New article on GTO cartel activity

[DonJuane]

A friend pointed this out and unfortunately at least on my machine, Google Translate won't translate the entire page so I translated for anyone's benefit who is interested. Please forgive any mistakes I made but I had to cut and paste in a paragraph at a time.

Original articles:
https://www.smafaq.com/discussion/602/ca...najuato-cl
https://poplab.mx/article/Guerradecartel...Guanajuato

My pieced translation:


Cartels war sinks at the helm and bathes blood in Guanajuato

The de facto alliance between the state government, the federal government and the CJNG to eliminate El Marro has been trying unsuccessfully to crush him for 9 months; the CSRL counterattack has caused the governor's popularity to decline

For approximately three years the different drug trafficking groups that dispute control of the state of Guanajuato have been in a virtual technical tie. Although each cartel has managed to consolidate areas of influence, it is difficult to draw the “border lines”. We know that in León, Silao, Dolores, the towns of Rincón and the northwest of the state there is a strong presence of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG). In the south of the entity (Pénjamo, Acámbaro, Salvatierra, Santiago Valley) there are still incursions of cells from the Michoacan cartels that threaten the conquests of the CJNG. Finally, in Salamanca, Celaya, San Luis de la Paz, Villagrán and the Apaseos area, the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel (CSRL) dominates, aimed mainly at the illegal extraction of hydrocarbons, although it has recently strengthened its “division” of kidnapping and extortion, and has ventured into the theft of ATMs and bank branches.

Technical tie

But much of the state is still in dispute. There are regions and municipalities that have passed from control of one cartel to another, in relatively short periods of time. According to the heat maps that the State Attorney General's Office (FGE) began to publish on its social networks, this situation occurs in Irapuato, León, Salamanca and Celaya. There are too many territories that are no man's land, or rather, that are everyone's land. There is no clear winner. There is no hegemonic cartel in the state, so we are in the worst of all possible worlds. There are several cartels fighting the control of the entity, but so far none has managed to prevail. This "technical tie" is in fact the main reason that explains the bloodbath that is lived in the state. The cartels are braided in a deputy in which nobody wants to give ground. The sides at war have the human, material and financial resources to keep up the fight. The worst part is that they have supply lines outside of Guanajuato (Jalisco, Michoacán and San Luis Potosí). Even if the business falls, they can continue to receive support from abroad. We have been like this for more than 3 years.

A new actor enters the scene

We all remember the sweeping pace with which the CJNG broke into Guanajuato. In record time he crushed and annihilated historical leaders of drug trafficking and car theft in León, such as Gustavo Sánchez Reynoso, (a) "El Jari". They advanced to bayonet openwork in municipalities such as Silao, Romita, Pénjamo and Irapuato. The ruthless commanders sent by Nemesio Oceguera (a) "El Mencho", leader of the CJNG, "were taking a place" with relative ease. But the CJNG suffered the "disease of victory." His rapid advance through several municipalities in the state made them think that Guanajuato would be a piece of cake. They started by placing blankets on bridges, roundabouts and boulevards. They executed some local narcocumenudists. Beside their bodies they put phosphorescent cards with the list of the following rival narcomenudists who would be killed, looking for their dispersion. We all learned the way. A narcomanta, a massacre, a stage setting and its diffusion on social networks, were the house brand. They were the famous clean of Jalisco.

Emergence of United Cartels

At first it seemed that the battle would be decided in favor of the CJNG, but it was not. The Gulf Cartel, the Zetas and the Sinaloa Cartel gradually realized that if the CJNG's hosts came to control Guanajuato as a whole, they would be dangerously approaching their main operational bases. This is how the group of United Cartels (CU) emerged, an amalgam of several cartel cells to face the advance of CJNG troops. More out of necessity than for pleasure, they agreed to finance and support the army of José Antonio Yepez, (a) “El Marro”, leader of the Santa Rosa Cartel, dedicated for at least 12 years to fuel theft. They applied a universal maxim of the art of war: the enemy of my enemy is my friend. The expansion of the CJNG stopped when they entered the domains of El Marro. José Antonio Yepez was not left, resisted the onslaught and pushed back the troops of El Mencho. With the decisive support of the Shadow Group, a cell of the Gulf Cartel, the war entered an impasse. The narcomantas and cards that the CJNG left on decapitated bodies were answered with an amazing video in which El Marro challenged and threatened the CJNG. El Marro would not give up and would not be given control of the extraction of hydrocarbon from the PEMEX pipelines, its main economic activity.

Alvar and Zamarripa

Surprised by the emergence of the CJNG in the state of Guanajuato, with the Shield Project still in the test phase, with a state of force that had not been trained to combat drug trafficking cells, the tandem formed by the then attorney Carlos Zamarripa and by Alvar Cabeza de Vaca, secretary of Public Security, hesitated. The truth is that the Michoacan cartels, El Marro, the Gulf Cells and the Zetas had time working in the state. That is why Alvar and Zamarripa minimized the incursion of the CJNG. They thought the same thing would have happened that had already happened in other years. A new cartel arrives, takes control of a specific area of ​​the state, commits some high-impact criminal acts and creates new accommodations. Peace and tranquility would return shortly. The state was big enough for everyone.

El Mencho goes for everything

But they didn't have "El Mencho". Nemesio Oceguera gave the fulminating instruction to invade and control the entire state of Guanajuato. CJNG cells tried to comply with the order and certainly advanced several kilometers inside. They conquered many places with blood and fire. But when the CJNG reached the most important areas for hydrocarbon extraction, things got complicated. El Marro organized the resistance. The "huachicoleros" fought, organized, defended and won. The local mafias of Guanajuato managed to stop the advance of the CJNG, although with a dose of external support. It was an epic and memorable moment for the Guanajuato local cartels.
Guanajuato, just one more piece on the board

For its part, the government of Miguel Márquez could not read in time the new scenarios of the geopolitics of drug cartels. El Mencho turned Guanajuato into a strategic objective for the expansion and mastery of drug transfer, largely due to the weakening of the Sinaloa cartel. With the arrest of Dámaso López in Mexico City, and the award-winning delation agreement signed by the Mini Lic. (His son), before the DEA, the Sinaloa cartel was contracted and reconcentrated in its own territories. With that front almost completely closed, the CJNG was in a position to expand its areas of influence. One of the new places on which it was launched was Guanajuato. The war has spread to Veracruz and Michoacán. The increase in violence in Guanajuato was not the product of the “revolving door” that allows criminals carrying weapons to be released shortly afterwards. It is not due to the absence of federal forces in the entity. Nor was it due to the dispute over the control of the extraction of gasoline from the PEMEX pipelines. The origin of the war in Guanajuato had its origin in the commercial expansion policy of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel. No more no less.

The CJNG in the lands of José Alfredo

Faced with the arrival of the CJNG in Guanajuato, the first reaction of the state government was the “tactical withdrawal”. Álvar and Zamarripa allowed the Mencho to break with the agreements and division of territories that were among the different drug cartels in the state: Zetas, Gulf Cartel, Knights Templar. That was the time when the then Governor Miguel Márquez went to the media to say that the deaths and executions were among people who "were in bad steps." Maybe the government had to fight the incursion of the CJNG, but it did not. He let them get in the back door. And the new boys in the neighborhood ruffled the whole chicken coop. This “withdrawal tactics” was implemented by Zamarripa in several municipalities of Guanajuato, such as Cuerámaro or Manuel Doblado, where the PGJE withdrew the commandos of ministerial police and public prosecutor offices, after threats and machine gun bursts that these offices received . He reopened them recently, now that the CJNG has full control over the area.

The defeat of Miguel Márquez

The former governor Miguel Márquez put all his effort to bring down the insecurity in the state. He put his best, gave the battle, really committed to the issue, but failed. He oriented the budget and sacrificed resources in the election year to address the problem of insecurity. He made a million dollar investment to acquire surveillance technology (Shield Project). He made another million dollar investment to bring a military brigade to the state. Even their municipalities joined the coperacha. He replaced several municipal police officers, imposing the Single Command in several regions of the entity. One of the few battles that Márquez fought against the federal government was to demand Miguel Osorio Chong and PEMEX to become jointly responsible for the illegal extraction of fuels. He pressured federal legislators to change the legal framework. Miguel Márquez did circus, maroma and theater, but nothing worked. When the arrest in Puerto Vallarta of Víctor Manuel Pérez Rico, one of the leaders of the Gulf Cartel, was announced, it was also made public that He had his base of operations and permanent residence ... In the city of León! Rendered at the evidence of the failure of his policies, Márquez dropped a sentence at one of the last meetings he headed of the Guanajuato Coordination group where the point was addressed. This phrase could well be his epitaph of his security policies: "so that this man has been living in León without us noticing, there are only two soups, or he was very intelligent, or we are very stupid." It seems both were totally true.

The municipal police take sides

The state and municipal public security bodies have always played a role in supporting the cartels. But they certainly had not been forced to take sides so openly and explicitly. With the "technical tie" between El Marro and the CJNG, these groups forced corporations to be part of the war. Municipal and Single Command police represent small armies, which are well worth having under control. Depending on the municipality, these are small battalions of between 30 and 300 armed elements, with trunk radios and vehicles. The bribes had the expected effect and some (many) municipal police began to work for the cartels, not only in the storage and transportation of the merchandise, but with the apprehension, harassment and annihilation of rival narcos. They went from being chalanes partially responsible for cargo logistics, to being members of the armed arms of the cartels.

Police blood

This is how murders of directors, commanders and operational police officers of Celaya, Irapuato, Valle de Santiago, Apaseo el Grande, Salamanca, etc. began to take place. The police corps of these municipalities no longer only engaged in peripheral tasks in support of the narco. They were recruited for the different cartels to perform their own business operations. They made arrests of rival narcos, seized loads of competition and freed friendly narcos. If the directors of the Single Command were easy prey, the municipal police directors were even more so. The reaction could not wait. As the municipal police joined the armies of the cartels, there began to be casualties in the corporations. Bloody account adjustments and executions of police officers throughout the state. Despite posthumous tributes, most of the murdered police officers have not fallen in the line of duty, but because they were collaborating with one of the cartels in dispute.

The cops mutiny

Aware that they were the weakest link in the chain, low-ranking police began to rebel. On the one hand, they received the instruction of their superiors to work in favor of a cartel. But rival cartels began to annihilate them, literally as fair ducklings. Some demonstrated and others simply began to defect. The furious reaction of Álvar Cabeza de Vaca every time elements of the State Public Security Forces (FSPE) are manifested, has some logic. It is to some extent unacceptable that their warriors riot against the enemy. But the cops are also right in their own way. They do not have bulletproof vests, nor do they have the weaponry to deal with the cartels. For example, in the videos of the elite group of the CJNG it can be seen that its members use Barret 50 caliber, FN FAL 50 modified, AR15 with double drum and ground-air missiles. Not even the army brings that kind of weaponry. The result: Guanajuato is the state with the highest number of police killings and has the highest dropout rate among its hosts. The massive resignation of police officers that Luis Alberto Villareal, municipal president of San Miguel de Allende had to stop, is a clear example of the weaknesses, and why not say it, fears that invade the municipal police. They do not have weapons, vests, equipment, salaries, benefits and commanders sufficiently trained to fulfill the task of protecting citizens.

The professionalization of violence: contract killings

Because the cartels also rose to the next level. At the beginning, when the CJNG came to “sit a seat” in the municipalities, a small command recruited local hitmen, trained them and began to carry out their activities. They used to not be as effective, and even made mistakes frequently. The trade also requires a learning curve. However, hitmen from Sinaola, Tamaulipas and Jalisco began arriving. That is, professionals who did "turns" as God commands. Professional gunmen commissioned to kill senior police officers and strategic objectives. If there are groups that go to hospitals to “top off” narcotics shot, it is not only because of viciousness or evil. It is because in Guanajuato there are already “contract killings”. The targets set are eliminated, the hitmen do not charge. Even several clinics and hospitals are reluctant to activate the "silver code", the protocol that is applied when a gunshot wounded arrives for medical attention. What is the case of activating this code, when on many occasions municipal police arrive escorting and protecting injured narcos?

The war against the huachicol

When the federal government decided to combat the milking of PEMEX pipelines, there was a radical change in the strategy to combat insecurity that was implemented by the state government. The tactical withdrawal of Alvar and Zamarripa ended and they went on the offensive. The FSPE and the new State Attorney General's Office declared war on the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel. In a hopeful meeting in Mexico City, Arturo Durazo, secretary of Public Security of the federal government, gave absolute guarantees to Governor Diego Sinhue Rodríguez Vallejo that AMLO's commitment to combat huachicol was genuine. And indeed it was. Through approach operations, the FSPE and federal forces seized the emblematic community of Santa Rosa de Lima in Villagrán. They arrested relatives of El Marro, seized wineries, residences, property and property. The Governor himself went to Santa Rosa, ordered a police academy to be built on land seized in the area, bank accounts of alleged cartel financial operators were frozen, etc. Finally, the state government put on gloves and directed its batteries against a cartel. But ... Why did the state government choose the CSRL as an enemy and did not exert similar pressure against the CJNG and the territories under its control?

Choosing dance partner

The army made up of ministerial police and state forces is by far the "weakest rival" on the battlefield. As any layman in military strategy knows, it is impossible for the weakest army to simultaneously face two armies that overcome it in strength, firepower and knowledge of the ground (CJNG and CSRL). Four possibilities were then opened: A) to foster a truce among the contestants and to formalize a distribution of territories (which was the strategy that was implemented during almost the entire six-year term of former governor Juan Manuel Oliva), B) Make a tacit alliance with one of the cartels and in fact fight the other. With a single cartel dominating the state, peace would ensue in the entity, C) Maintain a withdrawal strategy, which is essentially what Alvar and Zamarripa had done, D) Launch into a holy crusade against both cartels. Of all the options, the only affordable one, but not without risks and complications, was to fight one of the cartels and give the other a wide sleeve. The dilemma was to know which of them had to make an unspoken alliance and which one to face. The answer came from Los Pinos, with the war that the federal government declared against fuel theft. The enemy would be El Marro and the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel.

TUCOM arises: All Against the Marro

There is a de facto alliance between the state government, the federal government and the CJNG to eliminate El Marro. This coalition has been trying unsuccessfully to crush the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel for 9 months. The counterattack of El Marro has caused the governor's popularity to decline. While the intention to vote in favor of the PAN decreases in the industrial belt, it is clear that the government of Diego Sinhue is losing the war.

As time went by, El Marro and its operators built a political protection network (mayors), fed a social support base (residents and community leaders) and a police protection network (municipal police directors, subprocurators and FSPE commanders) who support their army of hitmen, narcomenudists and criminal cells. The joint operations of the National Guard and State Forces only impact hydrocarbon extraction, that is, they only affect one aspect of El Marro's activities. But Marro's "portfolio of services" is broader. To truly dismantle the cartel, state and federal governments must amputate the political arm, the economic arm and the social arm that underpin the CSRL. It is not an easy task. For example, to prevent the CSRL from making use of fund 1 of branch 33 of the municipalities that it controls politically, it would be necessary to initiate the trial of origin to dismiss its municipal presidents. Even the SHCP financial intelligence unit received a setback recently when a judge ordered the accounts of the municipality of Villagrán to be unfrozen. They are definitely not enchiladas.
The war goes on

Something similar to what happened with the Tláhuac cartel in Mexico City is happening with the CSRL. We simply underestimate him. Apparently El Marro and his hosts took root in the area of ​​Celaya, Salamanca, Villagrán and Los Apaseos, etc., deeper than we thought. They obtained political support (they financed campaigns of several candidates who are now mayors), obtained logistical support (from PEMEX officials to milk the gas pipelines), bought police protection and gained social support through the delivery of medicines, supplies and the organization of parties and dances for the residents of communities and rancherías. Crush the Marro and his hosts will take time. They are not a simple band of outlaws. Nor are they a cartel the size of the Sinaloa Cartel or the CJNG. They are a medium level cartel, but a cartel at last. El Mencho has been fighting Santa Rosa de Lima for at least three years and had not been able to defeat them. It is hoped that the combined onslaught of the federal government, the government of Diego Sinhué and the CJNG itself, will end the dominance of El Marro. But it will take time. As it happened with the Tláhuac Cartel. During that period there will be ups and downs in the homicide rate in the state. Months in which high-impact crimes will decrease and months in which they will shoot with apocalyptic scenes. In the meantime, a segment of the CSRL hosts have in fact returned to “their origins” that is, the kidnapping of entrepreneurs, the extortion of small businesses and the theft of bank branches. All of them activities that never stopped performing, but that have now increased. However, these crimes generate a serious impact on citizens, which negatively impacts the levels of intention to vote of the PAN in key municipalities of the industrial corridor: Celaya and Irapuato.

CSRL counteroffensive

On the other hand, if the efforts of El Marro bear fruit and make May Zambada and the Sinaloa Cartel "open a second front" against the CJNG within the state of Guanajuato, the war will continue. State and federal forces are concentrated and stationed in the areas where Marro operates. But if the Sinaloa Cartel attacks the CJNG in León and the towns of Rincon, it will force a displacement of troops to that area, relieving pressure on the Marro. With the cunning that characterizes him, Mayo Zambada has become Uncle Lolo. Indeed, he opened a second front against Mencho, but in Guadalajara and its metropolitan area (with Nacho Coronel's son in front). That doesn't work for Marro. He needs the cells of the Sinaloa Cartel to act directly in León. In sum, unless El Marro has accumulated wealth that allows it to subsist on a substantial reduction in revenue, after the reduction of clandestine fuel intakes, the cartel war would last at least two or three years. The CJNG would take over the state of Guanajuato and ensue peace. But that will not happen before the midterm elections. The fight against insecurity commanded by the Governor, ironically, would end up undermining the PAN vote in 2021.
The end of the war

But the pacification of the state does not depend on the strategy of Golón de Timón launched by Governor Diego Sinhue. Nor does it have to do with the deployment of federal forces in the region or the work of the elite Marine Corps. That would be as much as thinking that a Chihuahuan dog (FSPE and FGE) could impose peace between a rottweiler (CJNG) and a German shepherd (CSRL). Peace in Guanajuato depends on the geopolitics of the cartels that dispute the national territory. Some analysts point out that El Mencho has many open fronts. Fight against Viagras and self-defense groups in Michoacán. In Veracruz he has a bloody battle, municipality by municipality, against the Zetas. In Jalisco he confronts the heirs of Nacho Coronel, the Sinaloa Cartel and the Governor Enrique Alfaro. And in Guanajuato, he is at war against El Marro and the United Cartels. It is a fact that the CJNG has its forces dispersed in several states, which prevents it from concentrating all its firepower to fight a single enemy like El Marro. What are the options? That the CJNG can end the war in Jalisco or Michoacán and thus transfer troops and resources to Guanajuato. For example, the CJNG Elite Group has proven to be fearfully lethal and effective. In a short time, the leaders of the United Cartels, in Silao, and the historical leader of drug trafficking in Valle de Santiago, Alfonso Mendoza Valencia (a) El Michoacano, were beheaded. But the elite group had to leave Guanajuato to go fight in Michoacán. Even so, a gradual weakening of El Marro's forces begins to be seen, but at a desperately slow pace. And the blows he gives, form the structures of state and municipal government, such as cases of extortion that were provided in shops and tortillas in Celaya.

These episodes have reduced the intention to vote in favor of the PAN to levels never seen before in that municipality.

Two scenarios

The end of the war would occur if the CJNG manages to reinforce the army deployed in Guanajuato. With the support of the state and federal government, the Mencho would take over Guanajuato and the war would move to the neighboring state of Querétaro, the next step for the CJNG to join the forces it has stationed in Guanajuato and the State of Mexico. It must be clear, the war never ends, it is only exported. But the war will continue if Marro manages to convince Mayo Zambada to open a second front against the CJNG in León. We depend on the decision made by Mayo Zambada in the solitude of one of its many hiding places where it is hidden somewhere in the golden triangle. The dilemma is to support or not support El Marro. For our sake, hopefully El Mayo makes the best decision.

Government of the State will never recognize that there is much left for the long-awaited peace to come to Guanajuato families. He cannot, under any scenario, confess that the achievement of peace does not depend on them. When the time comes, there will be others who will sit at the table to sign the armistice. The Prosecutor's Office and the FSPE play a secondary role on the battlefield. This is not by far the Guanajuato that Diego Sinhue wanted to show off in his first year of management. Diego faces a bloody Guanajuato, at war and plunged into a spiral of violence that will take a long time to calm down. This sad picture constitutes Diego's insecurity. The damn inheritance he received and about which there is not much he can do in the short and medium terms.

[roberb7]

I read the first part of this article on smafaq.com this morning. Thanks for translating the rest of it; there's some important stuff here.