User:Aaponce22/Illegal drug trade in Latin America

The Latin American drug trade came around in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s. The early countries that started the trade included Mexico, Guatemala, Columbia, and Puerto Rico. The illegal trade started when many high-powered figures different countries and regions wanted to move drugs and gain power. The high-powered men would purchase enormous amounts of drugs and guns. Once the men gained enough men and money from these illegal actions many people would support what they are doing and soon be entered into their cartel. there are many cartels through Latin America that are known to move substantial amounts of drugs through country borders. Each cartel will gain a profit from the transportation process of the drugs. Many cartels gained a lot of money and grew in power and grew in the size of the cartel. Each individual cartel either had one leader or two leaders, each leader would discuss and strategize the next move of the cartel. Not long after the cartels gained money and power, higher cartel leaders would bribe the local and national government for them to turn away from the illegal activity that was taking place in their regions that they had power over. the main drugs that cartels would produce and transport into other countries would be marijuana and cocaine. Different cartels would have different methods of transporting the drugs, the most common method of transportation was either through big haulers filled with crops or building materials or packed tightly into small airplanes.

The early days in the illegal drug trade started in Columbia in the early 19070’s. The famous Pablo Escobar founded the Medallin cartel to start making cocaine for the locals in Columbia. soon after gaining a lot of power in his local region, he would soon find a way to smuggle his product into American through his trade routes in Mexico. After the medallin cartel established a trusted and reliable route into America many other cartels in Mexico raised to power. In the year 1978 founders Miguel Angel Félix Gallardo, Rafael Caro Quintero, and Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo founded one of the most notorious cartels in Mexican history known has the Guadalajara Cartel. The Guadalajara cartel had gained control of majority of central Mexico all the way north up towards the United States and Mexico border. During this time in the illegal Latin drug trade violence skyrocketed throughout Latin America. Once cartels started to gain control in their respected regions violence broke out due to territorial disputes, money disputes and many other factors. During this time cartels would target extreme poverty sections to gain easy control of areas and help the cartel grow. Around this time most cartels were bringing in an average of around 400 million dollars a week from selling their products or smuggling drugs into the United States. Leaders and other higher ups in the illegal drug trade became rich way faster than they had ever thought they would. To keep themselves and the rest of the cartel protected from any government interference, cartels began to bribe the government so the military would stay out of the way of the cartel's business.

During the 1980’s is when the introduction of crack cocaine hit the streets in America starting in the southern region of California. Crack cocaine is a crystallized version of cocaine with a high potent count. what people do not realize is this form of drugs started in Latin America. many powerful cartels started to not agree completely over power disputes. The Guadalajara cartel soon separated themselves from the rest of the game by producing and selling crack cocaine, soon smuggling their product into America. For a long time, the Guadalajara cartel would buy cocaine from the Medallin cartel to smuggle into America, after disputes and many deaths the Guadalajara cartel became independent making their own cocaine that also evolved into crack cocaine. The value of smuggling crack cocaine into America was a lot higher value than Marijana and regular cocaine. Even though the Guadalajara cartel became the biggest in the world at the time, Pablo Escobar of the medallin cartel still would smuggle substantial amounts of cocaine into southern Florida in small planes. In the mid to late 1980’s more cartels began to form throughout Latin America. At this time, the illegal drug trade became “the war on drugs,” due to the high crime rate and the increased amounts of drugs that were being smuggled into the United States. The United States put together the drug enforcement administration also known as the D.E.A. many agents would move into Mexico and go undercover to help the United States bust down cartels and arrest leaders of the cartels.

During the 1980’s the violence and rinsed to an all-time high in Mexico. 100’s of people would go missing through just a week during this period of time. The cartels were not an organization that everyday people would want to come across in their life. Many cartels would have their versions of “soldiers”, who's only job would be to go out and kill people the cartel deemed as a threat. These hitmen would be responsible for killing, torturing, and getting rid of any evidence that was left behind. Major leaders with a lot of money also bribed the government to turn their head away from the violence that was taking place in these countries. For almost 30 years cartel leaders had a huge influence in the political area due to altering elections and killing political figures. Once the cartels gained power from the governments, they were free Todo anything they wanted to. It was not until the late 80’s when the DEA became involved with the illegal activity that was taking place in Mexico. since many cartels were smuggling their products into the United States through the border the DEA wanted to find the underlying cause of who oversaw the cartels and who was smuggling the drugs over. The smuggling took place at the southern border along California stretching all the way to the gulf coast of Texas. With a lot of land area to work with the cartels always found a way to smuggle the drugs across. There were different methods of smuggling drugs into the united stated border such as big moving haulers, tunnels that went underground for miles and one of the best methods they would use is by airplane. the people that would smuggle the drugs were known as “mules” these people would get paid just by getting the drugs into the United States. Most of the time whatever drugs that they had gotten into the United States value was worth over hundreds of millions of dollars. These men were valued within their respected cartel because without them the entire cartel would have little to no income. They were also paid extremely well, making well over millions of dollars per trip across the borders. If you were a pilot of an airplane, your income would rise due to the higher risk of getting caught during the Transportaion process.