The article below [via borderlandbeat.com] tells the tale of a cartel attack on police in Guerrero, Mexico. Before you read it, know this: there are no “good guys” in Mexico. The Cartels are in cahoots with both the state and federal governments, sharing the multi-billion dollar spoils of the lucrative U.S. illegal drug trade (and other nefarious activities). The conflicts between them are economical and political. They have nothing to do with “law enforcement.”
Also keep in mind that the United States has funneled tens of thousands of fully-automatic firearms into Mexico; a large percentage of these guns “seep” from police and military into Cartel hands. Last year, Mexico purchased at least $1.15 billion in military equipment from the United States. If Guerrero police were out-gunned by the cartels, it’s not because of budgetary constraints.
As for U.S. police forces that share in the Pentagon’s largesse — accepting “free” ex-military vehicles, guns and gear — their claims that they need the equipment to cope with well-armed bad guys are largely if not entirely specious. And as long as real good guys — armed Americans — exist, the situation could never devolve to the point it has in Mexico. Or could it?
Guerrero Cops had to ration ammunition after being ambushed. Boss faults “budget limits.”
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| Ambush scene, Guerrero |
Gunmen who ambushed 15 state police in the mountains of Guerrero on Tuesday didn’t hold back on their fire power. Investigators have estimated that 305 shots were fired on the police patrol.
On August 23 a patrol of 15 state police were ambushed in vicinity of Puerto del Gallo in the municipality of Heliodoro Castillo, an opium poppy-growing region wracked by the conflict of warring drug cartels that are well armed with high-powered weaponry.
In the ambush and ensuing 4 hour gun battle 3 of the State Police were killed and 2 more injured. Three of the attackers were also killed.
The Governor speaking at the funeral of the 3 dead state police, said that if it had not been for the reinforcements all of the 15 man patrol would have been killed. No arrests were made.
He didn’t mention what the 12 surviving soldiers told the media that were lucky to be alive because of the their limited supply of guns and ammunition. They had to ration their ammunition while defending themselves during the 4 hour attack. They couldn’t escape because the attacker’s high caliber weapons had disabled their trucks with shots to the motors. The bodies of their trucks, as well as their helmets were made of fiberglass and offered little protection.
“We don’t have munitions, we don’t have equipment, we’re lacking firearms and as if that weren’t enough we don’t have electricity at our headquarters in Puerto del Gallo; we have almost nothing,” said one officer.
`at the funeral of the three police officers that were killed, Governor Astudillo said that ‘Guerrero needs men and women with the bravery of Alejandro Hernandez, Arnulfo Palacios and Sabino Casiano’ he said, referring to the three dead officers encased in wooden caskets behind him.
He could have said that it took exceptional bravery for a police officer to do his job under armed, with limited ammunition, and inadequate protective gear.The Secretary of Public Security of Guerrero, Pedro Almazan Cervantes, highlighted the strength of the police officers, because during the fray ammunition was scarce by the prolonged aggression they faced, while all vehicles they had traveled in had been completely crippled by shells that landed in the engines.
When questioned by the media about what the survivors had said about having to ration ammunition, not having enough fire power, inadequate protective gear and the old trucks they were forced to use, the Secretary replied “everyone wants to have equipment that is ideal but there are limits set by budgets, not by a lack of either political will or concern. [But] there are shortages and they need to understand that,” said Pedro Almazán Cervantes.”
I am not sure that the three officers whose bodies they buried that day would understand that.
Solution: Make drugs legal. Then most if not all of this foolishness stops.
Gangsters shot hell out of each other during prohibition over booze…now booze is legal…now people don’t shoot hell out of each other over booze. Simple.
War on drugs equals complete failure and loss of liberty all around.
+1. The Portuguese model of decriminalization for all drugs seems like the way to go here. However, I am a bit hesitant because Portugal isn’t bordered by a failing third world state.
Dude, the US is failing third world state in a lot places and ways. Only difference is the greenback is the reserve currency of world so we have the benefit of printing unlimited amounts of currency while the rest of the world does not.
If the business of making cocaine, meth, heroin, you name it were legalized then none of the cartels would have to tool up and fight over resources, travel routes, etc. Hell, it would probably push Mexico into the top 10 economies of the world because then they’d all incorporate…lol I jest…kind of.
And yes, Portugal is a great example. But it only takes the smallest amount of common sense to see that criminalizing behavior that has no victims just doesn’t work. We all know that if we somehow possess an AR with a barrel shorter than 16″ we are no more a criminal in reality than if we didn’t…it’s only by an unlawful statute that we are criminalized for possessing an object that is hurting nobody else…possessing a substance is no different. It may hurt the user but that is their choice. Just like I can choose to shoot without eye and ear pro! GASP! Make it illegal! I shouldn’t be able to injure myself of my own volition!
The outrage!
Don’t forget to legalize heroin, oxy, and everything else or it will just shift from weed through meth into the hard stuff. And kidnapping. They do that a lot and will make it their new business. Also alien smuggling.
Fighting crime by legalizing it is a pipe dream. Everyone points to prohibition as a solution without looking at alcohol related problems. Hey everyone is having a good time so it must be ok.
Only force without fear is going to win.
WIth all due respect, I must disagree.
Bad people will do bad things if they can get away with it and it’s profitable. Human trafficking and other bad things would and will exist even if all drugs were legalized. Just like prostitution exists even though it’s illegal in a lot of places. Just like people having guns where they are banned. None of these victimless crime laws work. Ever. And the unintended consequences are usually worse than the problem itself.
If people were A. allowed to arm and protect themselves and B. actually wanted to do that then human trafficking and a lot of other heinous crimes would probably be almost non existent because the risk to reward wouldn’t be worth it.
But I can say unequivocally, that if the “war on drugs” stopped then billions of dollars of taxes wouldn’t be wasted, millions of families wouldn’t be ripped apart by having family members incarcerated, and many lives would still be here because they wouldn’t have been killed either by law enforcement or by cartel antics.
Kinda part of that whole “dangerous freedom” thing…vs nanny state cradle-to-grave tyranny thing.
Tax drugs? CO is seeing less and less revenue from their tax. U taxed drugs would then be illegal too. So on certain again, wrong answer. You would need to have drug sales be so lightly taxed as to not make a difference. Sorry no billions in windfall.
But you would have lots of new government spending on the problems in society drug use causes. That would escalate.
Drug users would need money for the legal drugs + high taxes. Where does that money come from?
You ok with heroin over the counter?
Your whole argument is based on the idea that if drugs are legal people would do more of them. You seem to completely forget the deterrent for doing hard drugs is that they destroy lives and most Americans don’t want to destroy their life. You know how uncool drugs would become to a majority of teenagers if they were legal? If you remove the thrill of breaking rules you remove a major motivation to doing drugs in the first place. The idea of making drugs illegal is the same nanny-state philosophy that motivates gun control.
“But you would have lots of new government spending on the problems in society drug use causes. That would escalate.”
You seem to be operating under the delusion that there is currently no profit motive in selling drugs, do you think people do that out of civic duty? There is plenty of margin available to pay huge taxes and still undercut cartel prices by 50% or more. Removing the huge profits of the cartels will remove their power very quickly.
Your comment on the problems caused by drugs illustrates a major change in our national thinking which would, in fact, have to be made. Those problems caused by drugs should not be paid for by our tax dollars, let the users die, whether of infection, OD, withdrawal, whatever, we do not need them. And, as with firearm laws, we do not even have any real way to estimate whether there will be any problems! We’re still waiting for blood in the streets, two-gun cowboy rigs, gunfights over road rage, and all the other whiskey dreams of the gun grabbers, who’s to say that legalizing all drugs wouldn’t be just as uneventful as “shall-issue” was? Many of the current problems are *caused* by the laws, users hiding in the shadows and committing crimes to obtain their drugs, using dirty needles, killing each other over turf to sell the enormously profitable drugs which would suddenly be sold for 1/10 the price at the corner store.
The enormous costs of the “war on drugs” over the past 50 years is worldwide, the incredible amounts of money paid by Americans for their drugs is threatening governments in more than just Mexico. We cast trillions of dollars in votes to stop the madness every year, yet our government insists on more cops, more guns, more courts, more prisons, while the normal American just demands more drugs, and continues to pay for them. It’s been pretty damn stupid for a lot of years now, time to quit. Like many other victimless crimes in the past, I really, REALLY, do not give a flying fish’s fuck what you put in your body, or whether it kills you. The idea of trying to mind everybody else’s business for them is an exercise in futility, and I don’t have the time or the energy for it, I wish my tax dollars could be spent on something on something less destructive, if not something actually helpful.
“Your whole argument is based on the idea that if drugs are legal people would do more of them.”
Research has shown that all human populations have a “carrying capacity” of addiction prone people. Whether you have strict law-enforcement or lax law-enforcement, the percentages remain about the same.
You misunderstand…I’m not talking about taxes generated…I’m talking about already spent.
I’m talking billions saved…look up the cost of the “war on drugs”…numbers might surprise you…don’t you want to know how your money is being used?
And yest I’m fine with heroin over the counter. Just like I’m fine with any weapon over the counter. Even scary black machine guns that fire in full auto.
Heroin is illegal now. Do the people who really want to use it get it? Look at Portugal, they legalized all drugs and they aren’t a nation of drug addled zombies…in fact studies are showing that usage has actually dropped and there are more rehab options available.
Legalize, get gov out and let private citizens take care of themselves.
“You ok with heroin over the counter?”
Yes, yes I am because IT WAS LEGAL AND OVER THE COUNTER prior to 1914 and the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act. STOP making drugs illegal as all of them used to be legal. Historically speaking prohibition is the aberration. Opiates and cocaine, in addition to a whole bunch of other powerful drugs, were sold at *drug stores*. The local drug dealer used to wear a bow tie and call you “sir”. Are you seriously suggesting that we bring back the Federal Prohibition of Alcohol?
And, lest we forget, a hundred years and countless destroyed lives and trillions of dollars later, you can still buy any drug you want on any streetcorner in any city in America. Even if you still think a “war on drugs” is a good idea, you have to open your eyes and realize WE LOST!
Prohibition never works.
It is morally wrong to dictate to free human beings what they can do with their own bodies.
True freedom starts with owning your body and determining what you put in it and what you do with it.
Personally I don’t care for drugs, but the issue should revert back to the states as the tenth amendment dictates. That being said, the Federal government will still have the Constitutional authority to dictate what comes into the country from outside, and that what people seem to forget when they think bring up Prohibition. Most of the alcohol was domestically produced. Many of the illegal drugs are not, and can still be banned from legally entering the U.S. Looking at how Great Britain used Opium (grown from their holdings in India) to effectively force China to unfavorable trade terms as well as two Opium wars that defeated the weakened Chinese further, I am not against the Federal government exercising their authority to ban certain imported drugs. Also, the cartels in Mexico won’t shrivel up and go away even if we did legalize drugs, they have alternative means of revenue. Kidnapping, human trafficking and organ harvesting are also part and parcel of the Cartel’s business portfolio.
Again, not against certain aspects of drug legalization, but it’s not going to be the panacea people claim it will be.
I would agree that it wouldn’t be a panacea, but it’s also hard to imagine (well not for me) what the free market solutions might be if drugs were legalized.
Perhaps the Mexican cartels would be completely out of business in the US or they would just start US based corporations. Again, getting the government out and letting the free markets decide leads to options that many would never dream or think of.
And it’s even harder for most to imagine in this day and age because there are no free markets, it’s all crony capitalism.
Can this happen in the US? It already has. 5 cops killed in DFW. It can happen on a larger scale.
But in the US the conditions exist where the police can get immediate help from the citizens around them. All they have to do is help to remove the pols(legally at the polls) and ask the citizens for help. It would be forthcoming.
Next, we’ll talk about ending this foolish war on drugs.
Just speaking from an individual liberty perspective, Modern Prohibition has effectively destroyed the 4th amendment. All any LEO has to do is have a real or imagined suspicion that you or your property are involved in drugs and most of your constitutional protections are thrown right out the window. I don’t personally care about the social harm drug legalization would cause, when compared to the appalling loss of liberty the war on (some) drugs has caused.
Well, if we open our southern border, a lot of those cartel gangsters will come here and Mexico will be safe. It’s a win!
Why come here with the power and influence they have there? They are better off in Mexico than coming here.
Well, they seem to be working on building that power-and-influence in the US too.
Makes good business sense, actually, to maintain a “secure market” as well as a secure production area.
“Why come here with the power and influence they have there?”
Because they can buy Hillary for cheap — and it’s tax deductible.
There’re a couple of images I wish I could un-think…
“Guerrero Cops had to ration ammunition after being ambushed. Boss faults “budget limits.””
Perhaps they shouldn’t have used so much of their supply.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-37127164
“Police used a Black Hawk helicopter during the operation, reportedly firing some 4,000 rounds into the ranch, known as the Rancho del Sol, during the initial assault. ”
I’m being facetious – We all know the slush doesn’t trickle down from the federales to the locals.
Ooo, and update. The Mexican President has just fired the Federale in Chief over this report.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/mexicos-top-police-chief-execution-allegations-215559524.html
Bad guys outgunned by bad guys.
They were short on guns and ammo because their superiors had sold that stuff to the guys that were shooting at them. Outnumbered? Naw, but it sounds better to say that, than the truth, they got their butts handed to them by a few pistoleros.
Wait, 150 men fired approximately 305 shots over a 4-hour period? That has the average attacker firing a grand total of two shots, or one shot per two-hour period.
I think it’s highly likely the police grossly overestimated the number of attackers.
Either that or we’re grossly falsifying the claim that the cops were outgunned. There’s a difference between being outnumbered and being outgunned.
If you believe that the Mexican drug cartels are going to start legitimate businesses you are either a liar or a fool. They like to kill people. It’s fun to rape and torture children in front of their parents.
The criminal culture of Mexico does not compare to the American gangsters during prohibition.
American gangsters built Las Vagas casinos. Not using firearms made they rich behind their widest dreams. American gangsters killed each other not civilians generally.
The Mexican drug cartels have not built a single casino. But they do commit crimes against tourists in Mexico at will.
As long as libertarians support the welfare state and fight the churches that traditionally helped the poor, making drugs legal will help only those who want to put a dildo inside themselves and use a heroin needle to improve their sexual experience.
This right here is reality. These are dangerous people and it’s coming here. If the chickenshit liberals succeed in disarming us we are all screwed.
California is weak. As it is disarmed the cartels will settle in their first.
The San Francisco police would rather tell on a fellow officer who has an AR15 than chase after Mexicans in the sanctuary city.
Correct, that would require actually working to serve and protect the community…instead they serve themselves and and protect their pensions.
“As long as libertarians support the welfare state and fight the churches that traditionally helped the poor, making drugs legal will help only those who want to put a dildo inside themselves and use a heroin needle to improve their sexual experience”
Might be true! So what? Who cares? Why is it my business and why is it consuming my damn tax dollars? They are not hurting you, leave them alone to kill themselves, or not. You are making assumptions and presenting them as established fact. How about the predictions of disaster in states legalizing first medical pot and then recreational pot? Have they proven true? I suspect not, but then I don’t know because I don’t care enough to find out, it does not affect me!
As the victims, for many decades, of all manner of claims that TEOTWAWKI would result from civilian ownership of firearms, I would think we’d be a little more careful about making all manner of unsupported claims about any result. All we need to know, here, is that all our efforts to prevent people from using drugs has had absolutely no effect, why do we continue to spend money without positive result?
Larry in TX
When was a kid in the 1970s the adults around me and on TV all said drugs were bad and should be avoided. Everyone was very judgmental.
Now libertarians have changed. Now they never say drugs are bad. Previous libertarian presidential candidates like Harry Brown and Andre Moreau publicly said you were stupid to take drugs. Because of them I started to study the libertarian ideas.
As I have said before you are either a liar or a fool if you believe making drugs legal will make life better for drug filled neighborhoods.
I say you have the right to do be stupid, a dumb @ss, a fool, etc.
But you don’t have a right to force me to, say what you do to your self is ok, or a good thing.
When the BATF or IRS starts arresting drug dealers for not paying taxes will that be OK with you????
Coming soon to a town near you.
To be fair, the bandido cartels are also armed by the Mexican government. The police are actually sacrificial pawns intentionally disarmed by their 2 faced masters. Wouldn’t want to have the profit producing branch shot by the revenue drainers.
Our stupid laws have turned a lot of Central and South America into war zones. Prohibition simply doesn’t work unless the prohibited item is something that no one or nearly no one wants.
Make drugs and prostitution legal and you’ll cut the cartels off at the knees. At that point all they’ll have left is basically kidnapping for ransom, numbers rackets and protection rackets.
I’m suspicious (don’t know) that kidnapping for ransom would mostly be popular in areas which disarm their citizens, might have serious drawbacks in areas where USPA or 3-gun are popular.
their may not be any ,”good guys” in this story but dont ******* say their arent any good guys in Mexico thats plain retarded, do you know all the guys in Mexico. what if someone said “their are no good guys” in the US with regards to a police agency loosing 3 cops in a shoot out with drug dealers. this could have been worded better. that the drug gangs are in cahoots with some Mexican authoritys is for shure, that it happens on a large scale yes. But can you honestly say some of that crap dosent go on here in the states. Drugs go north and destroy lives and auto weapons and munitions go south and destroy lives. I beleive theirs a little hypocrosy and coruption on both sides of the border.
We do not know if the fight was about the profit sharing agreement, or division of the little girls available. In Mexico, as I currently understand it, if they had guns, never mind enough ammo, then they were crooks, since everyone authorized to own guns uses them to steal from those who don’t. I mean, really, let’s not pretend we understand anything about a country where a “police station” does not have electricity.
The difference between doing drugs and kidnapping/rape/murder is that a person getting high on their own does not impact anyone else. Yeah I get it some of the addicts do crazy sh*t. But compared to what the gangs are doing, what the addicts do to get money because the drugs are so expensive, and what the govt does to undermine our freedom, why not choose the lesser devil?
Like most people here believe, it’s a free country and what others do is none of anyone else’s business until there’s an actual negative impact. Doing drugs per se is not nearly a crime compared to what the prohibition on drugs bring about (gangs, violent addicts, and MASSIVE EROSION ON LIBERTY). And how many people you know would allow drug addiction to destroy their health even if you hand them out for free?
How about legalising drugs and allowing them to be traded OTC, at fair price, which is worth not much more than Tylenol? By doing that, we cut off a MAJOR cornerstone of why gangs exist, why addicts kill for money, and all the asset forfeiture nonesense etc. Spend the money for the War on Drugs on education campaigns against drug use, and media thought manipulation like what they do for smoking, drinking, speeding, and seatbelts etc. By eating the loss of “more people doing drugs resulting in poorer health and some crazy behaviours”, we could gain quite a lot in return.
It’s not about the gun, it’s about lying for your coin while building your castle without a conscience. All sides doing the math, working the motivation and applying money for the best return. Government is nothing more than a cartel, founded on theater, enforced by police, while dispersing tax collectors. Citizens are walking ATM’s for the entire institution.
The war on drugs has been a failure
You can buy drugs in u s prisons, the most drug free zone possible
This war has had numerous unintended consequences as others have said here
As for Mexico, they have gun control
Citizens are effectively disarmed.
Both the police and criminals prey on the ordinary people with impunity
The only hope is the newly legalized ” rural guards”
These local militias have been defeating the cartels, expelling the police and capturing heavy weapons
Those affiliated with the Mexican Army are given M 4 carbines to keep at home
Corrupt politicians are trying hard to arrest them
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