How the coup against Mexican drug lords succeeded
It's a shocking announcement. US law enforcement has arrested two bosses of the notorious Mexican Sinaloa Cartel. Ismael Zambada Garcia and Joaquin Guzman Lopez were apprehended on American soil.
It was a coup, not an everyday achievement for US law enforcement: In El Paso, Texas, two men were arrested, Ismael Zambada Garcia and Joaquin Guzman Lopez. The news pushed the US media's usual Wahlkampf coverage aside for a while. Experts believe that the double arrest could significantly alter the structure of Mexican drug cartels.
Although the names may not mean much to most people here, Zambada and Guzman are leading figures, if not the heads, of the so-called Sinaloa Cartel, which has flooded the United States with drugs for decades. With the arrest, US drug enforcement agents have taken down two generations of the cartel.
The 76-year-old Zambada, known as "El Mayo," is one of the most significant drug dealers in Mexican history. Along with Joaquin Archivaldo Guzman Loera, better known as "El Chapo," he founded the drug cartel.
Since El Chapo began serving a life sentence in a US maximum-security prison in 2017, the man reportedly involved in the drug trade since he was 16 has been the gray eminence. His nickname "El Mayo" is said to come from his second given name, Mario. In public, he presented himself as a wealthy rancher. In reality, he paid off police and politicians to ensure free passage for his business dealings. During El Chapo's trial, his lawyers argued that Zambada was the true leader of the cartel. They claimed he had bribed the Mexican government to turn a blind eye to the criminal organization and let it continue to operate. To this day, Zambada could claim to be the only one of the 37 most wanted drug lords in Mexico who had never been captured.
"One surrenders"
The US authorities had offered a $15 million reward for Zambada's capture and $5 million for Guzman's. The 38-year-old is one of El Chapo's four sons, known as Los Chapitos or the Little Chapos, who inherited their father's stake in the Sinaloa Cartel. One of his brothers, Ovidio Guzman, was already arrested and extradited to the United States last year.
It's still unclear how the arrest came about. Mexican media reports suggest that both men surrendered to the US authorities. However, US media reports indicate they were lured into a trap. It's likely that both stories are true, but not for both men. According to the Wall Street Journal, the operation that led to their arrest was planned for months by the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI. Zambada and Guzman were reportedly lured into a plane under the pretext of a rendezvous in Mexico, but the plane instead flew to the United States, where the FBI made the arrest.
The covert operation apparently served primarily for the arrest of Zambada. According to CNN, citing two sources close to the conspiracy, Zambada and Guzman reportedly boarded the plane together to inspect potential secret landing sites in Mexico. At least one man on board was unaware they were heading to the US, it was reported. Fox News and the New York Times reported that Guzman convinced Zambada to get on the private jet. A Fox News reporter reported that Guzman surrendered after landing, while El Mayo was captured. Photos show US border agents next to a private jet in Dona Ana County, New Mexico. Meanwhile, it is reported that the Sinaloa bosses have flown to Chicago.
Strike at the Heart of the Cartel
FBI Director Christopher Wray stated that Zambada and Guzman had "evaded law enforcement agencies for decades" and "will now be brought to justice in the United States." The two are accused of overseeing the trade of "tens of thousands of pounds of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, and fentanyl into the US, along with the associated violence," according to Wray.
The arrests mark "the heart of the cartel, responsible for most of the drugs, including fentanyl and methamphetamine," emphasized Anne Milgram, the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration, in her first statement. And the arrest of El Chapo's son is "another heavy blow for the Sinaloa Cartel," Milgram added.
The Sinaloa Cartel, named after the Mexican state where the organization was founded in the late 1980s, is one of the most powerful criminal organizations internationally. The cartel deals in more than 50 countries around the world with drugs and earns billions of dollars annually.
The Man Who Brought Fentanyl
Simultaneously, fentanyl, a highly potent synthetic opioid, has become the leading cause of death among Americans aged 18-45 due to drug overdoses. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there were over 107,000 drug-related deaths in the United States in 2023. Approximately 70% of these deaths were attributed to fentanyl. According to US government data, fentanyl is often produced from products that originate in China and is then smuggled across the border from Mexico by drug dealers, particularly the Sinaloa Cartel.
In the latest of several US indictments against him, Zambada was charged in February with conspiring to produce and distribute fentanyl. Fentanyl "was largely unknown when [Zambada] founded the Sinaloa Cartel over three decades ago, and is now responsible for immeasurable damage," according to the indictment by Breon Peace, US Attorney for the Eastern District of New York. Since 1989, Zambada has "imported and distributed massive quantities of narcotics" and earned billions of dollars, the indictment states.
At the upcoming trial against Zambada, US authorities can hope for the support of another "informant." This is because Zambada's son, Vicente Zambada Niebla, has been in US custody and has been quite talkative. In the trial against El Chapo in 2018, he admitted to giving orders for murders and kidnappings. In 2019, a Chicago federal judge sentenced him to 15 years in prison. According to a statement from the prosecution, he has been cooperating with US authorities since 2011 and has helped the authorities identify members of the Sinaloa Cartel and a rival gang. This led to the indictment of "dozens of high-ranking targets and hundreds of their accomplices."
The arrests of Zambada and Guzman Lopez are a sign of the massive efforts of US authorities to dismantle the activities of the Sinaloa Cartel. "Fentanyl is the deadliest drug threat our country has ever faced," so General Attorney Merrick Garland in his statement after the arrest. "The Department of Justice will not rest until every single cartel leader, every member, and every associate who is responsible for poisoning our communities is held accountable."
Despite being notorious figures for decades, Ismael Zambada Garcia and Joaquin Guzman Lopez, both leaders of the Sinaloa Cartel, faced justice in the United States. Their arrests were facilitated by collaborations between the FBI and the United States Department of Homeland Security, highlighting the international nature of the Drug war in Mexico.
The Double arrest of Zambada and Guzman, who are accused of trafficking drugs into the US, could potentially reshape the structure of Mexican drug cartels, with significant implications for the global drug trade.
