Latin America – SOUTHCOM
The fight beneath the threshold
ZeroLine analysis covering modern conflict, intelligence tradecraft, and security dynamics across Latin America. Focused on cartel power, illicit networks, gray-zone activity, and the convergence of criminal and strategic actors. This is where warfare blends into organized violence and influence.
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How Mexican TOCs Build People, Power, and Local Control
Mexican cartels don’t survive on drug routes alone. They recruit constantly, shape local identity, and replace state functions where governance breaks down. If they still control the people and the narrative, they’re still in the fight.
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Mexico’s Cartels Are Not Just Cartels Anymore
Mexico’s transnational criminal organizations are fragmenting, globalizing, and adapting faster than the old “drug cartel” label can keep up. This ZeroLine brief breaks down the current TOC environment, the Sinaloa rupture, CJNG’s power dynamics, cartel plaza control, Chinese-linked chemical and financial networks, drone use, criminal governance, and the indicators U.S. intelligence professionals should be watching…
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NARCOSOC: Berets, Blow, and the Breakdown of Discipline
From Fort Bragg to Fort Bliss, cartels found the backdoor into the most elite units in the U.S. military—and walked right through it. Welcome to NARCOSOC: the shadow command we never authorized, but now have to fight from within.