Author’s note
I have followed events in Mexico for quite a while, partly because of a personal interest in the culture of this extraordinary country – an interest that began in childhood when I first devoured books about the great pre-Columbian empires of Mexico – and partly because my son Xavier has spent long periods of time in Mexico over the last few years. As I Skyped with Xavier over many months (and prayed he would stay safe and would never be in the wrong place at the wrong time!), I came to a better understanding of what was happening in Mexico and just how the drug war affects family life and people’s everyday experiences. Nothing is guaranteed. Nothing can be taken for granted. It is this feeling that underlies Emilio – the feeling of what happens when a nightmare that’s always hovered at the edge of your vision suddenly becomes a lived reality.
The Mexican drug war has claimed over 60 000 lives since 2006; in fact, some reports put the figure as high as 100 000. The war shows no sign of letting up, despite successive changes of government. Although Mexico has become more prosperous recently, and in many ways is a wonderful and exciting place with its rich, complex culture and strong joie de vivre, the drug war has caused deep trauma to the Mexican people. Unlike most wars, which are often the result of tribal conflict or an invasion by foreign forces, the Mexican drug war is both a civil war and a war fed by foreign elements, in this case, primarily by the US drug market. It is both a conflict between rival cartels/gangs battling for supremacy, and a war between the major cartels and the Mexican government forces.
There has been armed conflict over drugs for decades in Mexico, particularly in the north, but a more generalised civil war began after a government crackdown in 2006. The cartels assumed control of the trade formerly organised by the Colombian cartels. It’s a brutal business – they vie with each other in atrocities and the public display of dismembered bodies. As well as the high death toll among gang members, government forces, police, journalists, politicians and priests, there have been many thousands of ordinary people injured and tortured, thousands of children orphaned and many people reported missing. Whole communities are living in fear and the annual rate of kidnappings continues to be alarming.
Meanwhile, corruption within the system, particularly within the police force, all too often allows criminals to continue their reign of terror. Corruption isn’t just about money, it is also about fear, and many police officers are simply too scared to do anything more than keep their heads down. This is one of the reasons why new federal police services, backed by the army, were created.
A recent development, in some states, is the formation of armed vigilante groups that claim they can protect communities from the violence of the cartels by directly confronting them and also by disarming the local police, who they say are in league with the cartels. Such a development is an indication of how little faith desperate people have in the police, and in fact the government has as much as admitted it by allowing the groups to operate now as ‘Rural Defence Forces’. But it must also be said that there are many dedicated police officers who risk their lives every day trying to protect the community.
Children and young people have been directly involved in this pitiless war as relatives of murder and kidnap victims, or as victims themselves. Some are also perpetrators; there are increasing numbers of brutalised child and teenage assassins who often commit their lucrative crimes while high on the drugs the cartels give them. On the other hand, some young people attempt to make a difference, either by direct confrontation in vigilante groups – whose members are often young men in their late teens and early twenties – or in other less violent ways. One notable example is the nineteen-year-old woman who became a police chief in a district where no one else would take the position. (Alas, after only a year she had to quit her job and flee to the US for asylum.) Then there are the teenagers who joined an extraordinary movement called ‘the Messengers’; they stand on street corners dressed in angel costumes, holding up signs appealing to kidnappers and hitmen to repent. The harsh reality is that no one is entirely out of reach of this terrible war.
Timeline
1980 Miguel Angel Félix Gallardo founds Guadalajara Cartel, first cartel to prosper from Colombian cocaine trade. Guadalajara controls illegal drug trade across Mexico–US border.
1980s Gallardo divides trade among top drug leaders. Sinoloa and Tijuana cartels created following his arrest in 1989.
1990-2000 Violence escalates between the major cartels: Los Zetas, Sinaloa, Gulf, Tijuana and Juárez.
2001 Joaquín Guzmán Loera, ‘El Chapo’, escapes from federal prison vows to take control of Mexico’s drug trade with his Sinaloa Cartel.
2005 Guzmán breaks non-aggression pact of the major cartels with the assassination of Juárez Cartel leader. Violence escalates across Mexico, about 15 000 people killed.
2006 Operation Michoacán President Felipe Calderón launches first government offensive against drug cartels. Estimated 6500 Mexican military deployed to Michoacán, capturing La Familia leader and killing 500 cartel members.
2007 More than 20 000 Mexican soldiers and federal police deployed across Mexico. Almost 3000 people killed and an estimated 284 federal police commanders dismissed. US President George W. Bush pledges $1.4 billion in drug-fighting gear and training for Mexico and Central America.
2008 Inter-cartel disputes continue as Guzmán takes on the Juárez Cartel near Ciudad Juárez – the drug war’s bloodiest flashpoint with over 6000 deaths. Cartels diversify into kidnapping, human trafficking and extortion.
2009 President Calderón sends 10 000 troops to Ciudad Juárez. Violence spreads to Arizona. US President Barack Obama vows to end gun-smuggling into Mexico as drug-war death toll soars above 9000. Braullo Arellano Domínguez, leader of Loz Zetas Cartel, is killed in gun battle with Mexican forces.
2010 Gulf Cartel leader, Osiel Cárdenas Gullén, sentenced to twenty-five years in Texan prison. Worsening police corruption results in dismissal of more than 3000 officers. Los Zetas Cartel kidnaps and kills 72 South and Central American migrants in Tamaulipas for refusing to traffic drugs. Ciudad Juárez becomes Mexico’s most violent city.
2011 Mexico’s military captures 11 544 people linked to cartels and organised crime. US Senate report reveals 70 per cent of guns recovered from Mexican crime scenes were sourced in US. Several mass graves holding 177 bodies are discovered in Tamaulipas, taking the estimated death toll to 43 000.
2012 President Calderón’s offensive results in the deaths of more than 40 major cartel members but causes the splintering of cartels into more extreme rival organisations.
Mexico City becomes new target, with Mano con Ojos group claiming responsibility for severed heads found in the city.
2012 Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto takes office and vows to reduce crime and violence as cartels engage in more terrorist acts, focusing on public servants such as city mayors. An estimated 30 000 Mexican children are involved in organised crime.
2013 Human Rights Watch report estimates more than 60 000 people killed and about 10 000 missing due to drug-related violence. US Treasury declares ‘El Chapo’ the most influential trafficker in the world, his milti-billion dollar enterprise stretching to 54 countries. Record year for kidnappings in Mexico, with 1583 reported incidents.
2014 The rise of vigilante militia in Michoacán and Guerrero and other areas with high kidnapping rates creates a third force in Mexico’s drug war. Guzmán captured in Maxatlán, Sinaloa by Mexican and US security forces.
Glossary
abuelo grandfather
albondiga meatballs
agua fresco a drink made from fruit juices, such as mango and watermelon
arroz con pollo rice with chicken
bastardos bastards
café con crème coffee with cream
caldo de pollo chicken soup
caldo de res a hearty beef soup
cantina pub
Carlos Slim A Mexican business magnate, investor and phila
nthropist, once ranked the richest person in the world
chica girl
chilli quesos cheesy, spicy dip eaten with fresh tortillas
chiquita little girl
churros a Spanish doughnut
cielito literally ‘little heaven’; or darling
corazoncito mio my little heart
Día de los Inocentes Day of the Innocents (in memory of children who have died)
Día de los Muertos Day of the Dead
empanadas a savoury fried pastry filled with meat
Federales a slang name for the Policía Federal or Federal Police (‘the Feds’)
flan con nata crème caramel with whipped cream
hermana sister
hermano brother
hombre man Maestra Teacher
mariachi a traditional dance music very popular in Mexico, featuring bands playing stringed instruments such as guitars and violins, and trumpets
mi amor my love
mi hermana querida my darling sister
muy delicioso very delicious
pendejos rotten bastard
Policía Federal Federal Police; see also Federales
telenovela soap opera
tonto idiot
tres leches three milks (tres leches cake is made with whole milk, condensed milk and evaporated milk)
Find out more about …
Mexico
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/country_profiles/1205074.stm
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-18095241
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrHtTmBNc6c (fast-forward through the opening advertisement)
Brownlie, Bojang, Ali. Mexico, Raintree, London, 2012
Peppas, Lynn. Cultural traditions in Mexico, Crabtree Publishing Company, New York, 2012
Mexico’s Drug War
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-10681249
http://edition.cnn.com/2013/09/02/world/americas/mexico-drug-war-fast-facts/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLlrbAZv9Do
http://edition.cnn.com/2012/01/17/world/americas/mexico-city-security/
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/10/31/207103/kidnappings-soar-in-mexico-with.html
Effects of Drug War on children in Mexico
http://www.npr.org/2012/11/27/166027034/mexicos-drug-war-is-changing-childhood
http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/07/19/mexican-drug-war-claiming-more-child-victims/
Acknowledgements
This is a work of fiction, but I’ve used many sources for research, including news reports on the ever-evolving situation in Mexico, as well as the books listed below. My thanks to Xavier Masson-Leach and J.L. Powers for helpful advice on Mexican daily life and culture.
Campbell, Howard. Drug War Zone: Frontline Dispatches from the Streets of El Paso and Juárez, University of Texas Press, Austin, 2009
This book, which mainly consists of a series of interviews, is notable in that it presents the personal words and experiences of the ‘narcos’, the drug dealers, and also those of people on the other side, the police and other law enforcers. It gives great insights into how the cartels operate, too, and how they have taken hold.
Gibler, John. To Die in Mexico: Dispatches from Inside the Drug War, City Lights Publishers, San Francisco, 2011
This American journalist decided to visit some of Mexico’s most dangerous towns and neighbourhoods in order to bring back first-hand reports and interviews with people on all sides of the drug war. He profiles the corruption that enables the drug cartels to get so rich and powerful, and also focuses on the courageous – and dangerous – role that journalists have played in covering the war. His solution, to legalise drugs, won’t however meet with everyone’s approval.
Valseca, Jayne Garcia with Mark Ebner. We Have Your Husband: One Woman’s Terrifying Story of a Kidnapping in Mexico, Berkley, New York, 2011
This is a chilling account of a terrifying, months-long ordeal in which Mexican newspaper publisher Eduardo Valseca Garcia was held by a kidnap gang, while his American wife Jayne attempted to deal with the kidnappers’ ever-increasing demands, with the help of a young negotiator from the Federales. This book was very important in my research, as it described in detail an evolving kidnap situation, and how kidnaps are dealt with in Mexico. It has also been made into a movie.
Emilio Page 13
