El Aguaje, where 14 police were killed today, is two decades of Michoacán’s lethal conflict in a nutshell.
A rural village in Tierra Caliente, it's been smack in the middle of a long history of violence. Today was but the latest episode.
Thread 👇
tinyurl.com/yxfc4bl6
A rural village in Tierra Caliente, it's been smack in the middle of a long history of violence. Today was but the latest episode.
Thread 👇
tinyurl.com/yxfc4bl6
El Aguaje sits on a key overland road connecting the Hot Land region w/ the Sierra Madre, and was once a stronghold of the Milenio Cartel, big-time coke runners in the 90s/early 2000s. They had built modernist narco-mansions here, very untypical w/out the usual greco-roman kitsch
When I went for research in 2011, Milenio drug lords had been literally dragged out of their villas and executed, when from 2004 Los Zetas and later La Familia took over.
Then came Federal Police&Military offensives under Calderón, and thus true scenes of war.
Then came Federal Police&Military offensives under Calderón, and thus true scenes of war.
In 2010, La Familia split in two, and El Aguaje saw heavy fighting once again, with the Knights Templar taking over. In 2014, the autodefensas moved in, only to crumble soon after and see Templars and Viagras fighting over the village.
And now it's CJNG v Templars&Viagras-and fragments of the state either allied with one side, or obstacles in other ways.
CJNG-boss El Mencho was born 12 km from El Aguaje, and his move for the region is not least personally motivated. He too had been kicked out by La Familia.
CJNG-boss El Mencho was born 12 km from El Aguaje, and his move for the region is not least personally motivated. He too had been kicked out by La Familia.
El Aguaje, and much of the surrounding Hot Land, has been deep narco-war territory - and will remain so until the state develops a language and strategy for how to deal with these and other sites of internal conflict in Mexico.
