Matthew Cox | Inside True Crime Podcast - Cartel Kingpin Tells All

Episode Date: January 11, 2026

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power doesn't come from weapons or product. Power comes from Let's do it Let's switch which side No, what are you talking about? Let's do it. Go! Okay.

Okay, well, do your intro. I don't have an intro. The intro is we just start talking. Because remember the lower third is going to slide out. And it says, you know, Pierre Rossini, former L.A. Kingpin. And then it'll go, shoot. But see, so we don't even have an intro.

I don't think Rogan doesn't. Somebody suggested, oh, I know what it was. Julian. My buddy Julian suggested. He goes, he said, we don't do intros anymore, Matt. He said, we're not doing intros anymore. He said, Danny and I talked about it. We're not wasting time on intros.

We just go right into it. So, okay, Julian, that's what we're doing. So that's what I started doing. Save this a few seconds, except for this nonsense right here that we're right. Okay. Go ahead. So you're not going to say anything at all on? No.

We're starting with the kids. So we're starting. All right. So we're going to be discussing the creation. of the Mexican cartels and how they've evolved over the years, why they've evolved and the controversies within them and the wars and the whole thing. We're going all into it. Yeah, we'll be discussing the genesis of the cartels and how they develop.

It's perfect. Yes, let's do it. I'm excited. All right, well, 50 years ago, there were two cartels operating in Mexico. It was the Guadalajara cartel, which controlled. controlled the bulk of the border region, and then there was a Gulf cartel. In the mid-80s, an arrangement was made between the Colombians and the Mexicans in order to use Mexico as a transshipment point.

In fact, we discussed this during an earlier podcast. Right. Okay. Well, that relationship lasted for a few years before the Mexicans got smart and said, hey, we want to be paid in product for our services. This in turn prompted Mexicans now to be able to begin developing their own distribution basis distribution operations within the American market. Right.

And so for the first time, what you had were Mexican kingpins with their own American-based distribution networks. And so this allowed for the Guadalajara cartel to begin increasing revenue because it's much more profitable, one, they're not only smuggle the product on behalf of the Colombians, but the value of the product increases exponentially once it hits the American market. Right.

And so, for instance, the leader of the cartel, Felice Gallardo, was an individual who amassed the first multiple billion dollar wealth. And this was back in the 1980s. And he created a structure with an entire second tier of up-and-coming younger generation guys who later on went on and become famous. Men like Chapa Guzman, Huo Palma, you know, Natu Koroanao, all these individuals ultimately went on to become initially his second tier and later on the leadership of the subsequent organizations.

Now, what happened was in the mid-80s, there was a tremendous amount of law enforcement scrutiny, particularly coming from the Drug Enforcement Administration. So there was a meeting held in Acapulco in 1987, where Felice Gallardo essentially delegated authority for different regional outposts to five different groups. Later on, these are the five different groups

that ultimately went on to become separate cartels. But initially, they were just responsible. They were like the local franchises. Right. And so he kept for himself and his family the crown jewel, which is the city of Tijuana. The Tijuana San Diego Corridor right there

is very convenient for introducing contraband into the United States. 30 miles outside of Tijuana, you had the border of entry called Ticate. That was Chapa Guzman's. Then, in Mexicali, went back to Di Arianos, Phyllis' family. And then from there over, you had a group from Sonora, which is Caro Kintero's organization. Then you had the group in Juarez, which was Amaro Carillo's organization.

And so essentially from Tijuana to El Paso, you had five different groups that were responsible for handling the importation of material into the United States. Now, the most competent of those five groups was the one led by Chapa Guzman. Now, the difference between Guzman and the other individuals was the other people had direct family members involved. Nepotism. Just straight up nepotism. Whereas with Guzman, you know, he was competent.

See, in that world, unlike the corporate world or being some drone work at an Amazon, it's if you drop the ball, you get killed. I was going to say, I feel like competency is reliant on murder. That's the great filter in that community. And so everybody understood that if you were working for Guzman and you lost a load, curtains. Right. And so it weeded out the incompetence.

And so he had been able to develop a reputation, even amongst the Colombians, where they would drop off a load of Mexico, and before they're playing out back to Columbia, he'd already have it in L.A. And so nepotism is great, but you put the people in power or you entrust them with the authority to exercise so long as you know they're going to get the job done.

Right. So nepotism is great for loyalty, but it doesn't necessarily translate to competency. Yes, well, like so when Fleez-Gaiardo said, well, we're going to give Tijuana to my nephews, but we're going to give the Colombian product to Guzman because they knew he was going to get that product across the border without suffering any losses whereas the nephews could handle the weed.

Right. And so that went on until about 87. Eighty-seven, he delegates everything to these various little groups. Now, in 1989, Felizcairto gets knocked off. And those five regional outposts, devolved, which is a fragmentation

where it ultimately breaks down into five separate syndicates which became the modern structure of the five cartels. Right. Can I ask a question? Sure. You're saying Guzmonde

was in charge of the Senelola cartel. But... Well, at the time, there was no cartel. He was based... Okay. Oh, so we were really... Okay, sorry.

So we haven't gotten to Zabata yet. Oh, no, no, no. Back in 87, Zabata had nothing to do with this. Oh, okay. Sorry, go ahead. When they divvied up the territories in 87, it was the border crossings. Okay. Understand, Senaloa is not a border state.

That's why later on they were such a disadvantage because there are a thousand miles from the border. The other four groups are border adjacent. Right. Okay. Keep going. And so I thought you had skipped something. No, yes.

And so initially he gets entrusted with this port of entry. Right. So that means that all contraband coming through that particular. port of entry goes through him. Right. He controls the toll. Not only does he push through the product that he's responsible for, but he also charges all the other organizations to use his bridge.

Right. It's called Bezo. And so where later on he felt as if he kind of got shafted was he ended up with two of the smaller ports of entry. Like the nepotism kicked in a couple of years after this meeting. because when Diardo got knocked off, all of a sudden it was a mad rush. People were grabbing and holding on to

what they had previously been assigned. Well, he'd been assigned two small ones. The nephew's got the crown jewel, Cardizio's got a beautiful one in Mavolaredo and El Paso. You know, like all the other guys got the plums. He got the scraps. Right. And so,

and the second disadvantage he had also was the fact that he was young. I mean, he's 33-year-old, 34-year-old man. And so when you're dealing with men in their 50s, it's difficult for a 55-year-old to treat a 33-year-old as an equal. Right. And so although he was competent, he suffered from several disadvantages. One, his youth.

Two, he also suffered from the fact that evil, like I said, Sinaloa was not a border state. Now, what was interesting is prior to Belize Gallo getting arrested and illustrating the earlier point, there was a trafficker named Hector Palma. But O'Palma was much older, you know, 15, 20 years older than Guzman. And he was another individual who was an extraordinary smuggler. And Palma was responsible for handling a lot of the loads for Felice Gallardo.

And Palma would go through, he partnered up with Guzman to go through his port of entry. You know, competence finds competence. Well, back in the late 80s, there was a load that ended up getting knocked off. like, you know, multiple tonne shipment, which were late 80s, 87, 88, those were big loads. It wasn't until later on that you started seeing the much larger loads. And when you suffer a loss like that, the organization is responsible for the loss.

So now Felix Gallardo's got to pay the Colombians. Now he's not going to pay full price, but he may end up having to pay the Acapulco price, but it's still coming out of his pocket. So now he looks incompetent and it's costing the money. So, what do Palma and his business partner get called to account? The partner gets killed. What a Palmer gets spared.

However, Palma now found himself excommunicated from the community. Well, they don't give an opportunity to try and make it up. No, he essentially got expelled. Right. Because, I mean, a lot of times, they don't just whack you. A lot of times, they'll say, like, if you can, you know, we're going to let you make it up. You know, if you get hit again, then you're done. Now, police guy, it turned into a monster by that point.

And so Alma gets spared, but he's essentially on the outs. And you know when we're in prison, everything in prison breaks down, usually along racial or ethnic lines, particularly at the higher security level institutions. Right. And if you find yourself excluded from your particular community, now you're a... Now you're potentially victim of being preyed upon. Right. You don't have anybody back yet. You're a lone wolf.

Yes. And so that's the circumstance that he found. himself in. And unfortunately for Palma, his wife was manipulated into falling in love with another trafficker, some Venezuelan guy. He fills her head full of these pipe dreams. They're going to take off together. They're going to live together happily ever after. She withdraws like eight to $10 million worth of Palma's money from the account, grabs the kids, and leaves with the Venezuelan. Well, it turns out the Venezuelan was put up for dismission by the Arianos and Felis Gallardo. So they get the wife and children down to Venezuela. They decapitate her and kill his children. So now they send a box to what Obama? Not good. That's a bad. He opens up.

It's a bad. That's a, um, yeah, that's, okay. So to hear this guy, he's like, his wife's gone, his children's gone, his money's gone, he's freaking hell out. What the hell's going on? He gets a box. Right. Like UPS delivery. opens it up, there's a severed head. There's a VHS tape. He grabs the VHS tape, pops it into VCR, and the children had been taken

to a bridge in Venezuela. Oh, I remember this. And they tossed the kids off the bridge. And so, of course, they filmed the children plummeting to their debts. You know, young children, too, like eight-year-old, nine-year-olds. Yeah.

And Palma, of course, one absolutely loses his mind. Right. And so this is 1988. The following year, early 89, Felice Gallardo gets knocked off. He's now sitting in custody. But Wad Obama goes and joins a partnership with Chappo Guzman. They make an alliance.

Okay. He's in his 50s. He knows some guys in Colombia. He knows some guys in Venezuela. He can reestablish the ties. Because once Felice Gallardo got knocked off, those little satellite groups, they didn't have connections to the Colombians. They worked for him.

Right. He dealt with them. Can I ask a question? Sure. Hey, real quick, just wanted to let you guys know that we're looking for guests for the podcast. If you think you'd be a good guest, you know somebody. Do me a favor. You can fill out the form.

The link is in our description box. Or you can just email me directly. Email is in the description box. So back to the video. You said that Palma was kind of excommunicated. Why did they come after him? If they wanted to kill him, or they just... Pure spite.

Okay. And he... The individual who killed the wife... was an associate of the nephews, the Arianos. And so he knows that, he knew that Feliz Gallardo ordered it, but Gallardo is essentially in protective custody in prison. Right. Although he's technically incarcerated, he's still running his family's organization.

He's operating with cell phones. Remember this is now 89, 90? Right. You had cell phone technology. Whereas they were not able to be gotten to. So when Guadopalma reaches out the Chopper Guzman, they make a new alliance saying, hey, look, I'll handle the supply.

eye side, because he knows some guys down in South America, you handle controlling your toll bridge, your port of entry. Chappu Guzman wisely selected Chappo Pramma to be his partner. And for the first five, well, first five years of the cartels history from let's say 1990 to 95, Wero Palma was actually in charge. All right. He's the older of the two. He had the gravitas. He was able to go and obtain the source of supply. More importantly from Guzman's perspective, he knew that Guido Palma was the one man who would never cut a deal with the Arianos. That murder, the killing of his wife and his children, sealed the deal, yeah.

meant that there was never going to be a negotiated settlement. It wasn't a business arrangement, we'll give you X number of dollars per unit, settled the debt, no. That killing actually triggered a war that lasted for 20 years. It didn't end until 2008. thousands of men died behind the killing of his children. That was initially the precipitating factor. And so when Guzman selected

what Obama, Obama was like, look, I'll get the supply, you handle the smuggling, and I'm wiping out those guys. Right. Trouble just stood back. And that's the genesis of the Sinaloa arrangement. Now, there were other groups. operating in Sinaloa, Zambada, Espadagoza, Belted on Lava.

They said, hey, well, you've got the toll bridge, we'll just all use you. Right. And then they just, what do they just pay? They pay Pizzo. Yeah. But these guys, they formed like a little, and there's always strength in numbers. And so those organizations that were local to him, they bandied together. Now, what they did is initially you had the one state of Sinaloa, and within a year or two,

they'd already moved out to about a half a dozen states. And that's where they stayed for a decade. You had Halisco, Colima, Nayadi, Mitro Khan, and Durango. Well, all of the organizations in those territories came to Guzman's group and said, hey, we want our product taken across the border. Now, they charged them. Yeah. So that's a second revenue stream.

You're making your money importing product for the Colombians. You're making your money distributing the product you get as payment. to the Americans, and now you're getting the payment from all the other subsidiary organizations that want to use your toll bridge. And that was the genesis for Sinaloa. On the other hand, in Tijuana, they had a life of Riley. Sinaloa got to about six, seven, eight tons of Colombian product per month. In Tijuana, they started out with 20 tons. They were three times bigger. for the entire decade of the 1990s, this was the most powerful group in Mexico.

They were literally 15 miles from the border. Right. And so they gave them direct access to Southern California and San Diego. Whereas Sinolaoa, they were 800 miles to their port of entry. From there, they got to go to Los Angeles. Or they've got the second port of entry,

which is in Agua Pireeta, by Douglas, Arizona, that's on the New Mexico border. That's another 10 hours. So these guys had enormous disadvantage. One, they weren't a border state. Couldn't do anything about that. But two, they were assigned and inherited two very, you know, not very beneficial order crossings.

They're small. Given to smallness, it increases the probability of getting detected. Right. Because they're very little traffic. Very little traffic. You know, in Tijuana, you got 50,000 cars every day. They just can't search all. They can't even search a fraction of it.

They can't look. The success rate was about 99%. Right. It's pretty good for a product that has such a huge markup. Markup, yeah. You know, let's take a look at it. Like if it's eight metric tons, that's 8,000 units. Well, in order to get 8,000 units across the border, even if it's only 40 units at a time,

that's just 200 cars. Right. How are you going to find 200 cars out of a C of 50? thousand. Right. Unless they break it up over the course of two days. You can always give them somebody. Well, no, they do. They do. They do. Look, they've got a bust over here. The, the, the, um, the, uh, the border crossing guys, the, you know, their customs or whatever, they're, they're excited. They're all over here and you're, cho, cho, cho, right through. That's the, they call it's a torpedo. Torpedo.

What else send like a decoy load of, you know, marijuana. Right. Relatively inexpensive. And of course, that'll get all the border guards all running over there. We got a big bus. meanwhile they just start pushing through. But even then, they don't even necessarily even need to do that because the probabilities are so in their favor. And it's only with respect to the bigger loads where they'll do the decoys.

But Tijuana didn't have to go with the bigger loads because they just had that free flow of traffic. It's Sinaloa that was at the disadvantage. And so very from the very beginning, by 1991, like 1990 was the full year that it operated. By 1991, you already had... had Guzman's operatives in Tijuana operating clandestinely. And shortly they got, you know, identified,

those six got killed. And, uh, now Adianos, you know, they remember, when you have control of a plaza, that means you not only have the border crossing, but that means you have the endorsement of local law enforcement. And so your loads are protected. Non-paying participants in the market, their loads are susceptible to getting confiscated.

So that's when you see the police-making buss. They're just busing the guys that are on the payroll. Right. And you're saying from the Mexican side? No, the Mexican side. Oh, okay. Yeah. I can't believe you would suggest that Mexicans would be corrupt.

And then the loads that they knock off, after they get the big bus, they take the pictures, blah, blah, blah. Then they turn around and they sell it to the local plaza bus. Right. So it pays to pay for the service. and what have you seen um i'm gonna say it wrong suricata or what it you know what i'm gonna say you know what i'm gonna send you this movie you had to have seen it in coleman and there's two of them now i'm gonna i'm gonna

i didn't watch television hey i'm gonna send it to you you're gonna be like whoa this is great or you'll pick holes in either way it'll be fine you'll like it go ahead sorry no okay so the being here, once Tijuana discovered that, hey, you've got your operatives in our city, that means they're pushing through loads without paying their peso. So they naturally, they kill those six guys and tell Guzman, hey, stop sending your people over. They don't get a fine, right? No, no. So then they gets, so a second group gets knocked off, but these are like two high-ranking guys. Well, after these two, that's when Guzman says, okay, now they're going to start shooting it out. And they were able to gather some intel

that somebody Arianos are going to be partying in Puerto Vallarta because it's now in 1992. Right. And Chappa Guzman sends a hit squad with Wado Palma. 40 men dressed up as police officers. They show up at the nightclub.

And what's wrong with filing a lawsuit? Like, I don't understand. It's always straight to the violence with these guys. Well, no, see, that's the prior to the killing of Wadu Palma's wife?

They would have had a sit down. They would have had, it was, you know, that was, that changed. The dynamic of, of the entire industry. Right. You know, the Adiano's, up until that point, murder was the last result, the resort. Yeah. Adiano used it as a tool.

Right. And, and of course, like I said, Wadopoma wasn't going to negotiate no matter what. And so he sends it. Since these cops, he's dressed up, sorry, dressed up as cops. for all we know, they may have been cops. Okay, yeah.

And they shoot up the nightclub, end up killing like 12 civilians. They miss. Collateral damage. They miss the Adiano. Like they get a bunch of, now you're just an idiot. They get the bodyguards. Oh, God. But Adiano's able to, you know, while his bodyguards are fighting him off, boom, he sneaks out the window in the bathroom.

Oh, my God. Okay. And so now that was in like late 92. Right. Now you fast forward to the spring of 93, which was a very significant time. period because you had two events that occurred. For the previous three years, Sinaloa, unlike Tijuana,

because they didn't have the high flow of traffic, they went for the larger loads, six, seven, eight-ton shipments at a time. And they'd come up with a very clever mechanism in which they were concealing the contraband inside food products. They were being brought to Los Angeles. For, you know, Los Angeles is a predominantly Hispanic city.

You got a million little Mexican markets. Right. And so they're just importing Mexican goods to sell at these markets. Well, that's how the material was getting brought into the country. Now, that gets knocked off by the DEA in the spring of 93.

A month later, they discovered a first subterranean tunnel. Now, they previously found a tunnel in Douglas, Arizona, the Agrippietta border crossing, the one that was 10 hours away from L.A. Right. So they said, well, screw that,

we're not going to keep building infrastructure out there. they just went and built a clandestine tunnel under Tijuana territory. They were completely in the dark, made no money from this venture, and naturally that's what kicked off the war. They sent a group of hitmen to go try to take out Chappo Guzman, because Guzman, it was his tunnel. Okay.

He handled the smuggling. Right. Balma handled the supply side. So they target Guzman. They send 20 guys. So they figure out that it's Guzman. And Guzman isn't. supposed to be there.

No. He's done. Okay. He has, just making sure. Yeah, he does. His border crossing is 30 miles outside of Tijuana. Right, right.

So. He's not supposed to be in our area. We find out they have this, this super tunnel. And so what do they have? They have engineers that they, where do they get people like, no offense, I can't dig a truck tunnel that's probably not going to collapse? Yeah, they bring in guys from Germany. Okay.

And so they brought in not only the German engineers, but they brought in the craftsmen necessary to create it. Give it to structural integrity. Give it the ventilation system. Give it the locomotion system. These are, you know, a million dollar... Yeah, enterprise. Yeah.

Per tunnel. Yeah. You know, and they'll build like an array. Right. And so you'll have like a three tunnel set up. So they'll be activating, you know, the Alpha tunnel will be operating. Bravo is on standby. Charlie's mothballed.

Right. Bravo, you know, Alpha gets knocked off. Activate Bravo. Charlie's on standby. You're building Delta. And so they just keep rolling. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. of course, they're not supposed to be doing any of this

because it's not their territory. Right. So the Ariano send a group of hitmen to go catch Chapman. They knew that he was going to be flying out of the airport in Guadalajara. And so when they made the move at the airport, he's driving a particular type of vehicle

that they knew the car he was going to be in. So the hitman riddle the vehicle full of bullets. Unfortunately, it's the wrong car. who's in that car an archbishop from the Catholic Church the archbishop for the Catholic like that's like the highest guy in Guadalajara

Guadalajara is the second largest city in Mexico and it's also a cultural center for the country right long car and so yeah of course they both happen to be driving like the same white you know Chevy Marquis or some whatever the hell it was and so they

that triggers an enormous response because Mexico although very corrupt is also very Catholic. Right. Like this is the line that got crossed. Yeah, yeah. So the government's furious. The government's just absolutely infuriated. And so for, on every level, you had the overland route gets knocked off by the DEA.

The subterranean route gets knocked off by customs. This incident with the Archbishop happens, all of a sudden, like we were in L.A., price of skyrocketed. Right. They go from 14.5 a unit. Now they're charged in 1818.15.5. in a matter of, you know, weeks. But I mean, why? Because it immediately a war. Supply side.

Yeah, well, supply side issues. Okay. Whenever there's a major disruption, people start hoarding. Yeah. Because you don't want to sell something today for 16.5. You have two weeks from now you can get 19 for it. And so it has this effect where it accelerates. Prices start skyrocketing because until a new setup is established and people know that the

supply is back online, it creates an enormous drought type of condition. Okay. And so once the killing of the cardinal occurs, Guzman takes off. The government just slams everybody, Mexican government. That's precipitated the price results. Well, when Guzman gets arrested a month later, he gets charged for the killing of the cardinal. He's like, hey, well, hold on a second.

and I'm the, they were trying to get me. Like, he's the victim here. Right. And so after a little bit of investigation, they determined, oh, yeah, he was the target. This, of course, makes Adiano's public enemy number one now. Guzman, unfortunately, gets thrown in jail anyway. Like, okay, well, you're innocent of this killing,

but we're giving you 20 years for the drug activity. So now he goes out of the way, boom. Buto Palma at this point is completely in charge. His number two is now Mayo Zamada. Because Palma is spending more, of his time in combat. Right. So he's kind of delegating to some of the other guys.

Like, hey, you guys handle the dope. I'm over here busy. And so this continues for another year. That's when you get the second big knockoff. This is a significant event in the backdrop of my case. We're in the autumn on 94. A shipment gets knocked off. And at the Takati border crossing, 10 tons.

And... 10 tons of product. That was the last of the big loads that came from Senegal. From that point forward, they started using the diversification model, you know, build a fleet of 200 cars, 40 units per car, and just send the cars. What was the 10 tons in? Was it? I don't know what the circumstances surrounding how. I was just wondering if it was a truck or if it was.

Well, it had to be a truck, of course. Well, I don't know. I mean, I remember, I don't know if you're going to mention this story about the, about the hollowed-out telephone holes that are getting trucked down the... Yeah, but still, that's still trucking. They were using tractor trailers

in that particular circumstance, and you're talking about Vicente Guerrero. Guerrero's an interesting character because later on, you know, Guerrero's wife was brothers with the headset. And so, and Guerrero was dealing directly with Ocel Cardinals.

He's an individual that pops up later on in the story because this is Gulf Cartel. But just to complete that's all, they were using tractor trailers with the long trailers used to move those flight posts. Right. You know, these are like, you know,

30 feet, 40 feet in length. Yeah. And what was very clever about Guerrero's operation, particularly reason why he got slammed with 35 years, was because he, his construction and trucking company were paying the Texas Highway Patrol to provide escorts for the trucks.

So the highway patrol So the highway patrol, the Texas Highway Patrol is, is, they're escorting loads of product coming from Mexico. These concrete, these concrete light poles that are hollowed out. They just stuff them full of product. Yeah, it was three tons per truck load. Yeah, so they're, and then you got the sheriff's department. You got the two, you know, like Texas State Trooper in the front, Texas State Trooper in the back. The light.

And a little truck with the wide load. And so you got police escort. and they're bringing three tons at a time, boom, boom, boom, going from Brownsville to Houston. Balzy, yeah, 35 years for that. Just for being clever? Is that an enhancement? Well, it was the...

That's a 12-point enhancement. It was the, that issue with respect to the Texas State Troopers, and then they had a second run where they were going from... Oh, is this the bus? We were going up to Corpus Christi, and in Corpus Christi, they had school buses that they were using to move to product from Corpus Christi up into Houston.

And so, you know, they would take the school bus, go and pick up... Like, it's kids with like special needs kids and take them to... He didn't want to say it. Special needs kids and like they take them to the zoo. So they're all on this bus that's filled with product. They drop them off at the zoo.

It's been a few hours. Take the truck over to the shop, lift the frame up off you know lift the carriage frame off the carriage access to compartments pull the material reassemble everything get back pick up the kids from the zoo run them back down to Corpus Christi

and so it was that double whammy that altered it garrows getting 35 years but so back to what's in the Lola so in the autumn of 94 that load gets knocked off right which precipitates them to start going okay you know what we're going to do the smaller loads now it requires

lot more infrastructure. Now you've got to have 200 drivers, you got to have 100 of cars, you got to have warehouses, but you can't afford to not sustain these, you know, 10 metric ton losses. Right. And so that's where you had to transition over by 95 to where you had the smaller loads. Also at that point, that's the year that NAFTA took effect. And that really changed everything because now you had a tremendous amount of traffic coming back and forth. And it made the principal border crossings that much more valuable because you know, people focus on the Tijuana border crossing with the civilians. Well, there's a second border crossing that's commercial. Or the Tijuana one, Nuevo Laredo, those become crown jewels because they've got an enormous amount

of trucking coming through. And the trucks, you're not doing 40 units per car. That's where you had Carrero coming with three tons. Right. They're going through those passes. And that's later on what's going to really kick things off. It was a mad scramble for those type of assets. Because what people don't necessarily understand about cartels is they group together

in order to control certain key assets. sets. So for... Like areas or regions. Okay, well, in Sinaloa, they wanted control of Halisco because Guadalajada is not only a major metropolitan area, but more importantly, it's the money laundering capital

of the world. Well, you need access to those money launders. Right. You know, once you go outside of the city, literally, there are fields where you've got the trailers for tractor trailers, you've got trailers parked. Underground. It's just buried in the desert.

filled with cash. You know, you get $1 billion to $2 billion a month coming into Guadalajara in cash. Well, there's an entire infrastructure designed just to surface that capital. Well, that can't be replicated. So that's a tremendous asset you want to control.

Next to Halisco, you've got the state of Kalima. Well, Kalima's got the largest port on the west coast. It's critical. Not only could you bring material in from Colombia, but more importantly, later on as they start moving into manufacturing their own product, they need to get the precursors in from China.

So Kalimba's got a port, mutual con's got a port, those are the two biggest ports on the west coast. You fight for control of the ports. You fight for control of the border crossings. Other key assets are key corrupted political officials. You know, when after Guzman gets knocked off, myosombada steps up really assumes control operationally for the cartel.

Well, he's in a business relationship with a man named Armando Valencia and another man, Omaro Carillo. Well, from 1993 to 1997, these men put together an operation resulting in the importation of 30 tons a month. Just those three organizations. And it was, you know,

the most secure importation operation in the history of the world. and it was secured because they had control of the generals, one of which had responsibility for maintaining the integrity of Mexican airspace. Well, the American government went in, built a state-of-the-art radar system so that the Mexicans can identify planes flying in from Colombia that aren't properly signaled. Well, if you've got control of the guy that's responsible for an operation... Yeah, he lets this one in.

He lets that one. That's right. Meanwhile, on the supply... side, you had Sambada controlling the general in Guadalajada who maintained control over that military zone. Well, he had one of his buddies controlling an air base in the Mexican state of Sonora. So now you had planes flying in from Colombia getting green lit by one general, landing at another military base green lit by the second general. And so, and when I say general, I mean, he's got all his colonels, his captains,

everybody down the line is getting a piece. Right. So they're getting millions of dollars a month in payments. Amato Cardillo at his peak was paying about $500 million a year in bribes. That's just greasing the wheels. Right. And so you started getting these shipments where they bought a fleet of Bone 727s, gutted them, turned them into cargo planes,

and just started flying airliners or carrying 13. 14, 15 tons per load. They're getting greenlit by the general. They're getting on, you know, when they land, you got the people unloading them are uniformed military personnel. And so it was just an impenetrable operation. You know, that fell apart when the general

that was responsible for greenlighting the landings, he gets selected to be their drugs are. So in 1996, he gets elevated to becoming the chief narcotics fighter for the country. And the whole time, they end up discovering that he's living

in one of a model Carillo's high rises. It was like, what are you doing, man? Right. So, you know, they had to shut down that operation.

Right. But they had that five-year run where it demonstrated the power of having control of assets. And by having those two generals, they were able to get away

with this. Nobody else could do that kind of a thing. Right. And so now most of the control, most of the assets they fight over are physical assets, ports, border crossings, and in 1995, after that last big loss, you had the switch over to one,

they're going to be sending over smaller loads, and two, you had the elevation of Zambada essentially taken over control. Well, he fully took over control in the spring because Werto Palma, then the head of the cartel, gets into his Learjet crashed, and he survives the plane crash. And so he's able to get away, you know, of course, the military and everybody responds because they just see an airplane crash. They don't know it's what Obama's plane. Right.

And so he ends up actually getting away and they find him later on, you know, convalescing. So now he joins Guzman in prison. So you got these two guys out of the way, Zimbada takes over. And this is the first of the golden eras because he's not caught up in all the bullshit in the drama. So while the war continued, he focused more on the business. And so that's where you saw the massive growth in the scene of the little operation happened under Zambada. And this is when he had that 30 ton a month operation going on with Carrizo and Valencia. Well, independent of that, he formed another relationship with the guy named Ignacio Coronel.

Now, natural cordonel was operating in Halisco. Well, he maintained a fleet of tuna boats. And so while you've got the 30 tons a month coming in through the air route, he had another 10 tons a month coming in through the maritime route. And so now they're hitting on both cylinders. In addition to those two, you've got an individual named Armando Valencia. Now, Valencia was actually one of the principal players on the supply side in my case.

And Valencia, not only was he, for that era, an extraordinary trafficker, he's the one who broke her together the arrangement between Zambada and Carillo. He's also the individual that had the visionary to see the value in synthetic compounds.

So he entered into a relationship with a guy named Demescua, who was another one of the ultimate suppliers on my case, And they started manufacturing what was essentially... Right. And so for the first few years, you know, they had complete control of this market. And so, you know, Emescua had his connections, which, you know, when Sinola selected

Los Angeles, they divided the city up into basically different regions. And so, you know, Zambada, Guzna, Usman and Redo Palma had their operations based in L.A. County proper. Like Zambada ran his operation out of my hometown of West Covina. And so West Covina was ground zero, essentially. It's like, you know, how could I say this? The, you know, West Covina is the drug trafficking. What Palo Alto is to Silicon Valley.

Right. And those three groups really took over, the LA County underground drug market. The fourth organization that operated in L.A. was Valencia. Well, Valencia's was down in Orange County. And so it's Valencia's group that supplied the large quantities of the synthetic material to L.A. traffickers, like the guys in my case. Right.

And so the other thing to understand about Orange County is Orange County was home to a large Asian community. Now we've got three or four Asian clusters in the greater LA area. And in the LA area, we had four triads operating. Well, the triad that operated in Orange County was a group called the 14K. And so Valencia's group is operating in Orange County. They developed ties with Chinese gangsters based in Orange County. Now they got to connect in China for the chemicals. and so they started bringing in just tons of precursor chemicals into Mexico, producing the material, bringing it up to Los Angeles, distributing it all through their Orange County distributors.

And the difference between that particular material and the product from the Colombians is that in the Colombian context, the Mexicans are middlemen. They're coming out of pocket a significant amount of money to obtain the material. Then they got to incur the cost. with transporting, you know, protection, security, all that nonsense. With respect to the material they're manufacturing, on the other hand, it's nearly all profits.

Right. And so what you saw was an enormous amount of revenue going now to Sinaloa without a corresponding increase, you know, Tijuana was still much bigger, the Gulf was still much bigger, but they had all of the synthetic market locked up. and so by 1997 this is where in the United States it started becoming an issue and you started getting a lot of law enforcement attention where they were saying hey we got to stop this stuff coming up from Mexico and it just that's the year that emescuent they brought a lot of pressure on it

amescuas gets taken up he gets busted so now valencia's like okay well he's already overseeing this massive operation with the Colombians now he's overseeing this massive operation with the synthetics, so he forms a business partnership with Nacho Coronel. Well, Nacho Coronel takes it to a level that they didn't think was even possible. He brings in chemists from Israel, and they reconfigured the labs. They go from producing what before had been previously bulk powder material

to now it's more powerful crystallized form. Right. These are the super labs that are in the jungles, right? Well, in the villages outside of, once you leave Guadalajara, you know, jungle is a misnomer. It's not necessarily jungles. You know, but the city of Guadalajas. I saw pictures.

They looked like jungles. You saw pictures of the Colombian operations. Oh, okay. Yeah, the Mexican guys don't do it. They just pay for protection. They got that warehouse. They got that building. And so, yeah, so they have enormous labs that got constructed,

primarily, you know, they came in with the Israelis, they came up with the configuration, they developed the formulas, they taught the locals how to use it, and they started producing material on an industrial scale. And so at this point, you had Zambada essentially consolidating the Colombian-related aspect. You had natural cordonel

consolidating the synthetic aspect. And at this point, Cordonel becomes so powerful. Like he's literally the second, if not the third, most powerful drug lord in the Western Hemisphere. Because he's still got Satuna boats, but he's got control over the synthetics,

and that's 90% profits. Well, what about poor Guzman? I mean, he's still in prison. I feel bad for him. Well, remember, don't forget, prison in Mexico is not. It's not. It's not.

It's not Coleman. No, no. You know, prison in Mexico. We see pictures. Prison in Mexico is, they live better in prison than 90% of the men in this country. Yeah. Well, he had a buddy in prison who literally showed us, you know, the photo albums. He had like multiple photo albums are this thick, filled with photos of him in Mexican. This is a cartel member who's showing him in prison with photograph. He's photographing in which is insane. And, I mean, they're drinking Corona. He's bringing in prostitutes. He's, his meals are catered.

Yeah, they got three, every day, every meal was catered. So they brought in catered food three times a day. They'd bring in hookers for three or four days at a time. They'd bring in two or three of them at a time. And it's all allowed. Well, they're paying $5,000 a week to live on that range. Yeah, they live on. So like if you have different units set up, they have their own unit, like their own area,

their own section where it's just cartel members. Yeah. And so they're paying $5,000 a week. And for that, they get the privileges of, you know, alcohol, drugs, women, catered food, they run their businesses from there. He ultimately got charged. When he got charged, it was for running a $300 million conspiracy out of prison.

Yeah, he's got cell phones. He's answering calls. He ended up and he did like a seven, he did 10 years in a Mexican prison, of which he did like six. Right. He had like seven kids in six years. And then they had to move him to,

they... Then they brought him to America to serve his time. Serve the time for what he had done. And he was not happy at all. Right, no. Like all this sucks. Still living pretty good. Still, I mean,

it's not Mexico. but he's still got all of his foods catered. He didn't go into that chow hall unless it's a special meal. He's got guys cooking for him, doing his, doing his laundry, making his bed. Am I right? No, no, is that? Okay. But yeah, it wasn't as good as Mexico.

There's no hookers or anything. You're not bringing in. Your wife can't come visit you for five days. They wouldn't have the wives come. No. Did he father a couple of kids or something? Like a half a dozen kids. While he's in prison.

Yeah. And so, It was, well, and that's the same thing with Guzman. I mean, there's numerous stories, and you can look at, I'm sure you can watch stories on YouTube, recreating the events, but it's literally, you know, they bring in groups, bands,

they're playing corridos for them. You know, they're having 30, 40, 50 people, banquets. And, uh, but he's still running his business. Right. However, you know, the thing about Guzman, you got to understand is he was actually the smallest distributor of the factions. Right.

Like, he was the largest of the smugglers. But Zambada's distribution network was much larger. Valencia's was much larger. The distribution end is different than the importation. You know, the government likes to just conflate everybody as being drug traffickers. Well, there are different roles within, you know, a divorce lawyer is not a criminal defense lawyer and is not a bankruptcy lawyer. Well, there are different specialties. Well, his primary specialty was overseeing the importation of the material.

So now, and the majority of the product he imports wasn't his. Right. Now the government, of course, says, well, we're going to attribute 200,000 units to him. That's everybody's 200,000 units. That's just getting dumped on the guy.

Yeah, but he was also the more flashy, the one that kind of got the public's eye and he got... Yes, you know, and that was, you know, Zimbada. Like nobody. He's driving an old pickup truck

around Cinaloa, doesn't bother anybody. Yeah, same thing with Valencia. Yeah, probably the largest drug trafficker who has never achieved any measure of notoriety. Right. You know, like I said, 30 tons a month, nobody ever heard of him.

You know, like, I bet. There's like, what, one or two photos of him? Yeah, there's like one or two photos. I'm just a few photos of Valencia. But, you know, like... Guzman. Oh, yeah. He's posing with people.

Like, he's like, come on, you know... Yeah, they got the photo of him with the Hummer holding a machine gun in front of him. He's like, come on, what are you doing? And so... So by the turn of the century, things were hitting on all cylinders on the Sinaloa front. Now, where things get really interesting

is what happened out in the Gulf. Because in the late 1990s, you had a man named Ocel Cardenas, and he rose to challenge control of the Gulf cartel. Now, the golf cartel was much bigger than Sinaloa. You know, Tijuana's doing 20 tons a month. The golf's doing 20 tons a month. Right.

You know, Sinaloa is importing a lot of material, but it's going to different groups. Like, individually, these other groups were much more powerful. Well, Ocel Cardenas made a move to take over control of the Gulf. However, there were various factions within that particular syndicate that were very powerful. And so what Cardinus did is he entered into a relationship with a former military personnel. He was a special forces individual for the Mexican special forces And he goes to him and says

Hey look I need to put together a security detail Because he knew it was going to be a rough move Like these other guys aren't going to just Go along with him taking over And so he says I need to put together a security detail Where can I find some highly trained men He's like well we'll get him out of the military

And so this individual named Desina He was a later on He became known as Z1 Right I was going to He was the C-1, the very first. He was the very first Zeta. And so he reaches out to his group of associates

within the Mexican military, and he persuades 30 of them to defect. Now, these are all special forces. These are guys that were trained in the School of the Americas by the Israelis. They're trained by American Special Forces at Fort Bragg. And what Cardin is this that was interesting is he took the very men that were trained

for counterinsurgency and counter-narcotics and put them in charge of being his enforcement arm. And he was able to first subdue the other Gulf cartel factions in order to consolidate control. Then, with this 30-man unit, having achieved its primary objective,

he said, you know what? Let's scale up the enforcement arm. Now, they end up paying a lot more money per man than the Mexican government. So they get 300 more guys. So now you've got 300 trained men. These aren't undisciplined thugs. These aren't gangbangers.

Yeah, these guys have been... Straight special forces coming. You know, these are Army Rangers. Right. You know, they all have got military call signs. They've got a military culture. You've got the commander. You got the captain.

You got the lieutenant. I mean, they maintain that structure. Yeah, you have military tactics. You've got military tactics. you've got military-grade equipment. And so you've got this group of 300 trained military personnel led by a contingency of 30 special forces.

Then they bring in approximately 1,000 military personnel from Guatemala. So they end up building what's essentially like a 1,500 man army. And Osiocardinus unleashes them. They ultimately go on to become famous as Los Zetas. Right. And they were a paramilitary force unmatched in the handles of organized crime.

And what they were able to do, particularly in those first few years, struck terror into all of the other groups. Because they just started to rolling through territory. And not only were their tactics superior achieving a high degree of success, they were vicious. They were trained in psychological warfare. So when they attended to their missions, they engaged in a level of savagery to intimidate the opposing groups. And so this caused enormous panic

because they were literally just rolling up ports of entry. Eagle Pass. I mean, like, boom, all the guys in the rest of them in Texas. Now they're coming up against the Waters Cartel, which is in Texas. Meanwhile, another contingency is coming in through, through the northwest. Sinaloa was operating in Monterey, that falls.

They're coming into Durango. And the Ariano's being opportunistic, they decide, you know what, it's form an alliance. So the Dewana cartel forms an alliance with the Gulf cartel. They come together and say, you know what, let's squeeze out these guys in the middle and we'll just keep it all. So now, of course, Juarez and Sinaloa, they already had business ties.

but at this point now, they're engaged in a fight for survival. Hey, if you like the video, please check out my Patreon. We're going to put special content for some of the stories that aren't quite making this overall arc, kind of like a little, some side discussions. We're going to put that on Patreon. So if you join Patreon for $10 a month, you can go and get that exclusive content back to the video. Well, I mean, I don't need, I know you're going to get to like the different world, the different, like, you know. Now we're going to get to the Federation consolidating,

but before we're still in the late 90s with DeZeta. Do you want to make any comments? Do you want to talk about it? I mean, I know that they, I mean, I know they're shooting helicopters out of the skies. I mean, I know that every time that. That was a different group. A different group, was it?

Yeah. Okay. Well, I mean, I know that, you know, I mean, I kind of know that they were, like you just said, they were vicious and they're, you know, they're protecting. Okay. What was it? What was the one where they protected?

The guy they caught him in the building, and they're sitting troops in to try and surround the building and get this guy, they're firing in the building, and he's asking for the Zetas to come in or somebody to come in and rescue him, and there's a huge fight for like two days or something like that. Yeah, that's this guy. That happens in 2003. Okay.

So that hasn't happened yet. Okay, cool. Well, see, we're getting to that stuff. Okay. I don't know. I'm good. And, you know, what was interesting about the Zetas is they had an espried a corps. And so not only we're,

were they advancing successfully militarily, they demonstrated to the other groups how important it was to have a sense of cohesion. When their guys got knocked off, they orchestrated major prison breaks. They're going and getting their men out. Right. They didn't leave nobody behind.

If one of their men got killed, they went and they got back to corpse. And so it created a dynamic that it caused the other groups to say, hey, we got to up our game. Right. Meanwhile, you know, by the dawn of millennium, panic had already begun to set in because unless they're able to stop

this juggernaut, they're all going to be under the control of the Gulf. At that point, and of course, the Gulf's just going to wipe everybody out because they're going to take over. Right. And so that's when Miles Zimbada really out of desperation

came up with the plan that was both bold and simple. And so it was going to be a two-pronged attack against the Gulf and Tijuana. But in order for him to pull it off, he was going to need his Pisa, Chopo Guzman. Right.

So now Kuzman's sitting in prison, having the time of his life, hookers, the whole nine. He gets to call saying, hey, we need you. Oh, are you serious? So he says, look, we're going to get you,

we're busting you out. But I was halfway through this sentence. He's halfway. He's about eight years into his bid. Yeah, I'm ready. I, So now you're putting me for a halfway house. You're going to have warrants out for his arrest.

You're like, damn it, all right. So they break Guzman out. And Zambada's brother's waiting for him, put him on a helicopter, they whisk him away. Zambada explains the situation and say, hey, we're about to lose everything. He says, I need you for two reasons. One, Guzman was vicious.

Right. Now, he may not have been to what Obama. Right. But Guzman had not only, a willingness to do whatever was necessary that also included using a particular asset that Guzaman had. And what Guzman had that other people didn't

was an attorney named Humberto lawyer. Oh, yeah, this is good, bro. This is good. And the lawyer was secretly an informant for the Drug Enforcement Administration. And so one of the ways Sinolo was ultimately able to protect themselves was by

not only putting together their own military task force but they were able to create an ally with a much more powerful force even stronger than the Zetas, their uncle Sam. And so they were able to manipulate the American law enforcement community. But at the beginning, Zambada says, hey look, bust out Guzman.

They get together. They decide, okay, well, you know what we need to do? we need to strengthen ourselves. So Guzman and Zambada, they bring in Nacho Koroa now. Well, how do they get Guzman up? Yeah, Guzman out. They ended up bribing the warden.

Right. And the number of the officers, they put them in what was a laundry cart, and they rolled them out. Like, shh, just throw some clothes over and let them lay down, wheel them out. And there was like, what, a helicopter or something? A helicopter.

Well, I mean, they had to get them in a van, drive them to an airport, and they got them into a helicopter and whisked them away. Nice. And so, yeah. I just admire that. And so they bring on board natural Coronel.

They explain, hey, look, you're just in the same boat as us. And Coronel says, all right, I'm in. So now Coronel brings in Armando Valencia, who at this point was his business partner under synthetics. So you've got like four of the guys coming together. Then they bring in Chopper Guzman's cousin, Arturo Alfredo and Arturo Beltran Leva, another group of Sinolo and Kingpins. Now this group comes together.

So these five say, okay, we're going to form our own group, and we're going to reach out to the other individuals that were in trouble. So they reach out to the Carillo-Ferunce family in Juarez. Amato Carillo had passed away, but his younger brother had taken over. So now they come in with Vicente and say, hey, you're in direct crosshairs. So he jumps at the opportunity to join. Right. So then these six guys hold a conference attended to by 25 other kingpins,

where everyone agrees to say, okay, you know what, we're going to form what ultimately became known as El Cartael, the Pacifico. You know, the Pacific Cartel. Right. Or known just within the group as El Federdason, the Federation.

The Federation. And so this Federation was essentially a group of 25 to 30 separate organizations that came together for the purposes of defending themselves against Tijuana and the Gulf and in particular, de Zetas.

And so Chapa Guzman, Nacho Coronel, and Arturo Beltran Lava led the military wing. And so they had group of enforcers just targeting lower level and mid-level operatives for both of the respective cartels. Right. On the other hand, for the leadership, that was the more sensitive information. That's where Zambada had Chaba Guzman contacting Umbar Deloia. The lawyer. The lawyer is meeting with the DEA. and U.S. Attorney's Office, you know, Department of Justice officials in San Diego,

feeding them information. That information now goes to D.C. See, now, when the Department of Justice contacts the Attorney General's office in Mexico, it's different than it's coming from the local police. Right. Like, they didn't trust the police in Tijuana. 80% of the police officers were on to take. Right.

And so there are units within the Mexican government that are properly vetted, that they know haven't been corrupted. And so when something comes in from like the Attorney General of the United States directly, they dispatch that particular unit. They keep the locals in the dark. Right. And Chappalgoosma's attorney began feeding them the information that allowed them to start targeting the leaders.

And so in 2002, they set up a trap where Zambada was going to be in the city of Monchi vacationing with his family. And they let that information get known to someone they thought was a double agent. That guy feeds the information to the Adiano's. So Ramon Adiano and a group of hitmen come to Monchi to assassinate Sambada. Well, Zambadas got his military personnel waiting for him. Right.

Including the Federals. So the Federals pull over the vehicle. They got into a firefight. Right. And all of them get killed. So they took out the second in command of the Tijuana cartel. Okay. The head leader of the cartel, shortly thereafter, was spending time with the woman outside of Tijuana, who may have been his mistress.

They obtained that information. The cartel's paying top dollar for information at this point. Right. And most of the people that did the betraying were actually women. A lot of the escorts, a lot of the hookers on the side, you know, six-figure payouts. Right. You know where he's going to be at this day. Yeah.

And so they were able to get the information aware. Adiana was going to be, that information goes to the lawyer to the Department of Justice, the American Attorney General, calls the Mexican Attorney General, boom, they go get him. A year later, they take out. So they go get him, they go grab him, they go grab him, he's in jail. They go grab him, he's in jail. He's in custody, yes. Okay.

And so. By the way, you got to know, too, Colby, I'm sorry. But like the lawyers wanted, right? Oh, yeah, that's why he's. Yeah, the lawyers going back and forth between. He's, yeah, he's an American lawyer. in San Diego with warrants out for his arrest. He's been laundering drug money

and he was the contact on the American side, moving cash, setting up dummy companies. And he's given this information. So he's like walking into the DEA headquarters when they got warrants out for their arrest. It's like when, you know, shortly after I got indicted, I get arrested. Well, I called a friend who was a cop

who called the F crooked federal agent in my case. Boom, they get me released. Like those are the kind of moves you're able to make if you've got the kind of relationship where they're going to protect you. So I mean, that's like... So, you know, in my circumstance,

if you maintain a relationship with the corrupt agent, he'll call and say, hey, release him. Boom, I get released. Whereas with respect to Lumbert's lawyer, he's in the same circumstance where he's coming in saying, hey, look, I got information, and they know the information's coming

from Chapa Guzman. Like, this is Guzman's lawyer. He got charged with Guzman. He's saying, hey, look, Adiano's going to be at this house in this little village or this little town. Yeah, it's going to be right here. This probably, you know, that probably Tuesday night. And they're like, all right, cool.

Aren't you wandered? Like, hey, come on, stop it. And I'm not with that. We've got enough of that. And he just walks on out. And so, yeah. And so literally they were able to orchestrate the arrests and essentially decapitate the Tijuana cartel through information being fed to the Americans who then manipulated their lackeys

in the Mexican government. to go take out the leadership. And so they were able to remove the leaders through using their enemy. Right. On the one hand, and they were able to wipe out the lower level guys through, you know, essentially military action.

Yeah. In the 18-month period after the formation of the Confederation, there was like 2,000 guys that were T1 operatives who ended up getting arrested. Now the military, but the leaders, that information, came from the Sinaloa operatives. But when you take out the plaza boss,

he loses 50 guys with him. Right. When you take out the lieutenant, they take out 100. You know what I mean? It's just these massive arrests were happening because of the ability of Sinaloa

to manipulate the Americans to take out their enemies. Right. And so once the leadership was decapitated, that created a destabilization. Hazar and the Bada says, okay, boom. Send Hermann Magana.

Now here comes Paisa. He comes in with the military wing. and so now it's a battle for the next year but by 2004 Magana's got control effectively he's got control to where now they're able to say we're going to push through

Oscello Lo Loads so now they've got control to the San Diego Tijuana Quarter independent of this you've got the second military operation going out with Arturo Belta and Leva where now he says you know what they're going into Texas

so they attack the Gulf in their backyard. Well, before that, after they take out Tijuana, a year later, the same circumstance happened where they were able to get the information identifying word ahead of the Gulf cartel, Ocel Cardenas was going to be holed up at. Now, understand, he's got like 50 Zetas with him. And so the Americans were able to get the information, fed it to their lackeys in the Mexican government.

Here comes the Mexicans, you know, like 500 strong. And this was the incident you were talking about. where they're okay hey send more guys yeah they have a battle they have a it's like a huge fire fight it's like two days yeah that's how much ammunition

these guys carry with them it's like two days worth of gunfight you've got like reinforcement showing up is that a reinforcement they just you know it was just but obviously you're not gonna be able to overpower

you know an army shows up yeah yeah all right but I mean they're trying yeah but they're trying they hold them off for two days and ultimately they're able to catch Cardenas

and He's literally making phone call. Like, send more guys. I need a hundred more guys. It's like a little battle going on in this area with the military. And, I mean, that's... There are videos on YouTube that have battles. There's a famous battle at the St. Gertrude Ranch.

That was owned by another Cinelloa drug lord who's operating into Texas side. And, I mean, it's just battles. I mean, it's just literally, you know, dozens of Zetas hold up, shooting it out with... under the police officers. And I mean, like, you would think, like, these are the kind of things you see in the movies. Yeah. This is actually that.

I mean, there's just rocket launchers, grenades, they're throwing grenades at each other, and it's just pure insanity. And so, uh, they end up knocking off Hoseo Cardenas. They take him into custody. And so the same dynamics in play, they sense an opening,

oh, now they send Beltran Lava in with his enforcement group. So now they're running a war on two fronts. And although Sinaloa was technically, outgunned, they had the Americans that were assisting them. And so that was the X-factor that the other cartels never really anticipated. And so with the Americans orchestrating the removal of the leadership, the smaller group were able to come in and just start rolling up territory. They were able to push back to Zetas. And they were able to take over Tijuana and at least secure their eastern flank.

Now, at that point, we're talking 2003, 2004, this starts the golden era for Sinaloa. Because by now, they've got from Tijuana all the way to El Paso. So there's 17 border crossings. That's all theirs. And they're able to create an organization that the government later on characterized as the largest and most powerful drug syndicate in their history of the world. and that run ran from, let's say, 2004 to about 2010 with a hiccup in 2008. What was the hiccup?

Well, we don't want to get to that far because we're jumping ahead. So now in 2004, this was the first of the scan list moves. You know, you would think that you got to the position where things are stabilizing, you know, let's just focus on the business. They can't do it. All right. And this is where, you know, Guzman is just a knucklehead. So he decides, hey, you know what? Him, his cousin, Arturo Beltran Leva,

and they talked to the guy out in Juarez. His name was Juan, Jose Espadagoza. And, you know, Espadagoza is an interesting character in that he was an extraordinary trafficker who served as number two to Amaro Carillo. And Amato Carillo's right-hand man, of course, was his brother, Vicente. And so when Amato Carillo's, the dress, drug lord who passed away while he was having plastic surgery.

Oh, okay. Okay, in 1997. And so... And they killed a surgeon or something like that? Oh, yeah, it was gruesome what happened to the surgeons. They ended up in 55-gallon drum barrels, cement, the whole nine. And so the... When Amata Caligio passed away, everyone expected Spadagoza to take over.

But the brother said, no, no, no, I'm going to be in charge. And, you know, the thing about Mexico is power doesn't come from weapons or product. Power comes from who has access to the politicians. And so Amato Carrizo was spending $500 million a year in bribes. As Baragoza was handling much of the drug operation. Carrizo was handling the bribes in the political protection. Oh, his brother was. was involved in that operation.

So his brother's the one who's paying the governor, paying to chief of police, paying to senator. And so after Cardillo passes away, the brother's like, hey, look, I'm the one who's going to provide the cover. They're not going to deal with you. They're dealing with me. And so

Espada Gosa takes a step back. Let's the brother take over. Everybody else knows it should have been him. Right. You know, people don't respect men who inherit positions without having earned him.

Right. And that was a classic situation where he essentially got passed over. I was to say, nobody looks at a lottery winner and thing. And a stoop businessman. Yeah, exactly. Wow, you really knew how to pick those random numbers. Yeah, you know, and so that's the,

and so it created, you know, a certain level of animosity. And now they needed each other while they were facing the zonslot from the two groups. But now the things that kind of stabilized, Guzman, Arturo Beltran, and the Spada Goza get together and said, you know what? Let's take this other guy out. Right.

And so Guzman essentially double crosses the heads of the Juarez cartel that they had previously entered into an alliance with. Now, they don't get Vicente, Carrillo, but they get his brother at Odolfo. So now this launches another war. How do they get him? What do you mean? They caught him. Was he the one that was shopping with his wife or something?

Yeah, yeah. Coming out of a shore. Yeah. And, you know, high-end shopping mall. And a mall just shootout. Bruthr, got him down. Into parking lot. Yeah.

Not like with the 22, but to the back of the head. Not like a nice sweet. Boop. Nope. Like full on, right? Wasn't it like full-on? Like machine guns. Machine guns and stuff.

Like these guys are, they're not surgeons. It's not surgical skill taking out a guy. Anyway. And so, yeah. So that initially kicks off what went on to become the bloodiest battle. I mean, within just a few years, Wodez was the murder capital of the world. Right. And so they've still got, you know, they're still in war with two other groups.

Now they just kicked off one with this third group. Like it was unnecessary to do that. You know, it was Hitler invading Russia. Right, right. Just stupidity. Just pure sheer stupidity. And that's where the... I'm going to say arrogance.

Huberous and arrogance. And so, but they were able to, because of the increase in revenue that they were getting in, they were able to actually finance this. And so for the next five years, that's where you get this golden era where, you know, when we think of the Sinaloa cartel, you're thinking 0405, 06.

You know, that was their peak. And everything remained fine up until 2008. Now, in 2008, Alfredo Beltran Lava gets arrested by the authorities. And by this point, the other leaders of the core nucleus, they knew that Chappo was manipulating the Americans. Okay. And so... They're not happy about that.

Well, and they're thinking, they're blaming him. Yeah, yeah. Because he, but he double crossed, you know, they're all for him double crossing. The other guy. The Carillo. Yeah, yeah. But all of a sudden it's like,

well, now the head of this group gets taken out. Like, hold on a second. How do you get, it's him. Right. You know what I mean? So that kicks off and now a struggle between the two. So Arturo, the number two, who was good friends with the guy you were talking about from prison,

that was his best friend. Right. Okay. So Arturo decides, hey, you know what? he's going to retaliate. He kills Chappo Guzman's son. So now you're kicking off massive personal vendettas.

Right. The kind that are never going to get resolved. Yeah, yeah. You know, someone's going to end up deceased because there was no negotiated settlement. Right. And so the Beltran Lava faction breaks away from Korsin Aloha.

then a year later natural Coronel gets knocked off he gets killed after the authorities went to arrest him and so naturally Cordonell's group

are like hey hold on a second this is Guzman again now in reality like Guzman didn't have anything to do with Alfredo Beltran Leva getting busted okay

the authorities just apprehended him Artudel launches war against Guzman Guzman gets Arturo busted. Right. The lawyer, him met the lawyer,

at that point, hands off responsibility to Vicente Zamada. Who was the one that was in the, out in the ocean? He was like fishing or something like that. No, that's another one at the Adi Annals. They catch him later on.

Okay. Yeah, but so this is the same circumstance where the lawyer, he's like, hey, look, I've been running back and forth between these guys for five or six years. I'm through with my cooperation. Yeah.

Like, I've worked off whatever I, I have to do. I'm going to transfer responsibility to Zambada's kid. Right. And they, don't they agree? They basically well. Yeah, the Americans are like, yeah, no problem. So the Zomotis kids got indictments. They want him for hundreds of tons. You got DEA agents meeting with the guy.

So the lawyer, so the DEA, like where the U.S. Attorney's Office, they all, the indictments, the warrant, everything for the lawyer, they say, quashed it. You're good. You're clean. You go about your business. Just because he had been running the, he's been running the errands back of giving him all these different guys. Like,

You just busted fucking 50 or 100, 200, a thousand guys in last five years. And not only the number of the guy, but the quality, you took out the head of the Gulf cartel. You took out the head of the Tijuana cartel. Like, this is the kind of cooperation that normally the government would give you the keys to the kingdom for. Right. So they quash any problems that he has.

He's free and clear now. So now they decide, okay, well, someone has to takeover being the contact man. Right. Which it ends up being. Zumbada's son. So at this point, they got a lot of sun. this point, like, you know, later on, the government was like, oh, no, no, we were just hearing what they had to say, but they weren't getting anything in return.

Yeah, it was all bullshit. It's bullshit. You know, later on, when Zambato was going to trial, he brought his motions pre-trial because he's claiming, hey, I had immunity. I'm working for the government the whole time. Yeah. I'm meeting with you people. And just before all that comes out, they fucking make a deal. Well, no, not just that. They ask to get permission to bring the lawyer, whom bet the lawyer. Oh, that's right. That's right. And the government imposes national security privilege, saying, nope, you can't call the lawyer. Because the lawyers going to come in and say, hey, look, yeah, you guys knew what we were doing the whole time. Right.

That's going to make the government. That's going to make the U.S. government look really bad. Yeah. So then they end up cutting a deal with Zumbada's kid. He ends up getting like 14 years. Right. Where should have gotten all this? You know, like I get 40 years for being a fraction of the size of Zambada.

But they essentially just give him a get out of jail free card. He also gave him like a billion dollars or something too, didn't he give him like a huge? Well, he must do so. Okay. And I'm going to cut you a check too. They haven't collected yet. Okay. And so, but, uh, so Zambada's kid steps in to take over responsibility.

And so the information is still coming directly from Khoras, Inaloa. Well, they end up getting Alfredo Beltran Lava knocked off. Well, it's just five, six months later, the natural cordonel gets taken out. And so if you look at it from an outside, like from an insider perspective, who benefits? Guzman. Right. From an outsider perspective, it's impossible that all these big guys

are getting taken off in such a short order because suddenly the Mexican government became competent. Because each of these guys are also paying for political protection. So who's powerful enough to overcome their local protection? Yeah.

It's got to be coming from the Americans. Yeah, the Americans. And so that ends up triggering the destabilization of core Sinaloa. Because up until that point, they'd had that five or six year run that was just on fire. Right.

With the death of natural cordonel, this is what ultimately gave rise to the groups that became known as the Hellesco New Generation Cartel. So we're going to stop it now because we're going to do another video talking about the history of the new generation up until present cartel activity, right? Sure.

Okay, so we'll do that. Also, if you like the video, do me a favor, hit the subscribe button to the bell so you get notified of videos just like this. and please share the video, please leave a comment, try and respond to as many comments as possible. Also, please consider joining my Patreon.

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