In all the hand-wringing about the flood of Syrian refugees into Europe, no one has mentioned the possibility that an armed Syrian populace could have prevented the exodus, if not the conflict. Wait. How could an armed populace hold out against tanks, bombs and chemical weapons? Ask the Taliban. Equally, show me a mass migration of a million armed refugees. Meanwhile, here’s a story [via borderland beat.com] of large numbers of disarmed, defenseless civilians fleeing death a little closer to home: Mexico . . .

700 families flee death in Chihuahua

Around 700 families fled Milpillas and Las Chinacas communities in Chinipas, after attacks by a new criminal group. On Sunday the 20th, armed men arrived at these villages, killed two men, burned three houses and strafed one more with gunfire, that was found to be empty. After the events, the villagers fled their houses terrified.

In the crossfire, a child of nine years old was shot, and there are other injured children. There are two dead men and others disappeared, the only families that stayed are those that are burying their dead, and the families of the two young men that were kidnapped, said a farm worker.

The villagers of Chinipas have been accustomed to the fear and uncertainty because of the actions of this regions resident criminal group, but on Thursday the 3rd the fear started to grow when three leaders of the group that dominate the zone “Los Salazar” were executed outside of Milpillas.

They were Jesus Guellermo Vega, 50 years of age, Abel Olivas Ramos, 49 years of age and Edgar Munoz Rodriguez, 38 years of age, two of them were burnt.

This event complicated things more. first the two families of the dead men fled, and a few days later they said that another 15 families had left, and the number had been increasing. The criminals started to pressure the communities and there has been several confrontations. The fear increased for the villagers, and they abandoned their villages, and so started the exodus.

Some authorities recommended to the villagers to leave, because they were waiting for a major confrontation between “Los Salazar” and the new criminal group, within three hours.

The resulting stampede was very difficult, very painful, because they were leaving their homes, their land, it was a drama. The road between Alamo and Navojoa (of Sonora), was a file of cars, it was very sad. But that way they managed to save lives of dozens of entire families.

Since then all the schools are closed. Days after the shop that served the village was ransacked and already there is no food, the criminals emptied the village.

According to the villagers, the criminals attacked people that were not part of criminal gangs, but also attacked others that were “in the business”. These subjects, they said, were not part of the “Los Salazar” group, they were another that had arrived from Sinaloa to fight for the plaza after the escape of El Chapo Guzman. Others assure that they newcomers are people of Rafael Caro Quintero, who left prison on the 9th of August 2013 after spending 28 years in prison.

On this occasion, its not people from Milpillas that are angry towards us, its the new people from Sinaloa, said another farm worker.

According to the people living in the village, the majority of the inhabitants are seeded in this community. They are naturalized and legitimate, but with the passing of time the criminal groups took over from the citizens.

The leader of “Los Salazar” has for many years operated in the areas of Urique, Guazapares and Chinipas, Alfredo Salazar, currently imprisoned at “Altiplano” Cefereso no.1, Almoloya de Juarez. The group is currently operated by an uncle of his, who must now confront the criminals from the Sinaloa Cartel that arrived to take the plaza.

In Milpillas there were about 400 families of about 1500 people, and 300 families in Las Chinacas, all have fled.

In a communication given yesterday, the State Attorney General (FGE) said that in the Milpillas community the inhabitants had informed the investigating authorities that armed people sacked three houses, and victimized a 73 year old man, Rodolfo Burgos Hermosillo, who used to be the Municipal policeman in this locality.

In regards the three houses raided, they all had impact marks on the doors, forcing the locks to gain access to the interiors. Inside the houses the police recovered seven spent AK47 cartridge cases and three from a twelve bore shotgun.

In the exterior of one of the properties a white Chevrolet pickup was discovered without circulation plates, burnt out with a dead animal inside.

Later, and after carrying out some patrols, elements of the Army and Municipal Police of Chinipas went to Tecorahui, where the presence of armed subjects had been reported.

Click on image to enlarge for location of Tecorahui at marker

According to the FGE, when State Agents arrived they passed through the community of San Antonio, located close to the entrance, about four hours from Tecorahui, they received gun fire from armed men located in a house. The Agents returned fire and killed two criminals.

One of the dead men was, Arabel Vega Lagarda, 42 years of age, with a home in Milpillas, who was in possession of rifle made by Norinco. The other man, armed with an AR15, has not been identified.

Ten days after, the villagers of the community of Tecorahui, of the same Municipality of Chinipas, were not heard from, because the criminals had taken the village and were not allowing people to enter or leave.

One man managed to leave, and he could relate what had happened, but up to now, he has heard nothing from anyone who lives there. No cell phone calls, and they have no means to communicate, said one person who wished to remain anonymous.

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47 COMMENTS

  1. It happened in Germany 75 years ago, It’s happening in Mexico now!
    What makes you think it can’t ever happen here!

    • ^ This, but flip it around, if it comes down to it, and it’s their fault, make THEM go, sh_t in hand, kids and parents in tow, dog thinkin their on a crazy long walk.

  2. How could an armed populace hold out against tanks, bombs and chemical weapons?

    Gaddafi asked the same question.

  3. “Ten days after, the villagers of the community of Tecorahui were not heard from, because the criminals had taken the village and were not allowing people to enter or leave.”

    This all seems so dysfunctional that I doubt arming the villagers would help. Distributing the guns, the ammo, the barbed wire and even landmines needed to stop the free movement of criminals is not possible when every village have gang members. What would be needed first was a freaking ‘awakening’ and a massive and completely ruthless law enforcement operation.

  6. I doubt this is all due to U.S. interference in Mexico. OTOH I do think that the demand for drugs in our country has a LOT to do with the problems in Mexico.

    • True words. Recreational and serious drug users in the US are doing more damage to mexico than the US .gov. Actions have consequences.

      What the US can do is legalise drugs and treat the problem drug user as a victim, not a criminal. But there’s too much profit going to crooked pols on both sides of the border.

      • I remember reading somewhere that coke, heroin, and other drugs were actually available at some pharmacies in the US before the “war on drugs” started. Don’t know how true that is, but I think I can say this for everyone, the war on drugs has failed….miserably.

        I like to liken the war on drugs to our current government’s attempt to disarm legal gun owners, saying the criminals will be disarmed, too; a war on guns, if you will. It’s had about the same effect as the war on drugs, and more and more people are buying guns, if, for no other reason, than to give anti-gunners the middle finger.

  7. I seriously doubt that people who are now fleeing from Syria would have any trouble acquiring a gun there if they were ready and willing to fight. The problem is that for any particular guy faced with that choice, his personal chances of survival are pretty slim, even if such a zerg rush would ultimately be successful for the cause as a whole. And when that particular guy has a wife, his and her parents that are too old to feed themselves, and several kids, well…

    Taliban doesn’t have that problem because they’re fanatics who believe that dying in battle will instantly earn them a place in paradise. Ditto ISIS.

    I also have to note that Taliban also had artillery, for example. It was actually not dissimilar to how ISIS got their stuff – when Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan, they took what they could, but they have already given a lot of heavy weaponry to the official government by then (to remind, it wasn’t actually a war between USSR and Afghanistan, it was a war between the secular socialist government and Islamist rebels, with Soviets aiding the government), and when they left that government kept on fighting for a while longer. When it collapsed, with many units defecting to other groups, some of which would later form or join Taliban, they took that equipment with them.

    • Plus the taliban have a friendly country, Pakistan, that they can simply fade across the border into to rest and refit.

      • When you said friendly country, I thought you meant the US, being that we trained, armed and funded them during the 80’s against the Rooskies. Now, as far as I can tell, after a decade plus of bombing and terrorizing the middle east as a response to 9-11, ISIS pops up and guess who’s back…the Rooskies! History repeating no? How has my freedom been served pray tell? This is what collateral damage does, it comes back to bite.

  8. There’s plenty of guns in Syria. They don’t want to fight for their homeland when instead they can use it as an excuse to make a new one somewhere better.

    • They don’t want to make a new homeland that is “better.” They just want to make other countries more like their homeland, inshallah.

  9. Yep RF we REALLY need a million armed Muslims…can you you tell the good guy from the bad without a scorecard? Another civil war we’re involved in.

    • The same sentiments were held in 1940s against Japanese Americans and Italians and Germans…

      But to your point, the last time we armed a bunch of islamic fighters they called themselves the Taliban…

      Like all wars we just have to weed out the good ones from the bad…

  10. Whatever. Move to Texas, and all of a sudden the plight of the Mexican people matters. I’m a native Texan that lives 2 miles from “La Frontera”, same shit, different day. Who cares……….

  11. … show me a mass migration of a million armed refugees.

    There were at least the Goths, the Byzantines in Asia Minor, the Moors in Spain (in the middle phases of the Reconquista) and possibly the Boers. I’d add the Uskoks, the American Loyalists and the Mormons, but there almost certainly weren’t that many of those.

  13. Syria isn’t a civil war. The “rebels” are mostly foreigners armed by proxy. The “refugees” are not fleeing to save family, as they are 75% young males of fighting age. This is an invasion, pure and simple.

    • Rebels are mostly Sunnis who do not particularly like a Shia dictatorship.

      The reason why you mostly see young males fleeing is because it is easiest for them to make through all the vagaries of the road (which is rather physically demanding, at least the part until EU borders), and to find some kind of job later. The intent is that they can apply for family reunification once they have established themselves.

    • An interesting little factoid: Taliban has actually got its fame originally by standing up to the bullies that were already there. In particular, their first act of prominence was capturing a mujahideen field commander who was so fond of little boys that he exacted a toll from every village that they passed through, and publicly hanging him on the barrel of a tank in the last village he raped the boy in. Needless to say, this was met with considerable approval from the locals.

      I also had a chance to chat with a young Afghani refugee way back in New Zealand. He didn’t like Taliban one bit, and called them crazy fanatics. But he considered the other groups to be even worse in a sense that Taliban had at least offered some stability and rule of law in the areas under their control. A very harsh and not particularly just law, mind you, but he said that they all knew the rules, and knew that if they stuck to them they had nothing to fear, and any real crimes like robbery or rape would be dealt with swiftly and efficiently.

      On the other hand, other muji groups (those that formed the Northern Alliance), he said, were so thoroughly corrupt that wherever they went, they basically just demanded money and other favors, and didn’t offer anything in return – no security and no stability; and it wouldn’t change even in areas long under their control, as high-ranked muji commanders felt like they basically owned everything and could just barge into a house in a middle of the night to rape the women (and/or the boys in there), and then leave laughing because they knew there would be no consequences, as they were the people in charge.

      Some food for thought…

  15. The plight of ordinary Mexican citizens who live in a country with gun control is serious.
    U.S. law forbids foieigners from buying firearms here and bringing them to Mexico.
    Mexican law forbids gun ownership to law abiding citizens.
    The more or less corrupt Mexican Police (see Iquala Massacre on wikipedia) have money and legally have access to American gun markets.
    The cartels and other criminals arm themselves through illegal channels that includes the thousands of assault style weapons traffiked to Mexico by the ATF in the Fast and Furious gunwalking scandal.
    Even if the local people knew who the criminals were and wanted to organize a self defense force, they have no legal access to what would be the most effective firearms and a supply of ammunition from U,S. gun markets.
    A few hunting rifles and shotguns will be no match for AK:s and AR:s
    The other problem with self defense forces is warlordism. After the bad guys are defeated, you are now the local strongman. Will they become like the Colombian autodefensas and give in to temptation and become narcotics traffickers themselves? The amount of money to be made is truly staggering. Hard to resist.
    I do know that if I lived there, my family would be sent away and my neighbors and I would organize and arm ourselves illegally and fight for our land and homes.That happened in Michoacan when the local doctor formed an autodefensa group and was arrested on weapons possession charges by the government after fighting against the Knights Templar Cartel that had kidnapped and released him and murdered several of his family.
    The Mexican government is now making some half hearted efforts to arm the locals with the formation of the “Rurales” rural self defense force in Michoacan state.This was only after many other locals had formed vigilante groups of their own to combat the thugs.

  16. A disarmed populace that would have fared better if armed and would have prevented the exodus from the warzone?

    I want what you are smoking. Seriously. There is nothing an armed populace could have done against the regime or ISIS. To suggest otherwise isn’t very smart. Afghanistan and Iraq had guns everywhere, and that didn’t do anything for the populace, except maybe expand the conflict. To say that an “armed populace” would have prevented anything is a very simple-minded view of the world that excludes all the other factors that is necessary for an uprising to work or succeed.

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