Posted by Tina
The following article is instructive regarding the growing threat on our southern border. It provides links to the authors entire testimony before the Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere of the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee. You will have to scroll down on the blog to find the article. It was posted around March 18th.
More About the Mexican Narco-Terror Networks, by Michael Braun – Counterterrorismblog
** “The Mexican cartels corporate headquarters are set up South of our border, and thanks to corruption, cartel leaders often carry out their work in palatial surroundings. The cartel leaders manage and direct the daily activities of command and control cells that are typically located just across the border in our Country. **
** Those command and control cells manage and direct the daily activities of distribution, transportation and money laundering cells all across our Nation. *** The cartels operate just like terrorist organizations, with extremely complex organizational structures, consisting of highly compartmentalized cells: distribution cells, transportation cells, money laundering cells, and in some cases assassination cells or hit squads. Many experts believe Mexican and Colombian drug trafficking organizations are far more sophisticated, operationally and organizationally, then Middle Eastern terrorist organizations. *** The Mexican cartels rely heavily on three of their most important tradecraft tools to maintain power: corruption, intimidation and violencethe hallmarks of organized crime. If they cant corrupt you, they will intimidate you; if that doesnt work, they will turn to brutal violence. Without the hallmarks of organized crime, the cartels simply cannot effectively operate. The Mexican cartels spend hundreds of millions of dollars to corrupt each year, and they have succeeded in corrupting virtually every level of the Mexican government. If anyone believes for one minute that these powerful syndicates are not looking north into the United States to corrupttheyre obviously blind. We are already experiencing a spillover of drug related violence, and its not just in communities along our SWB. Its also playing out in places like Atlanta, Chicago, Omaha, Seattle, Maui and Anchorage. **