US Shows Map Of Mexican Cartels

"Ivan" for Borderland Beat 

Report says Sinaloa Cartel looks to face many challenges in 2020 and 2021 as rivals see a formidable drug empire

The US Congress identified Mexican cartels as having clashes in five regions and notes that the Sinaloa Cartel is divided into four factions.

The report Mexico: Crime and Drug Trafficking Organizations, prepared by the U.S. Congressional Research Service, shows the situation of the cartels in Mexico.

It notes that the Sinaloa Cartel appears to face many challenges in 2020 and 2021 as its rivals see a formidable drug empire built on profits from trafficking South American cocaine and smuggling methamphetamine, marijuana, fentanyl and heroin into the United States, and seek to unseat Chapo Guzman's group.

Some analysts, he says, have warned that Sinaloa remains powerful, given its international dominance, its infiltration of the upper echelons of the Mexican government and its resilient structure, but others argue that it is in decline due to its factionalization and its conflict with the Jalisco Cartel - New Generation.

The CJNG is intensely expansionist and uses displays of extreme violence to intimidate, it claims.

The document states that the Sinaloa Cartel operates in factions, one led by Ismael el Mayo Zambada; another by Aureliano Guzmán Loera, el Guano, Chapo's brother; another led by an unnamed co-founder of the Guadalajara Cartel; and a fourth faction led by Chapo's sons, Ovidio and Joaquín Guzmán López and Iván Archivaldo and Jesús Alfredo Guzmán Salazar, known as Los Chapitos.

It states that following Chapo's extradition and life sentence in the US, the cartel faced many challenges both inside and outside, and in 2021 there was even friction between Los Chapitos and the Mayo group.

The report identifies the Sinaloa and Jalisco Cartels as dominant in Mexico.

In the country, the criminal groups have five active battles for control of territories.

Sinaloa and Durango, it indicates, are dominated by the Sinaloa Cartel and do not identify any dispute with another active criminal group; while Baja California Sur and Nayarit, Jalisco and Colima, are controlled by the CJNG.

The Sinaloa Cartel and CJNG, it details, have a dispute over Baja California, Sonora and Quintana Roo; and the Sinaloa Cartel and the Gulf Cartel over Chihuahua.

The CJNG is fighting against a local group in Michoacán, Estado de México and Oaxaca; and against Los Zetas in Veracruz and Tabasco.

Los Zetas and the Gulf Cartel have a war for Coahuila, Nuevo Leon, Tamaulipas and San Luis Potosi.

He mentions that the fragmentation of the large cartels and the use of smaller organizations in a "proxy war" would be the cause of some of the bloodiest violence in the country.

In 2006 the dominant groups were the Tijuana Cartel/Arellano Felix, the Sinaloa Cartel, the Juarez Cartel/Vicente Carrillo Fuentes and the Gulf Cartel, but government operations to eliminate the leaders increased the instability of the groups and led to greater violence.

Over the next 12 years, Mexico's largest and most stable cartels fragmented, creating first seven and then nine major groups.

The fragmentation that began in 2010 and accelerated in 2011 brought new players into the criminal environment such as Los Zetas and Los Caballeros Templarios.

By 2018, a number of smaller organizations were active, and some of the formerly small groups, such as the CJNG, had filled the space left after other criminal groups had been disrupted by arrests, and the deaths of their members.

Unlike Colombia's experience in the 1980s and 1990s, where the sequential dismantling of the Medellin and Cali cartels led to less overt violence, the dismantling of the major organizations in Mexico has led to fragmentation associated with widespread and brutal violence.

It notes that there is an increase in violence within Mexico that coincides with a transition to the production and trafficking of synthetic drugs such as fentanyl.

The report mentions that after three years in office, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has avoided large-scale police actions against cartels and continued the militarized security strategy of the previous two administrations by authorizing the Mexican Armed Forces to carry out security tasks.

Lopez Obrador, he states, has advocated policies that focus on the causes of crime, but his government has not consistently carried out counternarcotics operations.

Continuing revelations of corruption at the highest levels, including public officials, Morena politicians and members of the police forces with criminal groups, and their apparent control of Mexican territory, demonstrate that the cartels are more entrenched than ever, he says.

"In 2022, law enforcement cooperation between the United States and Mexico is the weakest it has been in 15 years," it states.

It details that structural factors compromising security and stability in the country include persistent criminal impunity, entrenched corruption, and continued demand for illegal drugs from the United States and Europe.

Article published on September 4, 2022 in the 1023rd edition of the weekly Ríodoce.

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