Mexico: Economics and the Arms Trade

By Scott Stewart and Fred Burton
9 July 2009

On June 26, the small Mexican town of Apaseo el Alto, in Guanajuato state, was the scene of a deadly firefight between members of Los Zetas and federal and local security forces. The engagement began when a joint patrol of Mexican soldiers and police officers responded to a report of heavily armed men at a suspected drug safe house. When the patrol arrived, a 20-minute firefight erupted between the security forces and gunmen in the house as well as several suspects in two vehicles who threw fragmentation grenades as they tried to escape.

When the shooting ended, 12 gunmen lay dead, 12 had been taken into custody and several soldiers and police officers had been wounded. At least half of the detained suspects admitted to being members of Los Zetas, a highly trained Mexican cartel group known for its use of military weapons and tactics.

When authorities examined the safe house they discovered a mass grave that contained the remains of an undetermined number of people (perhaps 14 or 15) who are believed to have been executed and then burned beyond recognition by Los Zetas. The house also contained a large cache of weapons, including assault rifles and fragmentation grenades. Such military ordnance is frequently used by Los Zetas and the enforcers who work for their rival cartels.

STRATFOR has been closely following the cartel violence in Mexico for several years now, and the events that transpired in Apaseo el Alto are by no means unique. It is not uncommon for the Mexican authorities to engage in large firefights with cartel groups, encounter mass graves or recover large caches of arms. However, the recovery of the weapons in Apaseo el Alto does provide an opportunity to once again focus on the dynamics of Mexico’s arms trade.

To read the complete Stratfor article, please click here.