The death of Nemecio Oseguera or “El Mencho”, head of the Jalisco New Generation (CJNG) cartel, caused a wave of violence in , with dozens of dead.
The announcement of his death brought a violent reaction from the cartel, whose members attacked gas stations, stores and banks and clashed with Mexican authorities in 20 states.
The Mexican government announced the deployment of another 2,500 troops to Jalisco, bringing to 10,000 the number of troops deployed in the region since Sunday.
MEXICO ON FLAMES!
The death of “El Mencho” has unleashed absolute chaos. The leader of the CJNG, the most powerful drug group in the country, has fallen.
Are we facing the end of an empire or the beginning of a criminal civil war?
I’ll tell you in THIS THREAD (1/12)
— Memorias de Pez (@MemoriasPez)
How threatened is the World Cup?
El Mencho’s “head” will be highly valued by the Trump administration and will likely reduce some of the pressure on Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum.
But with the soccer World Cup approaching and Mexico being, along with the United States and Canada, a co-host country, the Sheinbaum administration needs to limit the fallout from this affair very quickly, or people may be reluctant to travel to Mexico.
How the cartels react
When such incidents occur, cartels usually react in three ways
THE first it is a show of force, aimed at preventing the Authorities from carrying out new operations. And that is exactly what we saw happening.
THE second way is often internal conflicts between factions of the same cartel or wars for control of territories with other cartels trying to invade foreign territories. Something gang members are already talking about.
THE third is a declaration of war against the Mexican government and security forces.
Who is the “El Mencho” cartel?
This particular cartel is notoriously violent and untrustworthy and our British journalists’ mediators in Mexico have always warned them not to even attempt to approach it.
The CJNG, along with the Sinaloa cartel, is the largest producer of a range of illegal drugs, including the opioid fentanyl, a drug produced mainly in Mexico and exported to the United States, where it kills thousands of users each year. The fact that its leader has been killed does not mean that the Nea Genia cartel of Jalisco is near its end.
US President Donald Trump’s war on drugs has mainly focused on Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela and Mexico. And after the arrest of Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro in January, the Mexican government is under even greater pressure to step up the fight against cartels at home and show tangible results.
