Monday, September 21, 2009

Are Mexican Cartels Expanding for Profit or Survival?

By Sylvia Longmire

The U.S. drug market is no longer satisfying the greed of Mexican drug lords and their cartels. Now they’re looking to Europe and the stronger purchasing power of the higher-value euro, and they’re using West Africa to get there.

But before we delve into Africa, we need to examine the recent history of Mexican cartel expansion into Europe and elsewhere in the Americas.

In January 2007, the Mexico City daily El Universal reported on the presence of Mexican cartels in Peru and their likely involvement with the terrorist group Shining Path. The report cited Western diplomats and Peruvian authorities, who said in South America, the Mexican groups are bypassing the Colombians and cutting their own deals with coca farmers in Peru and Bolivia. They’re also setting up dozens of tiny state-of-the-art cocaine processing labs inside Peruvian territory.

Last year, Strategic Forecasting (Stratfor) reported Guatemalan and Mexican government officials confirmed on April 15, 2008, that one of several Mexican nationals detained in Guatemala on April 9 was a high ranking Mexican drug cartel member near the top of Mexico City’s most wanted list. The arrest was further evidence that Mexican cartel members were expanding their presence in Central America.

On September 17, 2008, U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey announced the results of an international drug interdiction operation, called “Project Reckoning.” The operation included law enforcement agencies in the U.S., Italy, Canada, Mexico and Guatemala, and netted more than 500 organized crime members involved in the cocaine trade.

According to Stratfor, 16 suspected high-level drug traffickers working for Italy’s ‘Ndrangheta organized criminal clan were arrested in the U.S. and Italy as part of the operation. Cooperation between the Gulf Cartel and the ‘Ndrangheta organization involved the former using its distribution network to get cocaine from Mexico into Atlanta and New York. From there, the cocaine was handed over to ‘Ndrangheta members and trafficked across the Atlantic Ocean to Italy. Once in Italy, the cocaine was sold via domestic and regional distribution networks on the European market.

In the last month, General James Stravridis, current commander of the U.S European Command, and Michael Braun, former head of operations for the DEA, have warned separately in interviews and hearings on the expansion of Mexican cartels into Africa and the risk of extending their reach to Islamist groups.

West Africa, “particularly in the north, has become the transshipment point for cocaine into Europe and Russia. This shows the strategic risk not only for Mexico, Colombia and the United States, but for Africa, Europe and everywhere else,” Braun said in a recent interview with El Universal. “There are groups equivalent to Mexican drug cartels in Colombia, including the FARC, who are establishing their presence in West Africa because they need logistical support from African organized crime groups to send tons of cocaine from Colombia to Mexico, then to Europe, Russia and elsewhere.”

And it’s not just a one-way street. According to the International Narcotics Control Board’s 2008 report on drug precursors, U.S. authorities identified numerous suspicious drug shipments to Africa that were suspected of having Mexico as their final destination. In total, over 30 tons of ephedrine and pseudoephedrine—precursor chemicals for methamphetamine—were prevented from being diverted to or through Africa in 2008.

Rossen Popov, chief of the board’s precursors control section, said: “The remarkable thing is that … we have gathered evidence that behind most of these cases involving African and Middle Eastern countries there were Mexican trafficking organizations.”

So what does this geographic shift in Mexican drug trafficking mean?

First, it’s probably a simple business decision. Like any successful franchise, Mexican cartels want to diversify and expand in order to increase their sources of income. If they have found successful ways to expand their trafficking operations into South America, Africa, and Europe—whether it’s for additional drug or income sources—then they’re likely to exploit them.

All of the places mentioned above have significant operational benefits for cartels. Many places in Italy have a strong organized crime presence, which is crucial for drug import and distribution. Both Guatemala and many countries in Africa have weak government controls and corrupt government and law enforcement agencies, which is beneficial for successful drug trafficking operations.

There is also the possibility that Mexican President Felipe Calderón’s crackdown on the cartels, and both Mexican and U.S. enforcement efforts along the border, are actually making an impact on cartel profits. This would mean that the cartels are expanding their reach as a survival mechanism.

Whether or not this is really the case is debatable. Some analysts say that the increase in violence throughout Mexico and along the U.S.-Mexico border is indicative of an effective offensive against cartel operations. Seizures of drug, weapons, and cash shipments are also up, and so are arrests of mid- to high-level cartel members.

But does this mean that cartel profits from U.S.-bound shipments are decreasing, or does it mean that seizures have increased because traffic has also increased? When you’re trying to analyze black market goods and operations, it’s often hard to say.

Current enforcement efforts against Mexican cartels are definitely unprecedented, and trafficking operations have been disrupted considerably in some cross-border corridors. We know that the strength of the Arellano Felix Organization, the so-called Tijuana Cartel, has also diminished significantly due to major arrests of its leaders and lieutenants in the last few years.

But can all that account for the expansion of cartel operations to so many other parts of the world? Probably not. Just like McDonald’s cropped up in Moscow as soon as it was humanly possible after the end of the Cold War, Mexican cartels will work their way into any profitable niche on any continent.

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Sylvia Longmire is a former Air Force officer and Special Agent with the Air Force Office of Special Investigations, where she specialized in counterintelligence, counterespionage, and force protection analysis. After being medically retired in 2005, Ms. Longmire worked for almost four years as a Senior Intelligence Analyst for the California State Terrorism Threat Assessment Center, providing daily situational awareness to senior state government officials on southwest border violence and significant events in Latin America. She received her Master’s degree from the University of South Florida in Latin American and Caribbean Studies, with a focus on the Cuban and Guatemalan revolutions. Ms. Longmire is currently an independent consultant and freelance writer.  Her website is Mexico's Drug War; she is a regular contributor to Examiner.com; and her email address is spooky926@gmail.com.