Antonio Navalón
Assuming that in the afterlife, there was freedom of expression and that the spirits could manifest themselves, Fidel Castro must surely be, on the one hand, enjoying himself but also suffering. The events in Ecuador last week and the general uprising in many Latin American countries exemplify the triumph of what Fidel Castro tried so hard to do in his time, which was to start a revolution in all of America. A revolution that, under the communist insignia and ideological struggle, would end the capitalist system’s abuses, inequalities, and evils. However, the Central American wars, the more than 70 years of civil war in Colombia that began after the assassination of Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, and the constant conflicts and disputes to try to correct all the wrong decisions that have led to the growing social inequality in Central and South America or the disaster made by the United States in the region – although it might seem that it would – have not been enough to make the whole continent burn.
The drug trafficking and organized crime revolution has triumphed. On the streets of the United States, it is seen in the growing trafficking and consumption of fentanyl. It has also done so in the countries that receive remittances from their nationals from U.S. territory. Organized crime today is an uncontrollable force for the States; its cartels not only control a large part of the territories in which they are installed but also have weapons capabilities similar to or even more significant than those of the national defense forces of the countries. The situation exceeds the capacities and limits of control by the States, and when it comes to imprisoning any of their members – as has already happened in our country – madness and complete destruction are unleashed. When they are labeled – as happened with the Ecuadorian candidate, Fernando Villavicencio – as cartels and as a danger to social stability, they respond by attacking or taking the life of the person making the statement, as was the case of Villavicencio. The triumph of a revolution has led us to a process in which today, we can be distraught because there is not much to do.
If our societies were founded on solid values and where good could defeat evil, the battles, injustices, and situations in our daily lives would not exist. However, analyze and witness how bullets have won the battle over hugs. Today, we are slaves of a system in which – it is worth remembering – the first principle that made the United States the world’s leading power for many years has been violated.
It is not that there are no mafias in the United States; it is that there are all the mafias. So, what is the problem, and what is the difference? That in U.S. territory, no mafia, no organized group, and no challenger of the State is superior to the strength of the State itself. Nothing is above the law in the United States, and whoever tries to be is undermined by the force of the State and the law itself. The social revolutions unfolding worldwide – originating in the lack of astuteness in distributing wealth among citizens – and the hegemony of violence over any other life system has a very simple explanation. And it is that the States – with clear exceptions – are weaker today than these forces. In this case, what is the real triumph of this revolution? If victory for Castro’s revolution meant the failure of the capitalist system, what does triumph mean for groups such as the Sinaloa Cartel, the Jalisco Cartel – New Generation, or any others controlling and governing many regions of various countries? But beyond that undeniable fact, we must question what these organized crime groups are really offering to societies or – beyond provoking terror among citizens – what their proposals are to the societies they govern or pretend to govern based on.
Another story from which we should have learned the lesson is that having the capos locked up in prisons where they cannot see the sun or killing the capos of each gang is not the real solution to the problem. For every organized crime leader imprisoned or killed, five more get out. The head of the snake is killed; however, more heads multiply from the snake in a spiral that seems to have no end.
It is sad and especially painful that the only migration that is succeeding and triumphing is the one that represents the destruction of societies. It is evident that migration, poverty, and underdevelopment are part of the fabric and composition of the army of evil. These armies of evil have long since stopped selling vice in the form of gambling, prostitutes, or drugs to become true terrorist groups that challenge and often defeat States.
Let no one be surprised about what will happen from here on. However, it is evident that if the U.S. government endured a war in Central America to prevent the communists from taking power, imagine the military response they would have to make in the face of the harassment that means the destruction of the States in the South of their continent. And in that sense, there is something in which the United States has always been victorious, which is the defense at any cost and under any condition of the preservation and strength of its territory.
Today’s challenges are new, and consequently, the responses must be unique. We lament the loss of the democratic system without realizing that having some countries based on violence and the loss of the concept of security leads to the repetitive success of the so-called Bukele model. In the end, the way things are going and just as President Daniel Noboa has already decreed a state of emergency in Ecuador and promised the creation of two maximum security prisons to incarcerate the most dangerous, I fear that soon we will have catalogs of large construction companies in which the Nazi extermination camps will not be displayed, but the Alcatraz model or the Qincheng model. Sooner rather than later, it will become customary to see prisoners posing on their knees and underwear, as is already the case in El Salvador. We live in turbulent times in which the most significant threat is the lack of capacity of States to counter threats to their integrity and survival.
Further Reading: