On Wednesday, Elon Musk claimed a group of gangs and cartels the State Department has designated as “foreign terrorist organizations” could now be targeted by US drone strikes.
“That means they’re eligible for drone strikes,” Musk, a close advisor to President Trump, wrote on X.
The State Department designation applies to MS-13, the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, and six Mexican cartels, all organizations that operate inside the US.
The FTO designations expand sanctions on the criminal organizations but do not authorize the president to use military force against them. But the move is seen as a first step toward taking military action against cartels, an idea supported by many Republicans despite the risks of blowback and bringing a hot war to American soil.
In 2023, House Republicans introduced a bill to authorize the use of force against cartels and other groups “responsible for trafficking fentanyl or a fentanyl-related substance into the United States or carrying out other related activities that cause regional destabilization in the Western Hemisphere.”
The broad authorization for the use of military force (AUMF) had 24 co-sponsors, including then-House Rep. Mike Waltz, who is now President Trump’s national security advisor.
The US still uses the 2001 AUMF passed in the wake of the September 11 attacks to justify wars in multiple countries, bypassing the constitutional requirement for Congress to declare war, which hasn’t happened since World War II.
US drone strikes often murder innocent civilians. I can only see this as a strategy to provoke war with Mexico.
I hate to say this but sometimes wars are necessary to wake up the other side…!
Anyone who wants to provoke a war with a country that has 37 million of its citizens resident within the US is beyond stupid. Terrorism ain't rocket surgery, even Green Berets can do it. Want botulism in the food supply, refineries on fire, trains derailed, substations shot up, pipelines torn up, and caltrops on the freeway? Just attack Mexico and your wish will come true!
Do you think DC establishment care about those 37 millions…?! They eventually target cartels in Mexico on behalf of cia benefits just to push Mexican government do something about it…!
The AUMF is the gift that keeps on giving for the weapons manufacturers and defense contractors.
Dumbocracy?!
AKA kakistocracy!
Has everyone gone crazy?
Yes.
Bespoke Dystopia?
deport musk
I wish Elon Musk would just shut the fuck up and disappear.
The former seems unlikely.
But I doubt he’ll last very long as “senior adviser to the president.”
Like Tulsi Gabard, soon he'll tell Rump something he doesn't want to hear and he'll be gone.
"he'll be gone" LOL. Tulsi is a woman.
I meant Musk will be gone, same way that John Bolton went away and Gabbard will go. Rump is still playing his ‘Apprentice’ game show, don’t kiss up sufficiently or speak out of turn and he say, “You’re fired.”
Trump does not like being upstaged. So, if Musk last six months that indicates that he may just be pulling strings. IMO, I think they both have mental problems.
If you actually want to attack the cartels go after them where it hurts; their money.
The US is the world's largest money laundry, well over a TRILLION dollars in just drug money gets flushed through the system every year.* Unlike in the movies no one pays for a cargo container of cocaine with a suitcase of $100 bills, that money flows through half a dozen banks and as many shell companies before coming out the other end squeaky clean. The US banking system is intrinsic to the drug trade, and they knowingly participate in it.
Money laundering, politely called "private banking services", charge 10-15% for their services.
$1,000,000,000,000 x 10% = $100,000,000,000 PER YEAR
What state would our banking system be in without that $100-$150 billion of almost pure profit coming in every year? I hate to think. The high mucky-mucks of our (and every other) country know how to stop most money laundering, but they won't invite the economic catastrophe that would result.
*Not all money laundering goes through the banks, about a third flows through the stock markets, real estate (especially commercial), and the like.
And the way to go after their money is to legalize the stuff so that people buy it at Walgreens instead of on the streetcorner.
Elon Musk is a DEI hire.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/70b43888491e045a64d51158802d2bb7122108907544a18dfe865f78240b4f20.jpg
The U.S. Supremely corrupt Court dismissed much of Mexico's $10 billion lawsuit brought by the Mexican government against six gun U.S. manufacturers, despite the fact that more than 70% of the weapons trafficked to Mexican drug cartels come from the United States.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3d07153dbd13b7705dbd5f82c4faa36cc11cde0f37e1e50e1b547c4411e4e443.png
Univers25
psychopath
sociopath
down a path
to a shitshow
With a chainsaw
gasoline
and a match
watch the dumpster fire
as these morons rob the store
Remember
without elon
you wouldnt get [f]elon
and were all screwed
to high heaven
or hell…
War against Mexico by Musk the moocher.
Thank God! Legal-X says it is OK!
The Musketeer acts as the second US president because one is not enough…!
If Musk wants to bomb drug cartels he could start at CIA HQ.
Designating drug cartels as terrorists and threatening with drone strikes does nothing but make very clear that the Trump administration has not spent any serious thought on developing a strategy to attack the drug problem that has any chance of success. It sounds tough and all, but it would – beside cause a whole slew of entirely new problems, making the entire situation much worse than it is today, which is already defying description – make life so much worse for the very people already balancing on the extreme edges of desperation.
But the entire idea to attack the supply chain side of things is not any sort of solution as it is not the source of the problem.
Just like they are eligible for a free cell phones and medical insurance.
Enjoying Universe 25 folks with just a spice of 1984/Idiocracy?
im not at all…
'Might does not make right, it always corrupts from within and does always, quite the opposite'
The musketeer is interfering in the CIA secret drug business…! Should watch out…!
As far as I understand Musk’s role is limited to the recommendations regarding potential savings by examining efficiency and effectiveness of programs.
It is unusual for a person close to the president in one capacity to be involved in a matters of national security. And not just any security — but threatening the destabilization of neighboring country. Talking less and knowing one’s role should be the order of the day.
… but Musk tasks goes beyond the simple Recommending…!
The problem with fentanyl is with addicts using it. Since I was a kid, there has always been some new drug that people were using. LSD was the drug, when I was young. I have no idea how to treat addicts to stop them from using. Heck something like 10 to 20 % of population, depending on where one lives, smoke. If you can not convince people that smoking is bad, how are you going to get addicts not to be addicts?