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Why Did a Drug Gang Kill 43 Students? Text Messages Hold Clues

nytimes.com

51–60 of 110 posts

Re: Why Did a Drug Gang Kill 43 Students? Text Messages Hold Clues

#52
post #49
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> war on drug addicts No, ir was a war on political opponents, not necessarily addicts at all. The War on Marijuana and Acid was to go after hippies, and the War on Crack was to go after inner city blacks. The idea being all of these groups would have voted liberal and the Republican base supported punishing these groups. This was all assumed for decades but made explicit as the strategy by one of Nixon’s top lieuten…

There was at least a token attempt to crack down on Cocaine though, and that’s about as WASP a drug as is humanly possible.

Aren’t hippies majority WASPs too?

Re: Why Did a Drug Gang Kill 43 Students? Text Messages Hold Clues

#53
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is such a bad take. Cartels have small arms the US military has drones, satellites, the NSA. A war against the cartel would be much like our participation in Syria.

See the fictional riff at the beginning: > “El Coyote” Head of the New Jaurez Joint Cartel, was the man who ordered the attack on the Cactus Lounge and similar massacres on US soil, he would be killed in a US airstrike in 2032. But his Lieutenant and successor, Cartel Boss, Mexican Nationalist Front commander, and Future Mexican President, Jaun Herrera would reveal in his 2054 memoirs Smuggling to Freedom: From Narco…

They are assuming that the US would let it get to the point of cartel operating in the States with impunity kidnapping and murdering their way into effectively owning the government. This seems to be predicated by the understanding that the US has met abject failure in its campaign to hold, reform, and dominate perceptively weaker countries. It's true we couldn't dominate Mexico any more than we could dominate Iraq. It would be a deadly waste of blood and treasure that would work out horribly for all. We don't actually have to however.

We could trivially and in short order destroy Mexicos ability to function as a modern nation by destroying power generation, water, farming, roads, bridges, shipping, trains, airplanes. We could deny all large scale transport in or out and keep this up for years for less than the cost of Iraq. There wouldn't be a drug business there any more than there would be any other kind of business once all the engines that enable commerce are silent.

The logical end game for infinite acceleration is maximum violence on both sides. The fantasy described assumes that the cartel is able to accelerate infinitely while the US is stuck in first gear. I think in fact that the US citizenry are far too bloodthirsty for that to be reasonable. More likely far less acceleration on the cartel's side sees join missions between US soldiers and Mexican authorities leading to a shit ton of dead cartel followed by comparative peace leading to disengagement. Ultimately the drug trade returns to normal and nothing is resolved.

Re: Why Did a Drug Gang Kill 43 Students? Text Messages Hold Clues

#54

borderland beat covered this and it was a combination of the students stealing a cartel bus used for smuggling and the corrupt local government asking for favors of the cartels they work for to teach a lesson. Btw there is many more terrible things surfacing from mexico these days like everyday plebs having to post identifiers on their vehicles to indicate tax was paid to some cartel then rivals posting videos of kil…

> students stealing a cartel bus used for smuggling

That sounds rather irrational of them. Also, not what the NYT reported.

Re: Why Did a Drug Gang Kill 43 Students? Text Messages Hold Clues

#55
post #16

Perhaps we should end the fifty years long "War on Some Drugs" in the US that funds the cartels.

Cartels are directly selling their goods in the open in San Fran. You won’t be making their money source, just further streamlining it.

Re: Why Did a Drug Gang Kill 43 Students? Text Messages Hold Clues

#56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See the fictional riff at the beginning: > “El Coyote” Head of the New Jaurez Joint Cartel, was the man who ordered the attack on the Cactus Lounge and similar massacres on US soil, he would be killed in a US airstrike in 2032. But his Lieutenant and successor, Cartel Boss, Mexican Nationalist Front commander, and Future Mexican President, Jaun Herrera would reveal in his 2054 memoirs Smuggling to Freedom: From Narco…

They are assuming that the US would let it get to the point of cartel operating in the States with impunity kidnapping and murdering their way into effectively owning the government. This seems to be predicated by the understanding that the US has met abject failure in its campaign to hold, reform, and dominate perceptively weaker countries. It's true we couldn't dominate Mexico any more than we could dominate Iraq.…

> There wouldn't be a drug business there any more than there would be any other kind of business once all the engines that enable commerce are silent.

This would conflict with US goal of reshoring manufacturing from Asia to NAFTA/USMCA.

Re: Why Did a Drug Gang Kill 43 Students? Text Messages Hold Clues

#57
post #16

Perhaps we should end the fifty years long "War on Some Drugs" in the US that funds the cartels.

Why does the war on drugs cause Mexico to fall apart and not Canada? I don't think Mexico's problems would be solved if drugs disappeared tomorrow. For example, the cartels are robbing fuel [depots, refineries, regular gas stations, etc]. They'll keep doing that, it's profitable. So, how can Mexico solve its own problems? I have no idea.

The war on drugs in the 80s was focused on Colombia and disrupting Pablo Escobar's coke empire. That was successful but caused production to move closer to Mexico. Everything was stable until the national army took over policing enforcement in 2006 and now you have many 1000x more murders. Some of the murders that are reported as cartel murders can be national army murders. It's a different situation that resolves itself when demand drops.

Canada was winning best weed strain at shows but was never really supplying the US. The US was supplying Canada with weed/coke from Mexico and premium California bud if Canada was lucky. I'm sure some BC bud flowed south but everything was small operations.

Re: Why Did a Drug Gang Kill 43 Students? Text Messages Hold Clues

#58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cartels are not motivated guerilla armies. They are made up of 100% mercenaries. I doubt that there would be many encounters between them and US SOF because once that possibility is on the table, most of them will decide it's not worth the paycheck. Also, guerilla forced that have fought the US have all been dependent on state support. There will be no such support for the cartels as they have no state allies.

> have all been dependent on state support ... they have no state allies Do Mexico and China count?

If Mexico is a state ally of the cartels, why do they smuggle in their guns from the US?

China providing weapons to cartels is laughable.

Re: Why Did a Drug Gang Kill 43 Students? Text Messages Hold Clues

#59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are assuming that the US would let it get to the point of cartel operating in the States with impunity kidnapping and murdering their way into effectively owning the government. This seems to be predicated by the understanding that the US has met abject failure in its campaign to hold, reform, and dominate perceptively weaker countries. It's true we couldn't dominate Mexico any more than we could dominate Iraq.…

> There wouldn't be a drug business there any more than there would be any other kind of business once all the engines that enable commerce are silent. This would conflict with US goal of reshoring manufacturing from Asia to NAFTA/USMCA.

The would be less important than legislators not having their children kidnapped by cartel henchmen and dismembered.

Re: Why Did a Drug Gang Kill 43 Students? Text Messages Hold Clues

#60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> have all been dependent on state support ... they have no state allies Do Mexico and China count?

If Mexico is a state ally of the cartels, why do they smuggle in their guns from the US? China providing weapons to cartels is laughable.

https://insightcrime.org/news/chinese-money-launderers-mexic...

> While the involvement of Chinese money-laundering rings in handling drug proceeds from Mexico is nothing new, a number of recent court cases in the United States have revealed crucial information about how these schemes work ... weekly pick-ups from representatives of Mexican criminal groups, made in cash ranging between $150,000 and $1 million, with an average of $500,000. These were made in large cities including Chicago, New York and Atlanta ... network of Chinese-owned businesses in the United States and Mexico ... transfer a correspondent amount of money through Chinese banking apps. This happened entirely through the Asian country’s domestic banking system.

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