A counterinsurgency analysis of the Mexican drug cartels

John Maier:

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Analyzing the Mexican Cartels within the framework of counterinsurgency doctrine provides a basis for planning. Insurgents seek to break away from state control and form a space that they can govern.[10] A successful counterinsurgency campaign should neutralize the insurgents, secure the population, and reestablish government legitimacy. As counterinsurgency doctrine teaches, “Insurgents succeed by sowing chaos and disorder anywhere; the government fails unless it maintains a degree of order everywhere.[11] Dr. David Kilcullen, within his book Counterinsurgency, provides an insurgency process model that can be used to explain the methodology of the Mexican cartels.[12] The first step is corruption or criminality within the power elite. This in turn leads to the second step the commission of bad behavior by government officials and powerbrokers. These acts lead to the third step; anger within the populace. This culminates in the final step popular support, if not material support, for the insurgents. The cycle then becomes a closed loop as insurgent activity leads to a further weakening and resulting negative attitude towards the government. In applying Kilcullen’s model to the Mexican crisis, we see that the first step taken by the Mexican cartels is the execution of criminal acts. These acts garner large volumes of cash providing the cartels with greater power and access to enablers. This cash leads to the corruption of government officials, often within the security apparatus. Once corrupted these officials then begin to engage in a series of abuses against the populace. At the lower-end these acts may comprise mere negligence in the performance of their duties, but quite tragically at the higher end actually result in their participation in criminal behavior. A prime example is the wholesale participation in narco trafficking by deserters from the Mexican Special Forces, known as Los Zetas.[13] Cartel criminality along with the co-adaptation of Mexican security forces leaves the populace nowhere to turn. In the Mexican case it is not so much popular anger that advances the cartels, but blatant fear achieved by the use of terror and isolation. Given nowhere to turn the Mexican populace is a tragic victim to the events unfolding before them. Too often they become an enabler of cartel violence, if not wholesale participants. Within the Drug War we see the process model closed by the active participation in criminal and violent behavior by members of Mexican society that would have under ordinary circumstances been good and decent citizens.
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Adding to the complexity, the cartels have incorporated certain elements of the Urban Approach into their campaign. This approach is based on small, independent (self-supporting) cells engaging in violence designed to weaken the government, sow disorder, and intimidate the population.[18] Cartel on cartel violence mimics the sectarian violence seen in Northern Ireland.[19] As the Drug War is prolonged, violent attacks are directed not only at other cartels, but are conducted to intimidate the population. As an example, the assassinations of school teachers are designed to close down the education system, denying the youth of Mexico an education.[20] A government sponsored education which would provide an alternative to the narco-culture. To further advance their campaign the cartels have consistently assassinated government leaders at all levels, with special emphasis on local government and law enforcement. Additionally, they use ultra-violence to fix and intimidate security forces, limiting their ability to respond to attacks.[21] The lack of government presence creates a leadership vacuum which the cartels quickly fill.
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There is much more.

To defeat the cartels you need to protect the people and go after the strategic assets of the cartels.   Since most of their violence is directed at seizing control of routes into the US, the government should make control of those corridors a priority.  If they control the corridors, the cartels will have diffiulty exporting their dope and bringing the cash back into the country.