Combating Drug Trafficking: Strategies for a Safer Mexico

Abstract

[Name] [Instructor Name] EN 1311 10/31/2023 Finding a solution to stop drug trafficking in Mexico. For a long time, dealing with drugs has been a major, difficult problem in Mexico. It has made things less safe, traversed how money works, and changed how people live in the country. To solve this difficult problem, everyone, including ordinary citizens and the government, must collaborate on a solution. This issue has long harmed many families and individuals; therefore, finding a solution that benefits everyone is a win. Experts emphasize a key concern in the drug trafficking situation, emphasizing the government's role. Previously, attempts were taken to conceal this affiliation; nevertheless, there is a clear shift in Mexico, with state bodies unconcerned about public awareness of their engagement in such operations. Evidence points to countless lawmakers, government staff, and even presidents working in various capacities with drug dealers. President Calderón refers to these mutually beneficial relationships as "zones of impunity," which are areas in Mexico where cartels have complete operational freedom, allowing them to continue supplying drugs to the United States. The resulting earnings have been deliberately used to challenge the legitimacy of the Mexican government. These tactical alliances involve money transfers to avoid detection, maintain drug trafficking activities, and prevent extradition to the United States. P.R. Kan (2012). The second solution I see to this problem is for the civilians to stop taking the cartel's side instead of the government's side. Believe it or not, this happens a lot in Mexico, especially in the poor towns and cities, because what the cartels do occasionally that the government never does is that they take food for all the people in need. They also take them mattresses and blankets or help them out. They bring the kids toys so they can enjoy them and have something to play with because most of the time, the families in those towns cannot afford toys for the kids, sometimes not even used toys. They do this because they want to take advantage of many people in those small towns who are in poverty. Because the government does not hand out things to people with low incomes as they do, the civilians take the cartel's side because they believe that they are helping them out, and the government is not. In some ways, it could make sense, but it is not at all true because even though they are helping the poor in many ways, they also affect many other people in so many ways. They kidnap people; they sell drugs to millions of people, and most of the people they sell have been affected over the years. One thing they do a lot that is not talked about enough, in my opinion, is that they recruit a lot of young teenage boys and promise them money and power, and they ruin their lives because of that. Troopers have seen an increasing trend of cartels using social media to recruit youth for human smuggling operations. (News wire, 2023). Many of the boys they recruit are from the ages 11-15, and most of them are in a very difficult monetary situation, and that is why they join them; they want to help out their family, and the cartels promise them a lot of money. A kid that young cannot process the consequences that a decision like that can cause because it is sad to say, but 98% of the people that get into that kind of life by the age of 38 are either dead or in prison, serving a sentence. I believe that one big solution, or, better said, the difference between the U.S. and Mexico in this subject and why I believe that in the U.S., you do not really see as much organized Crime as in Mexico is because of the law. In Mexico, no one has respect for regular cops, even state troopers; they only have respect for the soldiers or the National Guard because they are the only ones who battle the cartels and organized Crime. The cartels buy most of the regular policemen, and even state troopers so they can keep on operating the streets of the city they are in, and quote, these criminal organizations in Mexico are the most powerful in the world. They have become, in many areas in that country, more powerful than the government institutions (Sandoval,1999). On the other hand, in the U.S., it is way different because hardly anyone tries to even level up to a police officer; in every traffic stop, almost everyone tries to comply with everything that the policeman says and asks for. In the U.S., the soldiers and the National Guard are only used for wars against other countries, but most of the time, they are in training for things like those. As in Mexico, the soldiers and the National Guard must be on duty 24/7 to combat the cartels. A vast difference also between the U.S. and Mexico in this sense is that in Mexico, it is easy to bribe a regular police officer or even a state trooper, whereas, in America, it is a felony to even try and do that kind of stuff. In my opinion, those kinds of details have a lot to do with the...