People are uncomfortable with the term "cartel" for these large crime organizations because it doesn't "Other" these orgs sufficiently far away from evoking capitalism; even tho' they are the ultimate form of unregulated, "might makes right" capitalism in the modern world.
That is a great point I hadn't thought of. I definitely think this is gangster capitalism. I also think some people are more comfortable seeing working class Mexicans as victims rather than people that can create powerful and ruthless organizations that cartel evokes. Best Shaggy.
The constant word games over the term cartel the past years has become so minute and convoluted especially in academic circles that it makes one wonder why they are trying to obscure the obvious problems and solutions and ignore the biggest contributor to lasting criminal organizations, state or private, the contributor that every criminal enterprise, cartel, narco state, etc., needs and that is the banking cartel of federal and world banks which every drug dealing cartel and corrupt narco state could not do without.
From the Bank of International Settlements, established to assist the German economy after World War 1 including Nazi Germany, to the banks the BIS directs, they are all truly the financiers of criminal enterprise. The financial manipulations especially money laundering have been devised by these financial criminals and provided cartels with wealth unimaginable without this financial assistance. Dig deep and you will find the fingerprints of the Bank of England, Chase, Swiss banks, Chinese banks and a huge number of regional banks in major drug dealing countries. Governments and intelligence agencies need these financial institutions to hide and invest their illegal gains from weapons sales and drug dealing to establish financial funds away from public examination. Just examine the weapons Hamas had in stockpiles, US and NATO weapons sent to Ukraine. Banks had direct investment in the international development of pharmaceutical companies for the continued international exploitation of the opium poppy resulting in the pharmaceutical companies being the most prolific drug dealer and creating more deaths with pharmaceutical opioids whose recipes and formulas seems to reach every street drug dealing organization in the world.
In Mexico, the Los Zetas would be a good example of a cartel who realized the benefits from learning and using the most sophisticated financial tools including computers to expand their profit dealings. Their hands were on the most extensive computer and financial crimes in Las Vegas, Nevada and Southern California. The Los Zetas were more then a group of extremely violent ex-military soldiers but also new warriors in so-called white collar crime.
Never be consumed by the origin of a word. Always look at the actions and especially track the money of these criminal organizations and you will always arrive at the real cartel that actually can control prices and quantity of whatever poison that can kill very large numbers of people everywhere in the world.
The NSA can capture every bit of data in the world, the CIA can overthrow a government in a week, but the U.S. government doesn't stop this. The only explanation is that the U.S. government created the criminal cartels, and it's easy to see why.
The secret space program cost about $1 trillion annually, according to James Rink. Of course, Donald Trump has put a halt to all of it, which is why he and AMLO get along so well, and why AMLO suddenly has billions to spend on Tren Maya and the associated economic projects.
More on the CIA to come. I think a lot of what has happened is by ineptness rather than design by, although with a lot of lies and corruption thrown in...
Much written about the IC seems to be based on lore, Soviet Agitprop, and a case of many Americans and the world seeing an easy to identify bogeyman to poor domestic politics in a given developing country.
I encourage Ioan and other legitimate researchers, journalists, and academics to take deeper looks into the IC. Almost all of them are honest, smart, and patriotic Americans asked to carry out very difficult policies to avoid actual full blown war. Also, the vast majority of IC action is collection and analysis. To give the Agency and others so much credit for all machinations in the developing world is incredulous. A dozen GS-11-14s making $100k less a year stationed abroad are not able nor have accomplished nearly as much as folks have attributed to them. Also to me the “agency causes all the problems” narrative takes away from actual native and local agency to pave their own paths both right and wrong.
The way that the ineptness is reported and written about the CIA, I think is a smokescreen to cover up the real damage that the CIA has done. For example, everyone reports on the attempted assassinations of Fidel Castro with exploding cigars that did not work but ignores the real assassinations of government leaders and opposition leaders in countries worldwide. Phoenix program in Vietnam was basically an assassination program resulting in over 80,000 lives. CIA trained and assisted with CIA personnel death squads in Colombia, Nicaragua, Guatemala, El Salvador resulting in more then 300,000 lives and of course the assassinations of President Kennedy, Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King.
It is very interesting to read the accounts of the so-called ineptness of the CIA and then try to track the background of the author and then the proof for the ineptness of the CIA which usually backtracks to the CIA itself. I am strongly thinking that the real CIA was never an intelligence gathering agency but more like a highly equipped, with the latest tools and weaponry, government and corporate sanctioned Sicario agency.
The CIA was created by Reinhard Gehlen, Allen Dulles, Bill Donovan, Otto Skorzeny and Prescott Bush. All of these men were Nazis. Why would you assume anything but evil coming from an organization created by Nazis?
So this is your attempt at communication, three strokes on the keyboard just to show your arrogant and dismissive attitude. Substack is a platform designed to embrace critical thinking and a constructive debate about important subjects. Your smart ass attempt of superiority belongs on twitter/X or Facebook/meta.
Thanks for your insight as always Tom. Great points. I totally agree that de-constructing cartel to the point of saying there is no powerful organized crime in Mexico is distracting from reality and that was a big reason I wrote the story. I think it is a good to understand the history of the concept to understand what the hell these forces are. That is fascinating about the financial crime and most definitely something that needs to be pursued. All best there friend.
Yeah, GNGOs (G for gangster) - kind of subcontractors from parts of the government but also in conflict with parts of it. Ben points out that as they grew in the 90s, it was kind of a priviaization process. Best David.
I might be wrong but from Sicilia and kiriakydes from caro to Chapitos or arellanos most cartel where made by coopted commanders of the 70's in CA And B C where the biggest market really started organized as inside the political loop of goverment connections in the CIA or D F S they where the biggest liaers and decievers of the people tdy most relatives of this so called cartel members and allies by politics live driving GT-4 Porches and laudering billions in CA real state they are mostly tdy us citizens and very succesfull buisnesmen recognized by the best universities even so I doubt this criminals are getting what they deserved they are much more powerfull than governments tdy
Thanks for the insight Jorge. Yeah, Sicilia definitely had some weird connections and was caught with a former Bay of Pigs guy. The CIA-DFS-Mafia-Guadalajara dealings of the 70s and 80s were sordid and more still needs be uncovered. Best friend.
In France, the media and public authorities are talking about the “Mexicanization” of the country and now refer to criminal organizations as “cartels,” without really knowing what that means.
In 2024, I co-authored an educational book on the geopolitics of organized crime .
One section focuses on the Medellin Cartel and offers a definition. I am submitting it to you for your opinion. Sincerely, Michel Gandilhon
traduit du français
Sheet 8 – The Medellín Cartel: The Template
Medellín, Cali, Sinaloa, Escobar, Guzmán—these names attached to Latin American organized crime have become almost legendary. Countless movies, series, and documentaries have turned them into pop-culture icons. Yet behind the more-or-less romanticized myths lie organizations that have triggered geopolitical destabilization on a massive scale in countries such as Colombia, Mexico, and, more recently, Ecuador.
An American Label
The word “cartel” first appeared in 1982 in a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) report following the seizure of 600 kg of cocaine in Cleveland. At that time, it described a network of criminal organizations involved in cocaine trafficking in Colombia’s Antioquia department, whose capital is Medellín. In 1986 the term was used by the U.S. Justice Department in an indictment against Colombian traffickers, and in 1988 the U.S. Senate used it in a report devoted to the Medellín Cartel led by Pablo Escobar.
Everyone knows the term comes from economics, where it designates an agreement among companies in the same sector to restrict competition by fixing prices, limiting production, or dividing markets. Specialists in organized crime often criticize the use of “cartel” in this context. Nevertheless, the analogy is far from meaningless when one looks at the way Escobar’s organization was structured: it really did function as a cartel-like pact involving multiple players.
In its heyday, the Medellín Cartel brought together roughly two hundred autonomous criminal groups that formed alliances with one another to coordinate every stage of cocaine production, transportation, and distribution. Think of it as a solar system. At the center—the “sun”—was the most powerful faction, strategically positioned along the long trafficking chain. Escobar’s strength lay in his mastery of logistics, which allowed him to organize exports to the U.S. market. He owned a fleet of planes that crossed the Caribbean to Florida; his partner Carlos Lehder even owned an island in the Bahamas. Orbiting this core were dozens of smaller organizations that produced cocaine and handed it over to the “office.” Because the core held the upper hand, it bought half the shipment at a low price but guaranteed that any seized merchandise would still be paid for.
Today in Mexico, the Sinaloa Cartel—born from the 1989 breakup of the Guadalajara Cartel and widely regarded as the country’s most powerful criminal organization—is said to consist of around fifty clans totaling tens of thousands of men. In this quasi-feudal system, weaker clans pledge allegiance to the strongest and pay a tax for the right to operate in various rackets (migrants, weapons, fuel theft, etc.) that go far beyond illegal drugs. The balance, however, is fragile; splits and new alliances regularly spark bloody wars for hegemony.
Collapse of the Model
In Colombia, the system eventually imploded under U.S. pressure. Starting in the 1990s, Washington demanded that Colombia extradite the kingpins. The Medellín “cartel” responded by declaring total war on the Colombian state—assassinating politicians, judges, and police officers and carrying out terrorist attacks. Pablo Escobar was killed in 1993. In the vacuum, new actors rose: the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the paramilitary United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC). Many of these civil-war players later demobilized under the 2002 and 2016 peace accords. Those who refused to lay down arms survive today as purely criminal bands still active in the cocaine trade.
Violence in Colombia has dropped sharply since the early 1990s, yet it remains very high. In 2022 the homicide rate was actually higher than in Mexico (28 vs. 26 per 100,000 inhabitants), while cocaine production reached an all-time record. Today the most powerful cartels are Mexican, thanks to their control of the strategic routes that supply the United States with both drugs and migrants.
Spotlight
Organized crime in Latin America is obviously not limited to the big cartels. Cartels rely on a vast ecosystem that includes street gangs and juvenile delinquents. Central America, which over the past twenty years has become a major cocaine transit corridor heading north, has seen a genuine “counter-economy” take root, aided by local actors. In El Salvador, for example, the Sinaloa Cartel works hand-in-glove with the maras—hyper-violent youth gangs that count tens of thousands of members. The same pattern exists in South America, especially in Ecuador, where the Lobos, fighting their rivals the Choneros, have managed to federate other gangs (Tiguerones, Chone Killers, etc.) into an alliance called Nueva Generación (NG), explicitly modeled on—and connected to—the Mexican cartel of the same name.
Key Takeaways
A cartel is an agreement among independent criminal gangs operating in a given territory (Sinaloa, Medellín, Cali, etc.) to carry out illicit activities. The pact is generally dominated by the strongest gang, to which the others swear allegiance. Emerging in Colombia in the 1970s, these organizations spread thanks to the drug trade across much of Latin America, where they continue to wield significant geopolitical destabilizing power.
Fascinating and useful stuff here, thanks much for posting. "Love this line: Think of it as a solar system. At the center—the “sun”—was the most powerful faction, strategically positioned along the long trafficking chain." - Great metaphor.
Thank you very much. The data on the origin of the use of the word “cartel” comes from the work of Alain Labrousse, France's leading specialist in the geopolitics of drugs. It partly overlaps with your article. It's always a pleasure to read your work. Here is a link to an article in which I criticize the absurd concept of “Mexicanization” as applied to the situation in France. As for the use of “narcos” to describe cocaine traffickers, it is etymologically absurd because cocaine is not a narcotic... Quite the contrary. But anyway, it's become common usage now.
Interesting point. Is that referring to U.S. streets? There, the cartels are smaller wholesale operations I understand as opposed to Mexico where they run things much lower down. All best there friend!
One of the three critiques you mention, that cartels don't fix prices, is easily refuted by the fact that narcos (I will use this word unapologetically, since that is what we call them in México) run rackets at the expense of farmers who produce a variety of agrarian commodities, most famously avocado. I suggest you look up into the surge of violence against leaders of the agrarian community who have recently spoken against the dirt-price they have been forced to accept for their products.
Yeah, great point and interesting connection there. And absolutely on the attacks on leaders, especially in Michoacan, that is a powder keg right now. All best there Diego!
Fascinating as always, mate. I’ve always had the impression that ‘cartel’ was a term that had been lazily used by the media and law enforcement to be attached to any large scale crime organisation that were making their mark in the world. Without being an expert on the subject I’d always looked on Medellin - at least in the glory days - as being the very definition of a cartel, with the different members of it who all worked together for a greater good. Interestingly I’d always assumed that they didn’t actually call themselves as that name but had never seen it confirmed anywhere so thank you for clearing that up for me!
I'm glad you wrote this response to the criticism of the term cartel and think that your journalism is valuable, but I think one aspect of Zavala's critique that you don't address that goes beyond him problematizing the word "cartel" is the reliance by many journalists on reporting state narratives. And it makes sense. It is is the norm in crime reporting in the US too to just basically report a police/state press release as fact (or at the very least without question).
I think really the main argument underneath the polemical statement "Drug Cartels Do Not Exist" is to push us to think about how neoliberal economic policy coupled with the increased militarization of the State (on both sides of the border) IS what created the conditions for the explosion in violence. It is no mystery that in the gulf areas, baja, and Guerrero that multinational corporations have moved in and expanded extraction industry largely for the gain of US elites, but how could this have been possible if the "Cartels" are actually the ones in control of these areas?
I think this is the deeper question, points to how the violence is very real, and how paramilitary organizations have long supported the interests of capital.
Thanks there Cam and those are call good points. That criticism of the government's claims and narratives is sorely needed on both sides of the Rio Grande. And cartels are involved in working to oppress environmental defender as I wrote about in a new story here - https://www.crashoutmedia.com/p/cartels-versus-environmentalists - All best there friend (and sorry I hand't responded earlier but I had missed the comment). Best
Mr loan Grillo , Im really intrigued by the stories you write . But there's a lot of other cartels out there , that journalists and people rarely know much about or rarely speak of. Most people know of El Chapo Guzman , El Mayo , El mencho Los Chapitos , el Guano ect . But after this year's presidential elections in Mexico your going see a huge power move by a cartel from northern Sinaloa , these individuals from that said group are extremely rich & powerful , but more importantly they have the Mexican government in there pocket . But like I said no one really knows much about them .except that there very discreet , extremely violent & well connected with everyone & everywhere . This cartel is ran by El chapo Isidro , he started as a sicario under The Amado Carrillo-fuentes DTO then the Beltran-Leyva DTO , he learned from the best .No wonder he's a smart business man , leader & mediator . I Would like to have a conversation sometime .
This sounds very interesting and I would be happy to talk. Send me a message at ioangrillo@hotmail.com and we can arrange something if you like. Best Leobardo.
Ioan. Thank you. You mentioned a couple of times the complex nature of Mexican law enforcement's relationship with the criminal organizations. They work with the criminal element and yet fight them. Have you researched or written on this relationship in more detail elsewhere?
You always have an excellency of content. Not sure if you’re on FB, my friend and I run a Border page called Broken Border-The Truth about Living on the Tx. Border
The murder of Mormon women and children looks like a Luciferian sacrifice. The Mormon Church itself is Luciferian, and a former co-worker of mine, Steve Ross, was ritually sacrificed by Mormons at the age of around 43.
I'm going to read this more carefully, but what caught my eye about the Cartel del Golfo were the symbols and slogans they displayed, which are the same death-cult type as the secret societies of the Luciferian Brotherhood. The cartels were clearly created by the CIA -- the Luciferians' assassins -- as were the Central American death squads and MS-13 (I knew someone who could have been a founding member of MS-13, and he was an MK-Ultra mind-controlled CIA asset)
"Valor" "Strength and immortality" "Transformation" -- transhumanism
"Respect" "Loyalty" "Discipline" -- fascist ethos
and the image of a phoenix (the highest seat on the Satanic Council), a scorpion, and an eagle clutching a snake
Hi Diana, that is very interesting. I hadn't noticed that symbolism but I do know there were narcos in Tamaulipas where the Gulf Cartel into some Satanic stuff. I'll have to look further into that. Best there.
Jessie Czebotar is the ultimate insider on the Luciferian Brotherhood, as she was chosen from birth to succeed the crone, who is the leader of the five queen mothers of darkness. She explains all of their symbols on Aquarius Rising Africa on YouTube. https://inscribedonthebelievingmind.blog/2022/09/06/jessie-czebotar/
Wait until you read my post tomorrow on human trafficking! NASA calls the vaccinated homoborgenesis because they were planning on selling people off-world as cyborg slaves. The Cabal's space fleet, Solar Warden, has already been doing this for decades.
People are uncomfortable with the term "cartel" for these large crime organizations because it doesn't "Other" these orgs sufficiently far away from evoking capitalism; even tho' they are the ultimate form of unregulated, "might makes right" capitalism in the modern world.
That is a great point I hadn't thought of. I definitely think this is gangster capitalism. I also think some people are more comfortable seeing working class Mexicans as victims rather than people that can create powerful and ruthless organizations that cartel evokes. Best Shaggy.
The constant word games over the term cartel the past years has become so minute and convoluted especially in academic circles that it makes one wonder why they are trying to obscure the obvious problems and solutions and ignore the biggest contributor to lasting criminal organizations, state or private, the contributor that every criminal enterprise, cartel, narco state, etc., needs and that is the banking cartel of federal and world banks which every drug dealing cartel and corrupt narco state could not do without.
From the Bank of International Settlements, established to assist the German economy after World War 1 including Nazi Germany, to the banks the BIS directs, they are all truly the financiers of criminal enterprise. The financial manipulations especially money laundering have been devised by these financial criminals and provided cartels with wealth unimaginable without this financial assistance. Dig deep and you will find the fingerprints of the Bank of England, Chase, Swiss banks, Chinese banks and a huge number of regional banks in major drug dealing countries. Governments and intelligence agencies need these financial institutions to hide and invest their illegal gains from weapons sales and drug dealing to establish financial funds away from public examination. Just examine the weapons Hamas had in stockpiles, US and NATO weapons sent to Ukraine. Banks had direct investment in the international development of pharmaceutical companies for the continued international exploitation of the opium poppy resulting in the pharmaceutical companies being the most prolific drug dealer and creating more deaths with pharmaceutical opioids whose recipes and formulas seems to reach every street drug dealing organization in the world.
In Mexico, the Los Zetas would be a good example of a cartel who realized the benefits from learning and using the most sophisticated financial tools including computers to expand their profit dealings. Their hands were on the most extensive computer and financial crimes in Las Vegas, Nevada and Southern California. The Los Zetas were more then a group of extremely violent ex-military soldiers but also new warriors in so-called white collar crime.
Never be consumed by the origin of a word. Always look at the actions and especially track the money of these criminal organizations and you will always arrive at the real cartel that actually can control prices and quantity of whatever poison that can kill very large numbers of people everywhere in the world.
The NSA can capture every bit of data in the world, the CIA can overthrow a government in a week, but the U.S. government doesn't stop this. The only explanation is that the U.S. government created the criminal cartels, and it's easy to see why.
The secret space program cost about $1 trillion annually, according to James Rink. Of course, Donald Trump has put a halt to all of it, which is why he and AMLO get along so well, and why AMLO suddenly has billions to spend on Tren Maya and the associated economic projects.
https://dianabarahona.substack.com/p/history-of-the-secret-space-program
More on the CIA to come. I think a lot of what has happened is by ineptness rather than design by, although with a lot of lies and corruption thrown in...
Much written about the IC seems to be based on lore, Soviet Agitprop, and a case of many Americans and the world seeing an easy to identify bogeyman to poor domestic politics in a given developing country.
I encourage Ioan and other legitimate researchers, journalists, and academics to take deeper looks into the IC. Almost all of them are honest, smart, and patriotic Americans asked to carry out very difficult policies to avoid actual full blown war. Also, the vast majority of IC action is collection and analysis. To give the Agency and others so much credit for all machinations in the developing world is incredulous. A dozen GS-11-14s making $100k less a year stationed abroad are not able nor have accomplished nearly as much as folks have attributed to them. Also to me the “agency causes all the problems” narrative takes away from actual native and local agency to pave their own paths both right and wrong.
Thanks for that insight Tomes and great to hear your voice here in the convo. All best.
The way that the ineptness is reported and written about the CIA, I think is a smokescreen to cover up the real damage that the CIA has done. For example, everyone reports on the attempted assassinations of Fidel Castro with exploding cigars that did not work but ignores the real assassinations of government leaders and opposition leaders in countries worldwide. Phoenix program in Vietnam was basically an assassination program resulting in over 80,000 lives. CIA trained and assisted with CIA personnel death squads in Colombia, Nicaragua, Guatemala, El Salvador resulting in more then 300,000 lives and of course the assassinations of President Kennedy, Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King.
It is very interesting to read the accounts of the so-called ineptness of the CIA and then try to track the background of the author and then the proof for the ineptness of the CIA which usually backtracks to the CIA itself. I am strongly thinking that the real CIA was never an intelligence gathering agency but more like a highly equipped, with the latest tools and weaponry, government and corporate sanctioned Sicario agency.
Thanks there Tom and good point. There are clever games in hiding their true nature - and there are certainly a lot of bodies there. Best.
The CIA was created by Reinhard Gehlen, Allen Dulles, Bill Donovan, Otto Skorzeny and Prescott Bush. All of these men were Nazis. Why would you assume anything but evil coming from an organization created by Nazis?
https://inscribedonthebelievingmind.blog/2022/08/30/omega-project/
So this is your attempt at communication, three strokes on the keyboard just to show your arrogant and dismissive attitude. Substack is a platform designed to embrace critical thinking and a constructive debate about important subjects. Your smart ass attempt of superiority belongs on twitter/X or Facebook/meta.
Thanks for your insight as always Tom. Great points. I totally agree that de-constructing cartel to the point of saying there is no powerful organized crime in Mexico is distracting from reality and that was a big reason I wrote the story. I think it is a good to understand the history of the concept to understand what the hell these forces are. That is fascinating about the financial crime and most definitely something that needs to be pursued. All best there friend.
Maybe they should just be called NGOs.
Just contractors.
Yeah, GNGOs (G for gangster) - kind of subcontractors from parts of the government but also in conflict with parts of it. Ben points out that as they grew in the 90s, it was kind of a priviaization process. Best David.
Great article as usual
Thx
Thanks much there. Always good to hear your voice here.
Thanks Ioan. If your readers would like to follow-up on your excellent overview, they might consider reading chapter 7 of my book Drug Wars and Covert Netherworlds. I can send an excerpt of that chapter to anyone who sends me an email request at creechan@gmail.com. I also posted the first few pages of that chapter to https://open.substack.com/pub/jimcreechan/p/cartels-meaning-and-usage-in-the?r=dwn67&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
Thanks much there Jim. I will check out those pages, and I'd love see a copy of the chapter as well in ioangrillo@hotmail.com.
Yeah, it's a fascinating, terrifying if sometimes nuanced and complicated issue.
I might be wrong but from Sicilia and kiriakydes from caro to Chapitos or arellanos most cartel where made by coopted commanders of the 70's in CA And B C where the biggest market really started organized as inside the political loop of goverment connections in the CIA or D F S they where the biggest liaers and decievers of the people tdy most relatives of this so called cartel members and allies by politics live driving GT-4 Porches and laudering billions in CA real state they are mostly tdy us citizens and very succesfull buisnesmen recognized by the best universities even so I doubt this criminals are getting what they deserved they are much more powerfull than governments tdy
Thanks for the insight Jorge. Yeah, Sicilia definitely had some weird connections and was caught with a former Bay of Pigs guy. The CIA-DFS-Mafia-Guadalajara dealings of the 70s and 80s were sordid and more still needs be uncovered. Best friend.
Dear Ioan Grillo,
In France, the media and public authorities are talking about the “Mexicanization” of the country and now refer to criminal organizations as “cartels,” without really knowing what that means.
In 2024, I co-authored an educational book on the geopolitics of organized crime .
One section focuses on the Medellin Cartel and offers a definition. I am submitting it to you for your opinion. Sincerely, Michel Gandilhon
traduit du français
Sheet 8 – The Medellín Cartel: The Template
Medellín, Cali, Sinaloa, Escobar, Guzmán—these names attached to Latin American organized crime have become almost legendary. Countless movies, series, and documentaries have turned them into pop-culture icons. Yet behind the more-or-less romanticized myths lie organizations that have triggered geopolitical destabilization on a massive scale in countries such as Colombia, Mexico, and, more recently, Ecuador.
An American Label
The word “cartel” first appeared in 1982 in a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) report following the seizure of 600 kg of cocaine in Cleveland. At that time, it described a network of criminal organizations involved in cocaine trafficking in Colombia’s Antioquia department, whose capital is Medellín. In 1986 the term was used by the U.S. Justice Department in an indictment against Colombian traffickers, and in 1988 the U.S. Senate used it in a report devoted to the Medellín Cartel led by Pablo Escobar.
Everyone knows the term comes from economics, where it designates an agreement among companies in the same sector to restrict competition by fixing prices, limiting production, or dividing markets. Specialists in organized crime often criticize the use of “cartel” in this context. Nevertheless, the analogy is far from meaningless when one looks at the way Escobar’s organization was structured: it really did function as a cartel-like pact involving multiple players.
In its heyday, the Medellín Cartel brought together roughly two hundred autonomous criminal groups that formed alliances with one another to coordinate every stage of cocaine production, transportation, and distribution. Think of it as a solar system. At the center—the “sun”—was the most powerful faction, strategically positioned along the long trafficking chain. Escobar’s strength lay in his mastery of logistics, which allowed him to organize exports to the U.S. market. He owned a fleet of planes that crossed the Caribbean to Florida; his partner Carlos Lehder even owned an island in the Bahamas. Orbiting this core were dozens of smaller organizations that produced cocaine and handed it over to the “office.” Because the core held the upper hand, it bought half the shipment at a low price but guaranteed that any seized merchandise would still be paid for.
Today in Mexico, the Sinaloa Cartel—born from the 1989 breakup of the Guadalajara Cartel and widely regarded as the country’s most powerful criminal organization—is said to consist of around fifty clans totaling tens of thousands of men. In this quasi-feudal system, weaker clans pledge allegiance to the strongest and pay a tax for the right to operate in various rackets (migrants, weapons, fuel theft, etc.) that go far beyond illegal drugs. The balance, however, is fragile; splits and new alliances regularly spark bloody wars for hegemony.
Collapse of the Model
In Colombia, the system eventually imploded under U.S. pressure. Starting in the 1990s, Washington demanded that Colombia extradite the kingpins. The Medellín “cartel” responded by declaring total war on the Colombian state—assassinating politicians, judges, and police officers and carrying out terrorist attacks. Pablo Escobar was killed in 1993. In the vacuum, new actors rose: the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the paramilitary United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC). Many of these civil-war players later demobilized under the 2002 and 2016 peace accords. Those who refused to lay down arms survive today as purely criminal bands still active in the cocaine trade.
Violence in Colombia has dropped sharply since the early 1990s, yet it remains very high. In 2022 the homicide rate was actually higher than in Mexico (28 vs. 26 per 100,000 inhabitants), while cocaine production reached an all-time record. Today the most powerful cartels are Mexican, thanks to their control of the strategic routes that supply the United States with both drugs and migrants.
Spotlight
Organized crime in Latin America is obviously not limited to the big cartels. Cartels rely on a vast ecosystem that includes street gangs and juvenile delinquents. Central America, which over the past twenty years has become a major cocaine transit corridor heading north, has seen a genuine “counter-economy” take root, aided by local actors. In El Salvador, for example, the Sinaloa Cartel works hand-in-glove with the maras—hyper-violent youth gangs that count tens of thousands of members. The same pattern exists in South America, especially in Ecuador, where the Lobos, fighting their rivals the Choneros, have managed to federate other gangs (Tiguerones, Chone Killers, etc.) into an alliance called Nueva Generación (NG), explicitly modeled on—and connected to—the Mexican cartel of the same name.
Key Takeaways
A cartel is an agreement among independent criminal gangs operating in a given territory (Sinaloa, Medellín, Cali, etc.) to carry out illicit activities. The pact is generally dominated by the strongest gang, to which the others swear allegiance. Emerging in Colombia in the 1970s, these organizations spread thanks to the drug trade across much of Latin America, where they continue to wield significant geopolitical destabilizing power.
Fascinating and useful stuff here, thanks much for posting. "Love this line: Think of it as a solar system. At the center—the “sun”—was the most powerful faction, strategically positioned along the long trafficking chain." - Great metaphor.
Thank you very much. The data on the origin of the use of the word “cartel” comes from the work of Alain Labrousse, France's leading specialist in the geopolitics of drugs. It partly overlaps with your article. It's always a pleasure to read your work. Here is a link to an article in which I criticize the absurd concept of “Mexicanization” as applied to the situation in France. As for the use of “narcos” to describe cocaine traffickers, it is etymologically absurd because cocaine is not a narcotic... Quite the contrary. But anyway, it's become common usage now.
https://www.iris-france.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/ObsCi_2025_10_Mexicanisation_Note.pdf
Thanks there friend, I'll take a look.
Being an active member of the "down the food chain" cartel I can say we overwhelm in numbers the real cartels as described here.
Interesting point. Is that referring to U.S. streets? There, the cartels are smaller wholesale operations I understand as opposed to Mexico where they run things much lower down. All best there friend!
The streets and, more and more, the predominantly rural areas in America. These products are quite available on the open range.
Interesting times, and great you made it through and are here with the us estimado Gregorio
One of the three critiques you mention, that cartels don't fix prices, is easily refuted by the fact that narcos (I will use this word unapologetically, since that is what we call them in México) run rackets at the expense of farmers who produce a variety of agrarian commodities, most famously avocado. I suggest you look up into the surge of violence against leaders of the agrarian community who have recently spoken against the dirt-price they have been forced to accept for their products.
Yeah, great point and interesting connection there. And absolutely on the attacks on leaders, especially in Michoacan, that is a powder keg right now. All best there Diego!
Fascinating as always, mate. I’ve always had the impression that ‘cartel’ was a term that had been lazily used by the media and law enforcement to be attached to any large scale crime organisation that were making their mark in the world. Without being an expert on the subject I’d always looked on Medellin - at least in the glory days - as being the very definition of a cartel, with the different members of it who all worked together for a greater good. Interestingly I’d always assumed that they didn’t actually call themselves as that name but had never seen it confirmed anywhere so thank you for clearing that up for me!
I'm glad you wrote this response to the criticism of the term cartel and think that your journalism is valuable, but I think one aspect of Zavala's critique that you don't address that goes beyond him problematizing the word "cartel" is the reliance by many journalists on reporting state narratives. And it makes sense. It is is the norm in crime reporting in the US too to just basically report a police/state press release as fact (or at the very least without question).
I think really the main argument underneath the polemical statement "Drug Cartels Do Not Exist" is to push us to think about how neoliberal economic policy coupled with the increased militarization of the State (on both sides of the border) IS what created the conditions for the explosion in violence. It is no mystery that in the gulf areas, baja, and Guerrero that multinational corporations have moved in and expanded extraction industry largely for the gain of US elites, but how could this have been possible if the "Cartels" are actually the ones in control of these areas?
I think this is the deeper question, points to how the violence is very real, and how paramilitary organizations have long supported the interests of capital.
Thanks there Cam and those are call good points. That criticism of the government's claims and narratives is sorely needed on both sides of the Rio Grande. And cartels are involved in working to oppress environmental defender as I wrote about in a new story here - https://www.crashoutmedia.com/p/cartels-versus-environmentalists - All best there friend (and sorry I hand't responded earlier but I had missed the comment). Best
Mr loan Grillo , Im really intrigued by the stories you write . But there's a lot of other cartels out there , that journalists and people rarely know much about or rarely speak of. Most people know of El Chapo Guzman , El Mayo , El mencho Los Chapitos , el Guano ect . But after this year's presidential elections in Mexico your going see a huge power move by a cartel from northern Sinaloa , these individuals from that said group are extremely rich & powerful , but more importantly they have the Mexican government in there pocket . But like I said no one really knows much about them .except that there very discreet , extremely violent & well connected with everyone & everywhere . This cartel is ran by El chapo Isidro , he started as a sicario under The Amado Carrillo-fuentes DTO then the Beltran-Leyva DTO , he learned from the best .No wonder he's a smart business man , leader & mediator . I Would like to have a conversation sometime .
This sounds very interesting and I would be happy to talk. Send me a message at ioangrillo@hotmail.com and we can arrange something if you like. Best Leobardo.
Ioan. Thank you. You mentioned a couple of times the complex nature of Mexican law enforcement's relationship with the criminal organizations. They work with the criminal element and yet fight them. Have you researched or written on this relationship in more detail elsewhere?
I get into somewhat in this pieces here, but I could perhaps do a separate story on just this topic. Best there.
https://www.crashoutmedia.com/p/so-is-mexico-a-narco-state
That would be excellent. Thank you for the link.
You always have an excellency of content. Not sure if you’re on FB, my friend and I run a Border page called Broken Border-The Truth about Living on the Tx. Border
Thanks there Trinda, I will def check that out.
Very informative and excellent read!
Thanks much for reading Trinda and good to have your voice here. All best there.
The murder of Mormon women and children looks like a Luciferian sacrifice. The Mormon Church itself is Luciferian, and a former co-worker of mine, Steve Ross, was ritually sacrificed by Mormons at the age of around 43.
https://inscribedonthebelievingmind.blog/2022/10/30/kristy-knight-the-mormon-church-and-project-monarch/
I'm going to read this more carefully, but what caught my eye about the Cartel del Golfo were the symbols and slogans they displayed, which are the same death-cult type as the secret societies of the Luciferian Brotherhood. The cartels were clearly created by the CIA -- the Luciferians' assassins -- as were the Central American death squads and MS-13 (I knew someone who could have been a founding member of MS-13, and he was an MK-Ultra mind-controlled CIA asset)
"Valor" "Strength and immortality" "Transformation" -- transhumanism
"Respect" "Loyalty" "Discipline" -- fascist ethos
and the image of a phoenix (the highest seat on the Satanic Council), a scorpion, and an eagle clutching a snake
https://twitter.com/OfficialBalam/status/1451969637206351872
Hi Diana, that is very interesting. I hadn't noticed that symbolism but I do know there were narcos in Tamaulipas where the Gulf Cartel into some Satanic stuff. I'll have to look further into that. Best there.
Jessie Czebotar is the ultimate insider on the Luciferian Brotherhood, as she was chosen from birth to succeed the crone, who is the leader of the five queen mothers of darkness. She explains all of their symbols on Aquarius Rising Africa on YouTube. https://inscribedonthebelievingmind.blog/2022/09/06/jessie-czebotar/
Okay, I'll check that out. Although I must admit, even though I cover gangsters I find Satanic stuff can be a bit scary!
Wait until you read my post tomorrow on human trafficking! NASA calls the vaccinated homoborgenesis because they were planning on selling people off-world as cyborg slaves. The Cabal's space fleet, Solar Warden, has already been doing this for decades.
:)
:) Back at yer bro!