Task Force Led by US Military Helps Mexico Hunt for El Mencho Cartel Boss

JAKARTA - A new task force led by the United States military that specializes in intelligence gathering on drug cartels played a role in a Mexican military raid on Sunday that killed Mexican drug lord Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, aka El Mencho, a US defense official said.

The Interagency-Anti-Cartel Task Force, which involves several US government agencies, was officially launched last month with the aim of mapping the network of members of the drug cartel on both sides of the US-Mexico border, US officials.

The official, who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity, did not provide further details on any information that might have been provided by the US military-led task force to Mexican authorities. The official stressed that the raid itself was a Mexican military operation.

A former US official, who spoke on condition of anonymity without referring specifically to the task force, said the US put together a detailed target package for El Mencho and gave it to the Mexican government for its operation.

"This detailed dossier includes information provided by US law enforcement and US intelligence," the former official said.

The former official added that El Mencho is at the top, if not at the top, of the US target list in Mexico.

Only a little information is publicly available about the US-Contra Kartel Interagency Joint Task Force, or JITF-CC.

Its website states the organization aims to "identify, disrupt, and dismantle cartel operations that pose a threat to the United States along the U.S.-Mexico border."

US Brigadier General Maurizio Calabrese, who leads the task force, spoke to Reuters this month about how the US military is channeling its experience in fighting groups such as al-Qaeda and ISIS to map the cartel's networks.

"The cartel operates differently from al-Qaeda or ISIS, a different motivation, which makes identifying the entire network more important for us so that we can disrupt and dismantle it," Calabrese told Reuters, as quoted by Al Arabiya (23/2).

Calabrese noted estimates vary widely but said there may be several hundred core members of the cartel "at the top."

"But then you have about 200,000 to 250,000 independent contractors that are going to help you move this drug," Calabrese said.

Jack Riley, a former senior official at the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), said President Trump's designation of the Mexican cartel as a terrorist organization last year opened up a new type of US military assistance.

He said it could be useful in terms of US intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance resources.

"Our surveillance capabilities are probably not unlimited, and that will be very helpful in real-time things," Riley told Reuters.

"But these people are very clever in hiding their traces, hiding who is responsible and where those people are," he explained.

A second US defense official, speaking to Reuters ahead of the Mexican operation, said the new task force was in line with a broader US strategy to combat the drug trade that has seen the US military take an increasingly greater operational control of the border with Mexico.

The strategy also includes US raids now routinely targeting vessels suspected of carrying drugs in Caribbean and Pacific waters, the legality of which has been questioned by Democratic lawmakers and legal experts.

"The whole idea of creating an interagency effort is to avoid unfettered tensions, to bring it all together, synchronize it," the second official said of the task force.

As previously reported, Mexican authorities killed drug lord Nemesio Oseguera alias 'El Mencho' in an operation designed to capture him in the western state of Jalisco.

The operation triggered a wave of violence, with cars being burned and gunmen blocking highways in more than half a dozen states.

The Mexican Defense Ministry said U.S. authorities had provided "additional information," but gave no further details.

A Mexican government source familiar with the operation said the Mexican government designed and carried it out, and no US military personnel were physically involved.

Meanwhile, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said the US provided intelligence support to the Mexican government in the operation that killed El Mencho.

A former police officer, Oseguera (60), is the mysterious leader of the powerful Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), an international criminal organization widely considered one of the most powerful in Mexico.

He has eluded capture for years despite a $15 million reward from Washington for information leading to his arrest or detention.

The killing of the drug lord is a major victory for Mexico's war against the drug cartels responsible for smuggling billions of dollars worth of cocaine and fentanyl into the US.

The administration of President Donald Trump has launched a campaign of pressure against the government of Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum to increase the crackdown on drug trafficking, including US threats to intervene directly in Mexico.