With Cartels Looming, The Border Crisis Is The Tip Of The Iceberg
What is also different now than in the past, the TPPF report explains, is that the cartels increasingly supplant the legitimate sovereignty of the Mexican state with their own often in cooperation with major elements of that state. The qualitative difference since 2018 has been the near-open role of the current Mexican president in allowing, and perhaps even participating in, that cooperation. Indeed, by some estimates cartels now control up to 40 percent of Mexican territory.
If that sounds outlandish, it is not because the facts don t support such a conclusion but because corporate media in the U.S. are for the most part unwilling or unable to cover the issue in depth or accurately convey its implications for America.
The implications are this: As the Mexican state succumbs to the cartels, Mexico s problems will become America s problems. That doesn t just mean a worsening border crisis but a breakdown of law and order all up and down the border, on both sides of the Rio Grande, and a worsening drug crisis in American cities far from the border. It means the corruption of Mexican officialdom will gradually spread to American officialdom, just as the operations of Mexican cartels have spread to every corner of the United States.
What to do about all this? The first step is for the United States to stop treating Mexico like a partner or a peer with whom we can work together to address common challenges. Our entire posture has to shift. We have to begin treating Mexico less like an ally and more like a hostile neighbor. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, to his credit, this week took the extraordinary step of issuing an executive order designating Mexican drug cartels as terrorist organizations. While that might not do much on its own, it at least sends a signal to Washington that it is time for the federal government to do the same.
There is of course a historical precedent for this, and indeed the relatively peaceful interregnum of the past 80 years is a departure from the historical norm of U.S.-Mexico relations. We are now returning to the norm, whether policymakers in Washington realize it or not.
This does not sound good, especially for San Diego.