The entire reason there is any conflict there is a lack of a monopoly on violence… The monopoly part is significant. It’s not just “doing a lot of”.

Reminds me of when ISIS was at its peak a few years ago and the BBC and all other news in the UK would always prefix it with “the so-called Islamic State”.

Like… no, it was a state. It had borders, it had a monopoly on violence within those borders, it collected taxes, it provided some public services.

Whether it offended the BBC’s sensibilities or not, it was a state

They are not states, but a tool of regional political groups. They do the illegal things politicians in power avoid if they want to maintain the facade. They don't have the monopoly of violence, they're intentionally allowed to act without serious retaliation.

Very relevant book: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_Cartels_Do_Not_Exist

You are completely correct. As much as many people don´t want to hear it, Mexico is a failing state. It´s extremely obvious when you are there that the United Mexican States lost most of the reins some time ago.

It started with the debt crisis, and its causes, but was definitively realized by 1994 when the Zapatistas took much of Chiapas.

Too much emphasis is put on the drug cartels alone, when the problem is much larger. I suspect by the end of the century maps will no longer show Mexico in its current form.

Idk. I'd probably put it the other way - part of the state turned into gangs.

Most of the core leadership of major cartels who haven't been arrested were mid-level officers in the DFS (Mexico's version of Italy's SID and Turkey's MIT from Operation Gladio days).

And what is interesting isn't the narcos who are arrested and indicted by the DoJ, but those who are arrested and then let go.

The story of Salvador Cienfuegos is a good example of that - arrested by the DEA on drug charges that were sealed while being Defense Minister, but charges were dropped for diplomatic reasons [0] or the DEA's investigation into AMLO in the 2000s and 2010s that was eventually dropped [1]. Meanwhile, giants like El Chapo or El Viceroy were successfully extradited or in the case of El Mencho killed.

To me, it feels like "untouchables" like Cienfuegos, Adán Augusto López, and Marcelo Ebrard or established networks even above them are likely running the show.

Sort of like how the KGB broke bad in the 90s or the Turkish military in the 1980s-2000s or the KCIA before Korea democratized in the 1990s or how leaders in the vice industry in Thailand tend to be associated with military leadership or how both the IRA and Protestant paramilitaries turned into drug cartels in North Ireland.

I also don't think it's a party ideological thing - PRI, PAN, and now MORENA have the same mid- and upper-level people.

[0] - https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/08/magazine/mexico-general-c...

[1] - https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/22/world/americas/mexico-pre...