Texas Mexico Cartels looking for Safe Zones

11/11/11

AUSTIN - Two retired generals say the cartels are building safe zones along the Texas-Mexico border. They're going to operate on whichever side offers the best security. The more the Mexican government cracks down, the more cartel will need to operate out of the Rio Grande Valley.

Retired generals Barry McCaffery and Robert Scales say the cartels have a clear plan to build a sanctuary zone one county deep inside the state of Texas. They want safe spots in every Texas border county where they can control operations.

Retired General Robert Scales says the plan it "to use Texas as a launch point into the heartland of America for their distribution of drugs."

Scales says cartels need our territory because of the crackdown south of the border.

"The foot soldiers - we have learned through our research - are criminal gangs, many in Texas prisons, that are essentially throwaway material," says Scales.

Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw thinks this is more than tough talk.

"You look at it from a military standpoint. What you're talking about is a military front," says McCraw, "You cannot have six of the seven Mexican cartels that have butchered over 40,000 people living in Texas and operating command and control networks in border counties, and leveraging the Barrio of Azteca, Mexican Mafia, Texas Syndicate, on both sides of the border and death squads moving back and forth and everything be safe."

The gangs here in Texas are referred to as trans-national. They form in our state and federal prisons but cooperate with the cartels in Mexico.

"I'm quite confident that enough people, if you call it like this is, they'll be action down the road," says McCraw.

People like McCraw and the generals stand by their claims that certain areas of the border are under cartel control.

"It's going to get worse in the coming years," says retired General Barry McCaffery.

McCaffery and Scales wrote in their military analysis, "In a curious twist of irony, the more successful the Mexican military becomes in confronting the cartels, the greater likelihood that the cartels will take the active fight into Texas, as they compete against each other in the battle to control distribution territories and corridors."

Congressman Michael McCaul believes his fellow federal lawmakers are in deep denial.

"Well the idea that these cartels have bought up ranches on the other side of the border, so they can easily pass because they own the property. That's what they do," he says.

They're worried the situation will get worse without federal help. So far, the feds have ignored calls for backup on the border.

The Texas Legislature called for the military report. The Texas Department of Agriculture and Department of Public Safety commissioned the study.

The generals claim their analysis is non-partisan.