Of course not, none of the sides are at all in the right here. But from the cartels perspective, they're almost certainly in the right.
Drug cartels are entirely the result of poor policies, and the blame for all the harms caused by them rests primarily on the shoulders of those perpetuating those policies. Surely the politicians that vote for laws that directly enable drug cartels to exist in the first place must be worse than the leaders of any individual drug cartel?
Any kind of serious analysis of who's more right would end up being a work at the scale of Rising Up and Rising Down, that's probably best avoided.
If we oversimplify cartels into innocent businessmen just looking to sell drugs, with governments being the ones that introduced violence into the equation in their effort to stop them? Surely it must be the cartels
If we oversimplify cartels into evil criminals just looking to wield power over other human beings, with governments just trying to liberate people from cartel tyranny? Surely it must be the governments
Well, sure! The crucial difference between cartels and ISIS is that the cartels are in it to make money, ISIS is an ideologically motivated nation-building project.
The cartels disappear when the activity becomes unprofitable, ISIS does not.
The cartels tend to use violence when it's profitable, ISIS will use violence because they believe that an imaginary man wants them to do so.
You could legalize and regulate their drug-related business, paying a small amount of taxes will probably be more attractive than maintaining a private military in the long term.
Alternatively you can fight like this, barely dent the cartels and instead cause massive amounts of suffering for the regular people who live in the middle of it all? If you actually cared about improving things rather than making a show, surely you'd want to pursue policies that (a) actually help you get rid of the negative influence of the cartels and (b) avoid collateral damage by not forcing the cartels to retaliate.
>What do you mean forcing? They are organized crime, this is what they choose to do. The right thing for them to do is turn themselves in.
Self preservation. Turning themselves in would be antithetical to that. To expect anyone to sacrifice themselves would be absurd.
The only reason the government is only occasionally assassinating individual leaders instead of fighting open war against the cartels is that the cartels are willing and able to impose unacceptable costs in retaliation. It would be suicidal to not retaliate.
>How do you expect the cartel to subside and eventually dissolve? Policies that encourage them to play nicely?
Drug cartels are entirely the result of poor policies, one of which is that the Mexican government has not been punishing the cartels. Maybe they're fixing that.
Of course not, none of the sides are at all in the right here. But from the cartels perspective, they're almost certainly in the right.
Drug cartels are entirely the result of poor policies, and the blame for all the harms caused by them rests primarily on the shoulders of those perpetuating those policies. Surely the politicians that vote for laws that directly enable drug cartels to exist in the first place must be worse than the leaders of any individual drug cartel?
Any kind of serious analysis of who's more right would end up being a work at the scale of Rising Up and Rising Down, that's probably best avoided.
If we oversimplify cartels into innocent businessmen just looking to sell drugs, with governments being the ones that introduced violence into the equation in their effort to stop them? Surely it must be the cartels
If we oversimplify cartels into evil criminals just looking to wield power over other human beings, with governments just trying to liberate people from cartel tyranny? Surely it must be the governments