomatic corps to the linkages between the FARC and a long list of illegal organizations around the world. With these proven ties, Colombia's international efforts to stymie the FARC's support within illegal realms, especially the black market, have received a boost.

5. Colombia attacked Reyes in a FARC camp located within Ecuador, disrespecting that country's sovereignty while maintaining that if the Ecuadorians had been in on the operation, then the FARC would have found out. Colombia's relations with Ecuador have been severely damaged well into the future with a poor prognosis for any improvement, at least during Correa's mandate.

One year after Reyes' death, on 1 March, 2009, we still find two Andean countries with no diplomatic ties. But the FARC has been forever crippled.

If you ask Uribe if it was worth it, he would not hesitate to tell you yes.

Guinea Bissau: President Assassinated

Mexico's El Universal reported (from an EFE news clip) this morning that the president of Guinea Bissau was assassinated in an explosion on 1 March.

Guinea Bissau is a western African nation long plagued by the drug trade, corruption, and civil unrest. It's difficult to pin down a specific actor in this assassination. But it's nearly certain that the country will now become - more than ever - an ideal spot for moving drugs from South America into Europe.

More on Guinea Bissau's role as a transit nation here.

Juarez: Calderon's Big Bet

According to the Mexican government, nearly 8,000 soldiers will take on at least three mexican DTOs fighting for control of Juarez: Sinaloa, La Familia, and the Juarez Cartel.

As of this blog post, some 800 have already arrived, and the rest are on the way.

What a way to begin March: a month that could possibly be the bloodiest we've seen on record for Juarez.

This border city has registered the highest number of so-called "narco-executions" in the country, with 2,750 in the past 14 months.

Nearly 8,000 soldiers will be used to not only secure one city, but completely remove all presence of any drug trafficking organization from Juarez, said president Calderon. That's a big bet.

This is the first time he's poured this size of a force into one city. As we watch the fall out, I think it will be interesting to consider the outcome if Calderon does not succeed.

Borrowed from the idea of a failed state, the idea of a failed city could be one that has descended into anarchy, where most law abiding citizens leave, and those that remain are willing to work within a new system, full of criminals, vigilante gangs, the wretched, and run by one drug overlord.

This is a worst-case scenario. Best-case: Juarez becomes a city where the Mexican government tried and failed to exercise sovereignty within its own territory.

Unfortunately, the path to either conclusion above, or one where Calderon's bet pays off, and Juarez becomes a peaceful place, is one littered with bodies.

At some point, someone has to win. If it's not Calderon, then one DTO will have to triumph over the rest. And it's hard to see how three or more of these groups could come to some sort of time-share scheme for the plaza, or some sort of compromise. There's simply too much money at stake, and the nature of Mexican organized crime is that alliances never last as long as conflict.

If the Mexican military cannot save Juarez, we will watch as the various DTOs, vying for control, slowly and steadily rip the city apart, along the way rendering it ungovernable, insecure, and ultimately a black hole of death and violence just south of the US border.

Calderon has thrown down the gauntlet, making Juarez the new focus of his own personal War on Drugs.

On one hand, it is a very risky maneuver. And if he loses, he loses big. Mexican organized crime will have won one of the biggest battles to date in the war Calderon has waged since he entered office.

On the other hand, he's knocking on Obama's back door with the realities of violence in Mexico.

Calderon knows that bloodshed on the border will be a headline story for mainstream media in the US.

I can already see Lou Dobbs, Chris Matthews, Glenn Beck, O'Reily, and others invite a cadre of "experts" who will all weigh on on Calderon's big bet, and who will either admonish or support Obama for not getting more involved.

Calderon has repeatedly asked Washington for help. To date, his requests have been answered with some small results: the Merida Iniative, Project Reckoning, and Operation Xcellerator, to name a few. Obama is also slowly moving towards banning assault rifles again.

But even when we put all this together, it still is not enough.

How many more bodies will have to pile up before Washington realizes that Mexico can't do it alone? Calderon is determined to win, but if he loses, Obama will have no choice but to get involved and make bets of his own.

Operation Xcellerator

Yesterday, the Drug Enforcement Administration (not Agency as many like to put it), released the results of Operation Xcellerator (photos here).

I'll quote their press release:

"To date, Operation Xcellerator has led to the arrest of 755 individuals and the seizure of approximately $59.1 million in U.S. currency, more than 12,000 kilograms of cocaine, more than 16,000 pounds of marijuana, more than 1,200 pounds of methamphetamine, more than 8 kilograms of heroin, approximately 1.3 million pills of Ecstasy, more than $6.5 million in other assets, 149 vehicles, 3 aircraft, 3 maritime vessels and 169 weapons."

I'd say that's major news.

On the heels of Project Reckoning, which focused on the Gulf Cartel, this operation seems to have delivered a gut shot to the Sinaloa DTO.

It's a given that most of the 755 arrests were mid- to low-level operatives. But they are a functioning part of a much larger machine, one that cannot run smoothly without even the smallest cog.

Here is some information on what was not reported.

Two reactions to this news:

First, the renown of the intelligence networks operated by Mexican DTOs has been somewhat dissipated - at least when they operate on the US side of the border. In Mexico, these guys can buy off just about anyone, and set up a pipeline of information that extends all the way to the top levels of state and municipal government - even federal government in some cases.

This level of corruption is simply not going to happen inside the United States.

The Mexican DTOs have a well funded and deeply entrenched network of lookouts, informants, and others who work within their own capacity to provide information, but the high number of arrests in Xcellerator suggests that the operation maintained integrity until boots started kicking in doors.

Second, we've gotten a glimpse, and only a glimpse, of the extent to which Mexico's DTOs have stretched their operations across the United States. This is not just a border state phenomenon. We have seen in Texas and in Arizona where there has been violence directly related to Mexican DTOs, and it's spreading.

I talked here (paragraph 5) about when five Mexicans where found dead in their apartment outside of Birmingham, Alabama. And in another case, a man was abducted and tortured until police came to the rescue in Atlanta. He owed Los Zetas money - never an ideal debtor.

Here is a map of all the places - towns, cities, hamlets, etc - that have reported a Mexican DTO presence.

For better or for worse, Mexican immigrants are working and living in just about every state. Most of these people are hard working and give a necessary contribution to their community, even if they syphon some of the "commons".

But as we get a glimpse of Mexican DTO activity in the United States, and especially as Washington begins to absorb this reality (and they take a very long time on The Hill), we will see the merging of two formerly separate worlds: immigration policy and drug trafficking interdiction.

Where and when the two will meet is largely up to Janet Napolitano, her staff, the president, and Congress.

Until then, I'm sure we will continue to see more shining examples of the DEA's exemplary work in the field of interdiction - but while necessary, interdiction is less than half the battle...

Iron River (partially) Disrupted

Phoenix-based gun dealer George Iknadosian, will soon go on trial to defend allegations that he sold hundreds of weapons - mostly AK-47 - to Mexico's Sinaloa Cartel.

The complete NYT story is here.

I also prepared a piece some time ago, here.

I have various reactions to this news. First, this guy was not the Sinaloa cartel's only source of armament, but considering how fast this group goes through bullets and weapons, I must wonder how US efforts to break up gun smuggling networks will affect the battles raging between Mexico's DTOs.

Inside the US, the ATF and other investigative bodies do not target gun smugglers based on their cartel faction. They follow a lead, gather evidence, build their case, and present it to the US attorney's office before gathering arrest warrants and such.

But as this process picks up speed, and I know it will under this administration, it will be interesting to see how a constricted illegal gun flow to Mexico affects the DTOs operational readiness to defend turf and/or go on the offensive.

I'm no military man, but it seems logical that if you're lacking in bullets and guns, you're going to defend, not attack. And lately it has been a number of offensive strategies that have kept the murder numbers high - Mexico already broke 1,000 murders for 2009 by the way.

A second thought has to do with the Mexican military. Will this supposedly incorruptible force become more compromised over time as the DTOs focus their bribery power on the men and women who control the army's arm supplies?

We already know that the Mexican army faces a serious desertion rate, and those who leave the army and join the DTOs are in a perfect position to engage their friends who are still in the army with cash and requests for help with raiding arms depots. We'll see if that happens.

A final thought - and this is more related to my next blog post - the trial of Iknadosian will reveal just how organized and well greased these smuggling systems are. US citizens still do not appreciate how effective and well organized the Mexican organized criminal factions can be. They have been in place for decades, and only until recently, they've been flying below radar. This fact alone explains why there are so many mid- to low-level DTOs operatives in place in all 50 states. Some of them smuggle guns, but most of them work on the other side of this market - bringing products into the US and distributing them to a neighborhood near you.

More Coke to EU

Poland's Internal Security Agency confiscated a ton of coke late last week. Along with EU organized criminal groups, members of an unnamed Colombian drug trafficking organization were also arrested.

Poland has been used as yet another gateway into Europe from Colombia and Venezuela. Apart from Project Reckoning, implemented by the DEA, I haven't seen any significant arrests of Latinos inside the EU over the past few years until today, and they're bummed.

Moving a ton of coke from Colombia to Poland is serious work - logistics, money, heavy lifting, and bribes. Money lost is not as valuable as time for these guys.

If the old rule stands - that the amount seized is roughly one third of the actual flow - then Poland is a serious player in the Colombia-EU coke trade.

Nicaragua's Vulnerability

On 1 February, Mexico's El Universal published a piece on the Sinaloa drug trafficking organization's presence on Nicaragua's Pacific coast.

According to the piece, the Sinaloa DTO has been present in Nicaragua since 2003. I'm not surprised to see this news: we've long known that DTOs are crawling around Central America.

What makes this news more interesting, however, is Nicaragua's demographical distribution. Most of the country's population is concentrated on the Pacific side. Truth be told, only a small amount of the country is actually patrolled and controlled by the government, seated in Managua.

There is a thin strip of population on Nicaragua's Caribbean coast, but if you've ever been to Bluefields, you'd note that most people there identify themselves more with Jamaica than with Managua.

And to the north, where Indian tribes rule, there is little to no connection with Managua, other than the occasional armed altercation between Nicaraguan police and the coastal Indians, armed to the teeth.

The vast expanse between Managua and the country's easter coast is a no man's land, especially to the north, where Nicaragua borders with Honduras.

The news in Mexico claims that DTOs are once again focused on Nicaragua's Pacific coast, but I agree with others, who claim the middle of the country is much more vulnerable.

Border Surge and Unintended Consequences in Spain

A colleague of mine who writes for Latin American Thought recently sent over an interesting article from El Espectador, a Colombian print weekly.

The article outlines how Colombian organized crime has installed itself inside Spain.

Citing the recent murder of a Sr. Leonidas Vargas, killed while resting in a hospital bed in Madrid, the author pointed out that in the past the assassin would have been sent from Colombia - most certainly on his way home before the Spanish authorities could respond to the crime. Today, however, the assassin probably didn't even leave Madrid, asserts the author. I completely agree.

For years now, Spanish police have done away with the idea that Colombian assassins travel from Colombia to do their work in Spain. Today, these men live and work in Madrid, perfectly blending in with Madrid's business class.

The are called "debt collectors," and are sent to force their targets to pay a drug trafficking debt - often marked in dollars - with their own life.

"You pay or you die."

There is very little about this scenario that we haven't seen in Latin America. There is even little novelty of this occurrence in Spain, especially for those of us who follow the trends of Latin American drug trafficking.

But what I find interesting is how Spain may become over time a new battle ground for rival trafficking groups who seek to use the Iberian peninsula as a spring board into the rest of Europe.

Until now, we haven't seen blood shed between the Colombian and Mexican drug trafficking organizations (DTOs). There is a business agreement in place, one forged many years ago. But this agreement considers only the movement of product into the United States. When the EU is under consideration, all bets are off.

Spain becomes a more important transit country when we consider Venezuela's role in moving bulk quantities of cocaine from Colombia to Europe, as much of it flows through Spain.

Spain is a stopping point on the drug route from Western Africa into the EU, and places such as Guinea-Bissau and Senagal, which have become reception points for drugs flowing out of Brazil and Argentina.

Finally, if all the talk of a "border surge" turns into reality, then we will see Spain, again, become a hot transit zone.

The Colombians are already in place. And I recently read that street gangs such as the Mara Salvatrucha are heavily networked throughout Spanish cities. What, then, will happen once the Mexicans come into town?

A spike of violence in Spain on the heels of any border surge, I think, would be the text book definition of unintended consequences.

An Opening for Obama to Engage Brazil

The new administration will seek to engage Brazil in an unprecedented way. This is one of the strongest conclusions made by nearly everyone I spoke with while preparing a recently published piece on Obama’s plans for Latin America.

The specifics of how, when, where, etc are yet to come. As many have already noted, there is a (long) short list of people on deck to take over for Tom Shannon. And Cuba will certainly be the first LatAm country to receive some long overdue attention, setting the tone for the Obama administration’s efforts south of the border.

But when it comes to Brazil, there are few in DC who can put their finger on exactly how the US can answer Brazil’s biggest question: so what? So what if you want to work with us, the Brazilians might say to Obama’s team. What’s in it for us?

From Brazil’s point of view, the US is not a free trader. Brazil has perennially confronted – and defeated over a cotton subsidies issue – the US at the WTO. Sugar and ethanol subsidies further exacerbate trade challenges, and to date there has been little to no support from the US on any matters concerning Brazil’s desire to become a player on the UN Security Council (never mind it’s one of the most defunct multilateral forums in existence today).

But let’s say that whoever replaces Tom Shannon has a keen ability to break through to Lula’s people, winning over the especially skeptical Celso Amorim, Brazil’s Foreign Minister and a strong advisor to the president. Then what?

What can Obama possibly offer that doesn’t have to go through Congress or be subjected to the geopolitical strategies of other UN Security Council members? The most clear answer is to support Brazil’s efforts to combat South America’s drug trade.

In a recently released policy paper on Brazil’s new national defense posture, the Brazilian military announced that it will begin shifting its focus from the southern borders to the Amazon basin, specifically to its borders with Bolivia, Peru, and Colombia. To date, the “Cobra” operation, run by Brazil’s Federal Police to patrol the Colombia-Brazil border, has met limited success, largely due to inadequate resources.

With the military high command united behind securing Brazil’s most porous borders, Brazil is in a position to provide support in material and man power to her neighbors that have the desire but not the ability to stop drugs flowing from their countries to flourishing markets in the US and Europe.

And I was waiting for the news to come out. I knew it was a matter of time before Lula would make public his first offer of assistance to combat drug trafficking in the region. It happened on 15 January in a small border town between Brazil and Bolivia, where an international road that connects the Atlantic to the Pacific will be finalized later this year (and the Chinese are happy about that).

Lula said, “he would grant Morales’ request for helicopters and other logistics support to patrol the porous frontier that is a major cocaine-trafficking route from the Andes…”

And this is where Obama’s people – and the Drug Enforcement Administration – should tread carefully. Lula is reaching out in an unprecedented way to assist Bolivia with an international challenge that Brazil now realizes is in its national best interests to combat.

The State Department under Clinton and the DEA should recognize Brazil’s political abilities in the region, and follow her lead. If Obama wants to appease Brazil, the best way is to whole heartedly support the region’s true leader – one with the ability to influence both Colombia and Bolivia (and Venezuela).

With enough support, Brazil could be encouraged to assist Peru, Colombia, and Venezuela with the region’s drug trafficking challenge. The US need not be the region’s policeman when a capable and ready Brazil is in place. It would be folly to try and force a reversal to the days when the US’ agents crawled all over the place poking around behind the backs of local police.

Finally, two caveats: I do not want to down play the DEA's important role in the region, but it is important the DEA remains a team player, as hard as it is sometimes due to concerns over corruption and operational integrity.

And second, I do not wish to promote the use of the military to do police work. The Brazilian Federal Police should take the lead on combating drug trafficking in the region. But I must recognize that in Latin America security sector reform is more of a dream than a reality. And the reality now is that if Brazil’s military will step forward to assist Bolivia and stop the cocaine and coca paste leaking out of that country and through Brazil into Europe and the US, we – and Obama – should welcome that initiative and do what we can to support it.

Thankfully, Lula has committed the Brazilian military before Obama’s team could come in and make that suggestion, which would have been a mistake and bad start considering Brazil’s sensitivities over issues of sovereignty – like what its military does and does not do.

With this announcement in place, the Obama administration has a clear hand to play. Let’s hope they do.

Inside Los Zetas

On the last day of 2008, Mexico’s El Universal paper published an interesting summary entitled “Los Zetas” por dentro. Its author had obtained a document prepared by the Mexican PGR (Attorney General), based on interviews conducted with former members of Los Zetas. As someone who has followed this group for some time, I was pleased to learn something new.

Many understand that the Los Zetas is a well organized drug trafficking organization, formed by members of a group of Mexican soldiers who deserted their unit, known as the Grupo Aeromóvil de Fuerzas Especiales (GAFES).

The GAFES deserters, totaling around 40 men, stuck together and offered their services to the Gulf Cartel, and Osiel Cárdenas, specifically. But once he was extradited around two years ago today, Heriberto Lazcano, aka El Lazca, took absolute control of Los Zetas. The group slowly but surely took complete command and control over all of the drug trafficking corridors formerly operated by the Gulf Cartel, primarily the plazas from Nuevo Laredo to Matamoros, across the border from Brownsville, Tx in the lower Rio Grande Valley.

When El Lazca took over the Gulf Cartel’s operations, Mexico experienced a cascading moment in the country’s drug trade. For the first time in Mexican history, we had a military unit operating like a drug trafficking organization (DTO). In Mexico, it’s normally the other way around.

And based on what we know from Colombian history, when you have a disciplined military unit operating as a DTO, it’s very hard to dislodge entrenched soldiers. The Zetas differ in one very important aspect: they are willing to take the Mexican military head on – and so far, the Mexican military has, at best, disrupted only a fraction of the group’s operations.

The men who stuck with El Lazco, who were part of the original Zetas, are referred to as the Zetas Viejos within the DTO. They are the men who work as commanders and operate from command/control positions in the group’s various hard points within its drug trafficking network. One very clear example is Miguel Triveño, aka El 40, who runs the Nuevo Laredo plaza – perhaps still the most lucrative drug trafficking corridor in the Americas.

El 40 and El Lazco clearly are Zetas Viejos. They are also known as Cobras Viejos, or L Viejos. Logically, the younger recruits, and next down in the line of command, are called Zetas Nuevos. These men include Mexican military deserters, former policemen, family members of Los Zetas, and – most notably – men trained within the Guatemalan Special Forces, known as Kaibiles. The Zetas Nuevos operate on the frontlines, take orders only from the Zeta Viejo commander they serve under, and act with the utmost brutality and lethal force.

These are the guys you read about when there’s a story that claims two trucks pulled up to a stopped car and unloaded a full clip into the target – overkill. Their calling card includes lots of brass bullet casings littered on the ground, kidnap and torture, decapitation, disfiguration, and in some cases very professional “double-tap” styled assassinations. In this regard, they differ little from the enforces who work for La Familia, the Beltran Leyva brothers, or the Tijuana Cartel.

But where the Zetas differ, I think, is again with the military order that reigns throughout the organization and the crisp, clean nature of many of the group’s operations. There are documented cases of paramilitary training for new Zetas, especially those with little to no military experience. Training camps dot the landscape in Tamaulipas and Nuevo Leon, hidden within large acre ranches.

The Cobras Nuevos, or L Nuevos, form the next level down the chain of command. These are the men who serve the Zetas Viejos directly as bodyguards. When the Zetas Viejos travel, they take a trusted contingent of gunslingers, and those men are the Cobras Nuevos. According to the PGR, sometimes Zetas Nuevos join them as the drivers to back up the Cobra Nuevos. They are all armed with one long barrel rifle, likely automatic, and a sidearm.

The next level down is where we get into the Zetas’ money laundering and business operations. A nation-wide network of men are in place with the sole purpose of covering up all the illicit business operated by members of Los Zetas. It’s not clear in the article, but it makes sense to consider that each Zeta Viejo operates his own group of business owners and accountants. Within the Zetas DTO, the members of this group are appropriately referred to as productividad.

The lowest members within the Zetas DTO chain of command are called halcones. These men serve as the eyes and the ears of Los Zetas wherever they may be. I’ve read stories that recount how in states like Tamaulipas, where Los Zetas have complete control, the halcones stand on overpasses that cross major highways just to take note of the traffic flowing in and out of town. These men likely work in business, politics, at bars, at hospitals, anywhere, and everywhere. These men are likely part of the Mexican “blue collar” infrastructure that keeps the country running. Makes me think of the movie The Fight Club – these guys are everywhere.

In addition to potentially thousands of halcones and members of the productividad who operate both in Mexico and in the United States, we can’t forget that the Zetas Viejos have any number of police commanders, politicians, high-level businessmen, judges, lawyers, military soldiers and mid- to high-level commanders, etc. on the payroll.

All that information funnels through the Zeta intelligence network, and is likely the principle reason why no man who betrays this group is safe in Mexico or the United States, or anywhere really. It’s very much like when Pablo Esobar in Colombia would send his assassinations to kill people who tried to flee from him in Spain, Russia, or even Turkey.

The Zetas’ counter intelligence organization has no peer in the Americas, and it begins with the halcones. Like most intelligence organizations, gathering information is easy, shifting through it to make sense of what’s important and what’s not is where the work gets tricky.

Obviously, this network is not without faults. A high-level Zeta leader has already been captured this year. Miguel Angel Soto Parra, who oversaw Zeta activities in central Mexico, is now in custody. He will likely join some of his other Zeta Viejo buddies caught last year, and join the list of those to be extradited to the US.

The bottom line, however, is that the Zetas is a well trained, well informed, and absurdly rich organization that will take more than the Mexican military to bring down. We tend to focus on just the top members, but when you consider all the levels within the organization that I’ve described above, the whole Zeta DTO expands into a massive criminal organization that likely employs thousands in a country where finding a legitimate job is very difficult, if not next to impossible in today’s economic climate.

It will be very interesting to watch how Mexico’s organized criminal map unfolds in 2009. I’ll make one safe prediction: Los Zetas will still be around in 2010, and quite possibly beyond Calderon and Obama’s respective administrations.

What if Mexico's Military Doesn't Win?

For over 500 days, Mexican President Felipe Calderon has used his military to combat organized crime across the country, specifically in Tijuana, Juarez and the states of Michoacan, Sinaloa, and Tamaulipas. But the body count suggests his measures have incurred more trouble than solution.

For the past 16 months, Mexico has registered 3,600 deaths - 225 a month, or an average of 7.5 a day - related to organize crime, according to Mexican daily La Cronica. In some pockets of Mexico, such as Culiacan, where violence has spiked in recent weeks, some quietly wonder what will happen if the military cannot control what is clearly the country’s top national security threat.

Mexico’s National Security Council met in Culiacan, Sinaloa on 13 May to discuss measures needed to diminish violence in the region. The high-level emergency meeting, including the Mexican Attorney General, head of the Mexican intelligence agency, the Secretary of Public Security, the Secretary of National Defense, and the Secretary of the Navy among others. It was organized after two weeks of extended violence in Culiacan that saw a number of policemen killed as well as members of organized crime, most notably the son of alleged leader of the Sinaloa Cartel, “El Chapo” Guzman.

According to some observers, the violence in Sinaloa may be in part due to a recent division within the Sinaloa Federation between “El Chapo” Guzman and the Beltran Leyva brothers. But what is beyond conjecture are the hardened positions taken each by the state’s police and military forces, and members of organized crime that operate in Sinaloa, a strategic state in the Mexican smuggling underworld.

During a two week span from 28 April to 12 May, a number of incidents escalated violence to the point where it has spilled over into Mexico City, causing at least one assassination that has put the whole country on edge.

On 30 April, a shootout in Culiacan left three gunmen and two local police dead. Another 13 were arrested and police seized some US$370,000 along with an unspeficied number of high-caliber rifles. The next day, Edgar Millan, head of the 27,000 strong Federal Preventive Police (PFP), held a press conference to assure the public that Calderon’s government would continue fighting.

He then boarded a plan to escort the 13 captured gunmen back to Mexico City where they were likely subjected to long hours of interrogation.

The following day, 2 May, four PFP agents were killed while patrolling a small town 15 miles outside of Culiacan. Two municipal policemen were killed along with along with two more gunmen and one unidentified male who was shot in the head. The bad guys had struck back.

By 4 May, notices started appearing around Culiacan. They came in the form of macabre messages written on coarse cloth cuts dangled from public places. Some messages were from the cops, telling the criminals to watch out. Others were from the criminals in response. And some were from one of the Beltran Leyva brothers, who claimed to be the boss in Sinaloa, a curious development. The various messages, none signed except those from Beltran Leyva, continued showing up every morning on 3, 4, and 5 May. By 6 May, local police lines were jammed with dozens of anonymous calls, most fictitious, about this or that cop who had been killed.

The next day gunmen again attacked the police, but only four were wounded. That was when the governor of Sinaloa, Jesus Aguilar Padilla, asked for a National Security Council meeting to be convened in Culiacan. But before they could meet, howver, a crowning moment of violence occurred in the early evening hours of 8 May.

Most believe it had nothing to do with the police.

Coming out of a local store, Edgar Guzman, the 22 year-old son of “El Chapo” Guzman, was attacked by an onslaught of gun fire and a discharge from at least one bazooka. He was instantly killed. The son of the Sinaloa Federation’s chief financial officer was also killed in an onslaught that left over 500 shell casings littered about the parking lot.

Now, Mexican authorities fear, there is confirmation that the Beltran Leyva brothers, formerly in association with “El Chapo” Guzman, have split from the Sinaloa Federation, marking the moment with the death of Edgar.

And to drive home the point of their strength and gut for violence, the brothers orchestrated the assassination of Edgar Milla, the head of the PFP, who was killed in Mexico City only hours after the death of the son of the alleged leader of the Sinaloa Federation. In under two days, the Beltran Leyva brothers exploded onto the Mexican organized crime scene as yet another group the Mexican government will have to dismantled before peace can be won.

It is reminiscent of when a DEA agent involved in the hunt for Pablo Escobar, the head of Colombia's infamous Medellin Cartel, lamented that killing Pablo only made way for the rise of the Cali Cartel. Now, as the Mexican army squeezes the life out of the Tijuana and Juarez Cartels, could it be that it has made room in the country’s black market for the rise of the Beltran Leyva brothers? If this is the case, then the question, “what if the military can’t stop them?,” is perhaps more appropriate than we thought.

Coca in Brazil

When satellite images revealed a small coca plantation some 150 kilometers south of Tabatinga in the Brazilian state of Amazonas on 14 March, both the Brazilian military and local members of the civil police immediately headed to intercept.

They found roughly two hectares of coca bushes and a small cocaine processing lab filled with all the necessary chemicals and other materials required to process coca leaves to coca paste and from paste to the pure powder.

According to analysts, Brazil consumes roughly 40 tons of cocaine a year, while another 40 tons annually pass through the county and on to West Africa where the shipments are downsized and carried into Europe, mostly through the work of dozens of mules.

Given the size of the two hectare plot, the bushes growing there could yield up to 12 kilos of pure cocaine, hardly enough to warrant Brazil as a source country.

The small plantation’s location was along the banks of the Javari river, south of Tabatinga, a lawless town that sits on the Brazil-Peruvian border. The location suggests cooperation between Brazilian and Peruvian elements, and confirms the use of the Javari river as a waterway used to transport cocaine from the remote jungles of the Amazon to the city of Manaus and possibly onto Belem on the coast for export, or south to Sao Paulo for distribution and local consumption.

The discovery of the plantation indicates that there are likely more, but most importantly, it confirms a long-held suspicion that coca bushes have been genetically engineered to grow at low altitudes.

According to local reports, the leaves of the coca bushes that grew along the banks of the Javari were thicker than the leaves found on bushes growing at higher altitudes in the Andes. Some point to the leaves’ thickness as a sign that this new strain can produce more coca paste per bush.

Tabatinga has long been known as a port town where drugs, guns, and the precursor chemicals used to produce cocaine meet and are swapped between interested parties coming south from Colombia, east from Peru, or west from Brazil. The Brazilian criminal Fernandinho Biera-Mar, considered to be running a multi-million dollar smuggling business from his prison cell, pioneered the links between organized crime in Rio and Colombia’s FARC. The cocaine for guns barter system he put in place is considered very much alive today.

It’s possible that his associates are involved in the creation of coca plantations in Brazil. Such an evolution is certainly not a surprise, as the Brazilian Amazon would be the perfect place to expand coca production.

Reporting the discovery of the camp, the Brazilian military called it a triumph of superior intelligence gathering. Others quietly regard it as a lucky break. With barely enough man power to operate the air-bridge denial program that Brazil maintains in the Amazon through a series of radar posts, and a Navy that refuses to patrol rivers, Brazilian authorities are hardly in a position to crack down on the proliferation of more coca bush plantations in the Amazon.

There is simple saying in Portuguese that goes, “In the Amazon, anything grows.” Apparently coca does too.