Mexican Cartels Build Mad Max Narco Tanks

Hugh Pickens writes "Not content with building their own submarines, using bazookas, rocket-propelled grenades or land mines, drug cartels are now building armored assault vehicles, complete with gun turrets, inch-thick armor plates, firing ports and bulletproof glass. The monsters look like a cross between a handmade assault vehicle used by a Somali warlord and something out of a post-apocalyptic Mad Max movie, and have already appeared in several confrontations with Mexican authorities. A look inside a captured 'monster' truck (YouTube video) reveals that in addition to swiveling turrets to shoot in any direction, they have hatches and peepholes for snipers, their spacious interiors can fit as many as 20 armed men, and they are coated with polyurethane for insulation and to reduce noise. Still Patrick Corcoran writes that the armored vehicles are not a game changer. 'While the "narco-tanks," as the vehicles are often called, make for great blog fodder and provide entertaining videos, seeing their rise as a significant escalation in Mexico's drug war would be wrongheaded,' writes Corcoran. 'In the end, the "tanks" are a sexy narrative, but these mistaken notions about the criminals' "military might" not only inflate the power of Mexico's groups far beyond any reasonable assessment, they also obscure the problem, and its potential solutions.'"

Comments

solutions...

[Azghoul]

"its potential solutions."

What, you mean like ending the hideous and utterly failed drug 'war'?

Re:solutions...

[Hazel Bergeron]

It hasn't failed at all. It's providing a tidy profit for all those who intended to gain from it.

Re:solutions...

[hairyfeet]

What failure? Private prisons funnel tons of dollars straight from the tax payers to the multinational cartels, a single drug bust can ensure you have a large underclass ready for exploitation for everything from booze and smokes to lotto tickets and check cashing places, it helps to keep the population under control while giving a nice excuse to make the police more and more like a military operating on home soil, while also helping to get rid of those pesky little things like the fourth amendment...oh...were you actually thinking it was about stopping drugs? Silly peasant it is about profits for the megacorps, just like everything else.

After all if it was about "The People" then pot would be legal, we wouldn't be fighting three wars while funneling ever more money to Wall Street and the MIC, nobody would touch Medicaid and Medicare, the military would be less than half the size and not building new aircraft carriers and superweapons like we had a war planned with the Ruskies for next Tuesday, but where is the room for massive profits and corruption in that? That is why your "vote" is a choice between "Rich corporate ass kisser in a blue suit" or "Rich corporate ass kisser in a slightly darker blue suit". Any choice that might actually listen to the people would cut into profits! Mustn't have that now, can we?

BTW how's that "Hope and Change" thing working out? Turned out to be nothing but Dubya dipped in chocolate huh? I'm afraid the late Bill Hicks nailed it more than 20 years ago. How sad is it the man has been gone for two decades and if anything his words are even more true now?

Re:solutions...

[Demonoid-Penguin]

BTW how's that "Hope and Change" thing working out? Turned out to be nothing but Dubya dipped in chocolate huh? I'm afraid the late Bill Hicks nailed it more than 20 years ago. How sad is it the man has been gone for two decades and if anything his words are even more true now?

Bill Hicks:-

I smoke. If this bothers anyone, I suggest you look around at the world in which we live and shut your fuckin' mouth.

Your denial is beneath you, and thanks to the use of hallucinogenic drugs, I see through you.

"This is your brain." I've seen a lot of weird shit on drugs. I have never ever ever ever EVER looked at a fucking egg and thought it was a brain.

If you don't believe drugs have done good things for us, then go home and burn all your records, all your tapes, and all your CDs because every one of those artists who have made brilliant music and enhanced your lives? RrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrEAL fucking high on drugs. The Beatles were so fucking high they let Ringo sing a few songs.

I have never seen two people on pot get in a fight because it is fucking IMPOSSIBLE. "Hey, buddy!" "Hey, what?" "Ummmmmmm...." End of argument.

Why is marijuana against the law? It grows naturally upon our planet. Doesn't the idea of making nature against the law seem to you a bit... unnatural? You know what I mean? It's nature. How do you make nature against the fucking law?

I believe that God left certain drugs growing naturally upon our planet to help speed up and facilitate our evolution. OK, not the most popular idea ever expressed. Either that or you're all real high and agreeing with me in the only way you can right now. (Starts blinking)

They lie about marijuana. Tell you pot-smoking makes you unmotivated. Lie! When you're high, you can do everything you normally do, just as well. You just realize that it's not worth the fucking effort. There is a difference.

No, I don't do drugs anymore, either. But I'll tell you something about drugs. I used to do drugs, but I'll tell you something honestly about drugs, honestly, and I know it's not a very popular idea, you don't hear it very often anymore, but it is the truth: I had a great time doing drugs. Sorry. Never murdered anyone, never robbed anyone, never raped anyone, never beat anyone, never lost a job, a car, a house, a wife or kids, laughed my ass off, and went about my day.

Christianity has a built-in defense system: anything that questions a belief, no matter how logical the argument is, is the work of Satan by the very fact that it makes you question a belief. It's a very interesting defense mechanism and the only way to get by it -- and believe me, I was raised Southern Baptist -- is to take massive amounts of mushrooms, sit in a field, and just go, "Show me."

That's an act, that's a frying pan, that's a stove, you're an alcoholic! Dude, I'm tripping right now, and I still see that that's a fucking egg, alright? I see the UFO's around it, but that's a goddamn egg in the middle. There's a hobbit eating it, but goddammit that hobbit's eating a fucking egg! He's on a unicorn. But, no, th-th-th-that's a fucking egg. How dare you have a wino tell me not to do drugs!

The worst kind of non-smokers are the ones that come up to you and cough. That's pretty fucking cruel isn't it? Do you go up to cripples and dance too?

A lot of Christians wear crosses around their necks. You think when Jesus comes back he ever wants to see a fucking cross? It's like going up to Jackie Onassis wearing a rifle pendant.

bullshit.

[unity100]

the person who wrote the article apparently doesnt know shit about military technology and history.

an armored personnel carrier is an armored personnel carrier. the fact that these are produced, and used means that the party using them has the means to produce them and use them. this shows an escalation of the situation.

Re:bullshit.

[ThunderBird89]

Except that this is not an APC. It's a truck with shit bolted and welded on, not much more than a glorified technical. It's just like Marvin Heemeyer's armored bulldozer, only constructed not for defense, but offense, and are only proof against small arms, as the officer said, not heavy weapons or anti-materiel/anti-tank rifles.

The fact that the drug lords are deploying these means they're desperate: smuggling operations fail, so the only way for them to make money is to try and bust through the border. It's certainly an escalation, but not a very dangerous one if handled correctly.
These things, judging by the looks of them, are not cheap to make, despite being improvised. If the military makes one big push now, ramps up Predator patrols, deploys Barret M82-s/XM109-s (if they're completed, the 25mm HE round should certainly prove adequate to defeat the weaker portions of the armor while remaining man-portable) and other heavy weapons, possibly even tank patrols along the border and MLRS units stationed at regular intervals, they might bankrupt the drug lords, or at least convince them that trying to assault the US border will keep costing more than it makes for them if they keep losing technicals at the same rate.
However, if they don't man up and replace jeep patrols with something that packs more punch, these things are going d what they were made to do, and will befeat the border guards, returning the revenue to the drug cartels.

The war on alcohol ended before this

[erroneus]

When alcohol was prohibited, the US saw all kinds of organization and arming of people in the alcohol trade. It got so bad that it was decided that alcohol should no longer be prohibited. Now it is just tightly controlled.

The war on drugs is a different story though isn't it. I guess the main reason why might be that all this stuff isn't quite so visible to the public.

Problem?

[DrBoumBoum]

they also obscure the problem, and its potential solutions.

The problem is prohibition and the solution is to stop it. Difficult to grasp?

Re:Problem?

[Paua Fritter]

Ending prohibition set a really bad precedent in that it gave people the idea that if they refuse to obey the law that they can get it over turned.

When a socially repressive law which is opposed by the mass of the population is overturned because of that popular opposition, that is a good thing.

But I take your point that once the state starts to bow to the will of the people, they are setting a very dangerous precedent. People might start to take the word "democracy" seriously.

Re:Problem?

[betterunixthanunix]

American government have no problem stomping on rights of citizens because of the "war on terror" (read: against us, Muslims), surely, they would have no problem restricting them in order to suppress the culture of drugs in US.

You must not have been paying attention: our rights have already been stomped on by the war on drugs, right from the very beginning. You do realize that cocaine was first made illegal because congress was told that "cocaine niggers" (black men who used cocaine) became unstoppable monsters with superior aim with a handgun, right? Shortly after the New York Times published the story detailing how "the cocaine nigger sure is hard to kill," souther police forces began increasing the caliber of their standard issue handguns. Marijuana was made illegal under similar circumstances; it helped that industries that competed with the hemp industry put pressure on congress.

You think your rights have not been stomped on? Take a look around. The United States has police forces that can only be described as paramilitary squads. When the local cops are as heavily armed as a small army unit, we are in serious trouble. If you need something more concrete than the abstract, "militant police forces are a problem," consider this:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/interviews/wald.html

Yes, the obvious reading is the correct one: a police force that pays its own wages by seizing assets from drug dealers. This is not limited to Florida:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=91490480

The only reason you do not perceive your rights being stomped on by the war on drugs is that it has been happening for so long now that you and most other people have generally forgotten that they ever had the rights they lost. Remember the days when the police had to obtain a warrant to search your home? Not anymore:

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2011/05/16/Warrantless-searches-expanded-in-drug-case/UPI-27821305557337/

It has gotten so bad that the DEA can now unilaterally declare a drug to be illegal for an entire year, without congressional approval:

http://www.dosenation.com/listing.php?smlid=8021

You used to be able to make large cash transactions in private; now that is automatically reported to the government, as part of an effort to crack down on drug dealers. Even so much as a misdemeanor drug offense now causes a person's right to buy a gun to be denied. Any company that does contracting work for the government is required, by law, to maintain a "drug free workplace." A drug offense can mean the loss of scholarships for students, regardless of their academic merit.

Your rights were trampled long ago, sir.

Thank you Wachovia

[Wonko the Sane]

This was all made possible because Wachovia laundered a sum of money equal to 1/3 of Mexico's GDP for the drug cartels.

Of course as soon as this was discovered the Justice Department sprang into action and initiated a RICO takedown of the entire institution and all its executives (in an alternate universe). What they actually did was politely request that the company pay a fine equal to 2% of their profits which was then refunded to them by the Treasury Department via a $54 billion bailout.

It makes sense because laws don't apply to the aristocracy like they apply to us peasants - they're doing God's work after all.

Re:Please remember

[alexborges]

They do, obviously, because its close to Mexico and has an open drugs market. But I think that is a moot point.

Now before I explain why, bear in mind I'm a Mexican living in Monterrey. Just yesterday I was caught in traffic because a couple of severed heads were displayed on a bridge I go through every single day. People are curious that way and drive slowly so they can see...

If you could magically stop US->Mexico weapon trafficking, they'd bring them in from all over central america where lots of (US led, incited or provoked) wars have been fought, leaving behind healthy weapons markets. Colombia had a worse problem than us in Mexico and their narcs didn't bring in the guns from the US (or obviously they did, but not as easyly as they can do it in Mexico), and they took half the country for themselves (Colombia is still, to this day, split in two).

Its not about firepower, police, law or drugs. Its about money. This mafias are the same as the italian, russian, american or japaneese mafias, and same as those, they get their money from certain trades more than others. In this case, beingthis close to the US means: 1) Drugs and 2) Slaves and Organs (you call this "illegal inmigration" and "black market" organ "donors"). Their bussiness is the border. They are smugglers.

Of the two, the first gives much more money, att least 20 billion dollars a year (at the very, very least, 10 billion, at the highest count, 60-70 billion). Mexico's oil industry, the third largest state-owned in the world, gives 40 billion at its best. And most of the state money comes from that, not taxes.

So in the end, its about how governments spend their resouces to face this threat: ours focus on drug trafficking to the north. Yes, most of our effort here is tries to make sure that your coke is more expensive. Imagine that. Actually, the President of Mexico in the 2007, as proof that this shit is working, cited that the price of coke in new york went up due to this genius war of his.

Now this was not invented by mexicans. We are catholics but not puritans. We certaintly have never, ever had a prohibition party like you guys did in the XIX century and we do not make international drug policy: that one is imposed by the U S of A. We did not prohibit marihuana until you guys came a knocking demanding we did.

You guys need to change that shit because we are killing people here to make the mafia stronger because this is the result of a policy you impose on other countries. If other countries do not comply with your war-on-drugs discourse, your senate puts them in a list where they face strong trade barriers. are not ellegible for aid, and are strong armed by US government lobbies that do their best, which is a lot, to complicate those countries access to international money lending programmes such as those by the IMF and the WB.

Change that shit man. We down here do not deserve to die, live with fucking murderers, give them a fuckload of money (through prohibition), because you guys cant officially state that your people like to get high, You hold this policy of purity that aspires to a "clean" america, while on the other hand you are the country with the highest per capita consumption of illegal drugs in the world.

Its stupid. Your country is killing mine over a really stupid view of the world. I want drugs to be legal in ALL OF OCCIDENT.

Jesus did not have the last dinner with a mountain dew and did not turn water into coca cola. He very well damned had a glass of wine and in that particular wedding he brought more booze for everyone to party the fuck on. I sure do hope you guys get that through your thick heads before the cartels find out that they have to force american authorities on their soil to fuck off so they can continue doing bussiness.

Re:Tell the sheeple it doesn't matter who wins...

[oursland]

Barack Obama has made it American policy to not go after medical marijuana dispenserise though George W Bush (and to be fair Clinton) did attach these legal (at a state level) and illegal (at a fed level) dispenseries.

That's bullshit. The Feds are still raiding dispensaries.

Here are three articles on recent raids that come up when I type in "dispensary raid" into Google News:

"Dog Killed in Pot Dispensary Raid " (June 10, 2011)
http://temecula.patch.com/articles/dog-killed-in-pot-dispensary-raid

"Agents raid 5 Fresno Co. marijuana dispensaries " (June 1, 2011)
http://www.fresnobee.com/2011/06/01/2410478/warrants-served-at-2-fresno-co.html

"Feds raid more Spokane marijuana dispensaries" (May 18, 2011)
http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2011/may/18/feds-raid-spokane-marijuana-dispensaries/