- Creator, Will Grant
- Position, BBC Mexico correspondent
Ismael ‘El Mayo’ Zambada is among the most infamous names in drug conflict historical past, synonymous with the fearsome energy and corrosive affect of crucial drug cartel on the planet.
The final of an authentic technology of drug cartel leaders, he created the Sinaloa Cartel alongside Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzman from the remnants of the Guadalajara Cartel after it collapsed in 1989.
However not like his notorious companion who was twice jailed and escaped, El Mayo was capable of evade seize for some 35 years. Till now.
US authorities arrested him in El Paso, Texas on Thursday. He has already pleaded not responsible to a number of expenses in federal court docket in Texas.
He was lured to the US as a part of an elaborate sting operation, masterminded by the son of his former companion, El Chapo. Joaquin Guzman Lopez, one of many heirs to El Chapo’s operation, was arrested alongside Zambada having led him to consider he was travelling to northern Mexico to take a look at potential properties for clandestine airstrips.
“Are you frightened of being captured?” Zambada was requested in 2010 by the late Mexican journalist, Julio Scherer García, who had travelled deep into the mountains for an unprecedented interview with the drug lord.
“The thought of being jailed provides me panic,” he answered. “I’m unsure I’ve what it takes to kill myself. I’d prefer to assume I do and that I’d take my very own life.”
When it got here to it, nevertheless, both he didn’t have the means or the chance.
For somebody who exercised such warning over so a few years, it appears extraordinary that Zambada was duped aged 76. Maybe it was all the time going to take one thing distinctive to see him in custody.
“It doesn’t shock me that Zambada didn’t go willingly,” says Mike Vigil, a former DEA agent. “He’s in his 70s, unwell and already stated that jail was his best worry.”
The arrests – and doable plea deal between the sons of El Chapo, referred to as Los Chapitos, and the US Authorities – begs the query of who will take management of the Sinaloa Cartel.
After El Chapo Guzman was arrested and extradited to the US in 2016, a spherical of bloodletting started as rival factions wrestled for management of territory in addition to fought opposing drug gangs who sensed weak spot.
Much more surprising, and violent, was the response of the Sinaloa Cartel’s foot troopers when their chief, Ovidio Guzman Lopez, was arrested in October 2019.
After he was detained, a whole bunch of gunmen descended on the town of Culiacan and opened hearth on civilian, police and navy targets with .50 calibre weapons and rocket launchers. Finally, the authorities handed Ovidio Guzman again to his males to deliver the preventing to an finish.
He was later re-arrested, extradited and is at present awaiting trial in a US jail.
Picture supply, US Drug Enforcement Administration
Mike Vigil thinks an analogous explosion of violence, which grew to become referred to as the Culiacanazo, is likely to be averted this time round:
“The Sinaloa Cartel has a really sturdy bench of doable leaders who may take over together with El Chapo’s brother,” he says.
In actual fact, Mr Vigil argues, the “Kingpin technique” – that’s specializing in bringing down particular person cartel leaders – isn’t profitable.
“Underneath the administration of (then-Mexican President Felipe) Calderon, it solely tended to create inner battle throughout the cartels which then led to a massacre.”
If that occurs this time, suggests former DEA agent Mike Vigil, “the one winner could be their rivals, the Jalisco New Technology Cartel (CJNG)”.
That stated, moments of flux and doable energy vacuums equivalent to this one are deeply unpredictable. The Mexican authorities have already despatched further forces to the state of Sinaloa forward of any flare-up of violence.
The opposite apparent query over Zambada’s arrest is: why now?
The operation was deliberate for months. Nevertheless, some experiences say there was additionally an opportunistic component to it. When the assorted components behind the ruse gave the impression to be coming collectively, regardless of some scepticism among the many US authorities, they finally determined they’d nothing lose by attempting it.
The larger motive behind the timing, although, was revealed by the phrases of the US Legal professional Common Merrick Garland in a video message confirming the arrests:
“Fentanyl is the deadliest risk our nation has ever confronted”, he stated promising that the US justice division “is not going to relaxation till each single cartel chief, member and affiliate liable for poisoning our communities is held accountable.”
Fentanyl overdoses at the moment are the main explanation for demise for Individuals between the ages of 18 and 45. It’s a staggering statistic and one which has maybe focussed minds within the Biden administration, particularly in an election 12 months.
Each Los Chapitos and El Mayo have made billions by fentanyl, which is straightforward to provide and transport with out the necessity for giant coca plantations within the Andes as with the manufacture of cocaine.
Specialists say that shutting down the smuggling of fentanyl altogether is nearly inconceivable. It is just too worthwhile to the cartels and too riven into the fashionable panorama of Mexico’s drug conflict.
Nevertheless, US regulation enforcement needs to harm the cartels which are producing it, diminish their affect and, wherever doable, dismantle their management.
The seize of El Mayo Zambada – even when getting old, unwell and captured in a double-cross – was all the time going to stay a key a part of that technique.
