Posted on 06/21/2005 12:41:10 PM PDT by robowombat
Mexican drug commandos expand ops in 6 U.S. states Feds say violent, elite paramilitary units establish narcotics routes north of border
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted: June 21, 2005 1:00 a.m. Eastern
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- © 2005 WorldNetDaily.com
WASHINGTON – The ultra-violent, U.S.-trained elite, Mexican paramilitary commandos known as the "Zetas," responsible for hundreds of murders along the border this year, have expanded their enforcement efforts on behalf of a drug cartel by setting up trafficking routes in six U.S. states.
A U.S. Justice Department memo says the U.S.-trained units have recently moved operations into Houston, San Antonio and the states of California, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Georgia and Florida. They have been operating in Dallas for at least two years, according to the feds.
The original Zetas are former Mexican army commandos, some apparently trained in the U.S. by Army special forces to combat drug gangs. Members of a broader Zetas organization have worked for the Gulf cartel since 2001. They provide firepower, security and the force needed to oversee shipments of narcotics and smuggled aliens along the border and up Interstate 35, which runs through Texas and Oklahoma.
According to FBI officials, the Zetas are attempting to consolidate their grip on the smuggling route along I-35. Anyone caught not paying the 10 percent commission they charge on all cargo – drugs or humans – is killed, according to U.S. and Mexican law enforcement sources.
The Zetas have also brought their cold-blooded killing tactics to the U.S., say federal law enforcement authorities – murdering rival drug dealers and sometimes innocent bystanders.
"Texas law enforcement officials report that the Zetas have been active in the Dallas area since 2003," said the Justice Department intelligence bulletin circulated among U.S. law enforcement officials. "Eight to ten members of the Zetas have been involved in multiple assaults and are believed to have hired criminal gangs in the area ... for contract killings."
The feds say the group has begun establishing its own trafficking routes into the United States and will protect them at any cost.
"U.S. law enforcement have reported bounties offered by Los Zetas of between $30,000 and $50,000 for the killing of Border Patrol agents and other law enforcement officers," the bulletin said. "If a Zeta kills an American law enforcement officer and can successfully make it back to Mexico, his stature within the organization will be increased dramatically."
The Zetas take their name from a radio code once used by its members. While originally there were 68, the Zetas have trained a second generation of commandos – many of them sons and nephews of those trained by U.S. military forces to combat drug trafficking in Mexico. U.S. law enforcement officials say they now number more than 700. Their numbers also include some Mexican army deserters and former federal police officers.
U.S. and Mexican law enforcement authorities say the Zetas operate special training camps in the Mexican states of Tamaulipas and Michoacán, where newly recruited Zetas take intensive six-week training courses in weapons, tactics and intelligence gathering.
The Zetas conducting a bloody war for control of the entire southern border in an effort to secure a monopoly on drug-smuggling and people-smuggling routes, according to law enforcement officials.
At least 600 have been killed this year in a wave of violence waged by the Zetas gang, headed by reputed drug kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, said Mexico's Attorney General Daniel Cabeza de Vaca.
Among the victims of the U.S-trained Zetas have been other suspected smugglers, hit men, police, soldiers and civilians on both sides of the 2,000-mile border.
There are widespread reports of the commandos making cross-border runs into U.S. territory in military-style vehicles, armed with automatic weapons.
The U.S. government spent millions of dollars training Los Zetas to intercept drugs, some of them coming from Mexico's southern border, before they could reach the U.S. The U.S. government has also sent U.S. Border Patrol agents to Mexico's southern border with Guatemala to train law enforcement and military forces to intercept human smugglers destined to reach the U.S.
Guzman, whose nickname means "Shorty," bribed guards to escape from prison in 2001. He is one of Mexico's most-wanted fugitives. U.S. authorities have offered a $5 million reward for his capture.
The spike in killings and kidnappings in northern Mexico in recent months has made headlines and prompted federal agents and soldiers to patrol the streets of Nuevo Laredo, across from Laredo, Texas. Recently, a new police chief in Nuevo Laredo was assassinated nine hours after taking office.
Among the 600 people murdered in gang shootings across the Mexican border this year, many were slain execution-style, with their hands tied behind their backs.
The violence along the border has reached a point where some are questioning President Vicente Fox's ability to govern the country.
A senior U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration official, Anthony Placido, told Congress last week that Mexico's corrupt police forces were "all too often part of the problem rather than part of the solution" in fighting the drug cartels.
Fox won office in 2000, ending 71 years of one-party rule and promising to clamp down on the multibillion-dollar cross-border trade in cocaine, marijuana and heroin.
While initially winning praise for putting bosses like Benjamin Arellano Felix and Osiel Cardenas behind bars, his crime-busting reputation has been undermined by the alarming rise in violence, along with evidence Fox has failed to clean up Mexico's police forces.
Faced with the fallout on its southern frontier, the State Department has twice issued travel warnings for the Mexican border, where more than 30 U.S. citizens have been kidnapped.
Mexico's apparent inability to curb the bloodshed on the 2,000-mile border is affecting the financial markets. Banking group HSBC said "staggering" levels of violence could raise questions about Mexico's stability in the run-up to next year's presidential election. Fox is constitutionally barred from running for re-election.
His approval rating has taken a hit, dropping 3 points to 56 percent in a poll in May, with many Mexicans complaining of safety fears, particularly in the north.
Fox has pledged a "mother of all battles" against the drug traffickers he says are openly challenging the government.
"We have taken on the challenge and we will do battle against all the cartels' criminals and against organized crime," Fox said in a speech Friday.
He sent hundreds of troops and federal agents to the states of Tamaulipas, Sinaloa and Baja California last week after suspected drug hit men killed the police chief of Nuevo Laredo.
Despite the move, drug gangs shot and killed at least 11 people across the three states during the week, prompting observers to declare the operation, dubbed "Mexico Secure," a failure.
All the druggies are talking about on these threads are how unmanaged and dangerous alcohol is.
Then in the next breath, they say because we have this horrible failure and being illegal drugs to them are similar, that we should also release that horror into society is as well.
I disagree totally, illegal drugs stay illegal.
Yes, exactly- we're in agreement. But keep in mind that what passes for education today is very limited- book smart, rather than reality smart. A person can be extremely intelligent- intellectually- yet be an emotional idiot. More than that, people have lost contact with their physical intelligence- the intelligence of their instinct.
I believe a sound and balanced individual is one who is in contact with and has developed their 'sensing/instinctive body mind', their 'feeling emotive mind' as well as their 'intellective/thinking mind'- I believe that the first two, when properly developed, should form a solid foundation upon which the 'intellective/thinking mind' can depend for undistorted thinking.
Unfortunately, Liberals (and by extension Democrats) confuse their emotive thinking with their intellective thinking, which is why their logic, programs and policies are so distorted in relation to reality. On the flip side, many Republicans tend to disregard the intellect of the emotion, which is why they fail to reach emotive thinkers, either in Senate, Congress, in the White House, or on the campaign trail.
Just a thought... :^)
The use end of the drug culture is where all madness is. Maybe you are suggesting users pay much heavier fines so they fear getting into it, I guess that would help.
Maybe a thousand dollar ticket to start?
True, they are not all druggies, some are pure anarchist trying to infect our society in any way possible.
I'm sure Communism USA gets involved now and then in the pro illegal drug politics as well.
We can read it all the time at DU.
Bayourod would have that answer. He's the only one I know of who has all the answers about why illegals are good for America. I think he said they help the economy, and besides, they're just doing the jobs that Americans don't want to do. We're just lazy white Christians who are strung out of drugs, you know. LOL!
Faced with the fallout on its southern frontier, the State Department has twice issued travel warnings for the Mexican border, where more than 30 U.S. citizens have been kidnapped.
Southern frontier? Looks like the State Dept needs to do a little more than issue travel warnings.
Works for me.
Is there any reason to think use of other drugs can be stopped by government?
Of course not, just as there was no guarantee of purity with Prohibition-era bathtub gin. The answer, then and now, is legalization and regulation.
Tell that to the people who are victims of robbery used to support a habit.
Both would be lessened if drugs were legal.
Tell that to victims of DUI.
DUI is no more an argument for a drug ban than it is for a car ban.
Tell that to the companies that pay higher health insurance premiums as well as deal with employee leave issues due to drug abuse. (You want to fire them? Fine with me
There you go ... problem solved.
Tell that to whoever has to keep paying for rehab that doesn't work
Nobody HAS to.
"The twin swords of political correctness and feminism "
We have become - WOMAN-HEARTED.
Typical liberal argument.
I disagree totally, illegal drugs stay illegal.
And you present no argument as to why alcohol shouldn't also be illegal. Your intellectual cowardice is appalling.
Start an alcohol thread and well discuss alcohol, but alcohol may NOT be used as a vehicle to allow other vices into society.
By your logic, we should reduce problems further by banning alcohol. But banning alcohol was tried and failed, just as banning drugs is failing.
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