The Mexican Drug War

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The Mexican drug war is an undeclared armed conflict involving drug cartels, the state, and the civilian population, and it is commonly considered to have begun symbolically on December 11, 2006, when President Felipe Calderón ordered the first large-scale deployment of the army against the cartels in the state of Michoacán, marking a historic turning point because the armed forces were systematically used for internal security. This decision was linked both to Calderón’s need to strengthen a fragile political legitimacy after contested elections and to the already enormous power of the cartels, as well as to pressure from the United States, the main destination for trafficked drugs. Before 2006 the cartels already existed and violence was not absent, but the state maintained an informal balance based on corruption and tacit agreements that limited open conflict, a balance that collapsed with militarization. The government strategy of targeting cartel leaders led to the fragmentation of large organizations into smaller and more violent groups, increasing competition over territory and trafficking routes and causing violence to explode across the country. Since then Mexico has recorded hundreds of thousands of deaths, tens of thousands of disappearances, militarized cities, and a sharp rise in human rights violations, while trust in the state has declined because of corruption and impunity. In many areas the cartels have effectively replaced state institutions by controlling territory and economic life. The conflict is made even harder to resolve by the role of the United States as a major consumer market and source of weapons, and today it continues in different forms, with violence that is less spectacular but more widespread and chronic. ⚠️ follow for more ⚠️

Collection: crime - Tags: organized-crime, mexico - Source: instagram.com