Assault rifles have long been the symbolic representation of revolutions, insurgencies, and violent uprisings around the world. Oftentimes these military grade weapons even come to represent cartels and organized crime as it exists in Latin America. However, in Mexico, a single gun can represent so much more than chaos and violence, an often-underreported narrative involving children, murder, drugs, propaganda, and organized crime. Sadly, in this narrative of bloodshed and broken dreams there is one commonality: a gun. In the case of Mexico, the AR-15 has become the physical representation of the power cartels have over the lives and future of thousands of Mexican children.
Presence of Firearms in Cartels
The AR-15 is a modern, military grade assault rifle that has quickly become the preferred armament in Mexican cartels and even around the world. Manufactured in the United States, the AR-15 has even been referred to as “America’s most popular rifle” by the NRA despite its repeated use in mass shootings. In the United States, an AR-15 can be purchased online in only a few clicks or even in many gun stores requiring nothing more than proof of residency and a clean criminal record. The gun’s popularity has only served to increase its value and prevalence outside of the United States. Mexican cartels prefer the AR-15 for many of the same reasons that it is popular in the United States, lightweight, heavy duty, and surprisingly easy to acquire. More often than not, the guns that the Mexican cartels use and traffic were purchased in the United States before being trafficked on the other side of the border. In some cases, cartels have even been able to manufacture AR-15 replicas with surprising accuracy. Cartels have become a significant problem to the security and stability of the Mexican State. Issues with security and violence not only play a role in the country’s overall stability, but also the security of its citizens. The image of an AR-15 represents the symbolic nature of the power struggle that exists between the Mexican government and cartels. Furthermore, the government's reliance on the military to combat the rising influence of the cartels represents the serious nature of the conflict.
Children as Cartel Operatives
There are an estimated 24 million illegal firearms in Mexico, with hundreds of thousands more being trafficked from the United States every year. Arms trafficking remains one of the most lucrative businesses in the diverse portfolio of many cartels. Many times, cartels employ children to do a lot of the work smuggling arms, drugs, and people across the border. Children as young as eleven years old get recruited from both sides of the border to act as smugglers. Cartels recruit children, although it would be more accurate to describe it as manipulation, to act as smugglers because they are viewed as expendable. Cartels often have little trouble recruiting children because working for cartels as a smuggler is often seen as a “cool” job, and an easy way to earn money. Some sources cite the number of children engaged with Mexican cartels around thirty-five thousand. For smugglers, the pay is often considerably higher than other jobs available near the border, such as construction and factory jobs. Child smugglers can make up to nearly two thousand dollars a day, more than what a factory worker can make in four months. Higher pay is one reason child smugglers typically forgo education, their families, sports, friends, and many other things normally considered normal for children. Another reason cartels recruit children is because they receive significantly lower sentences if caught. In some cases, children that smuggle people across the border just get returned to Mexico without a sentence.
Cartels in Mexico have also been known to recruit children to be soldiers. In similar ways to how children are recruited to be smugglers, children are also manipulated or forced into becoming hitmen or soldiers for cartels. Although information is somewhat limited on specific ways cartels manage to recruit children into becoming child soldiers, cartels have been known to target orphans or children without a stable family. Sometimes, cartels recruit children by offering food or drugs in return for service. Cartels target children to act as soldiers because children are often able to evade law enforcement and do not typically attract attention. After being enticed into joining cartels, children are trained to operate weapons such as AR-15s before being given a target to murder. Additionally, children recruited by cartels are used to target police and military personnel to occupy their attention while cartels are able to perform other operations without any problems.
Cartel Methods of Control and Propaganda
Children that get recruited by cartels are oftentimes victims, forced into situations of danger with little to no autonomy. In the case of some teens like Edgar Jimenez, children work for cartels for years out of fear for their own life. Jimenez was convicted for multiple crimes, including murder by age 14. He served three years in a juvenile detention center. Upon his release, there were many concerns regarding his own safety, already multiple teens in his situation had been killed by their cartel employers. In many ways, Edgar Jimenez mirrors the experience of numerous other children in Mexico. Jimenez’s recruitment into the cartel would have been markedly similar to many others. Edgar and his sisters had been removed from their parents’ home because of concerns of domestic violence, although placed in custody with his grandmother, her death led to Edgar dropping out of school in third grade. Edgar’s situation made him an easy target for cartels.
Cartels focus on recruiting children with unstable domestic lives because they are easier to recruit. Children lacking parents or guardians are often recruited with drugs as a means to attach the child to the provider. Children are manipulated and forced to carry out operations because of their reliance on narcotics and allegiance to the cartel. Cartels simulate families by providing the illusion of care. Children that get involved in cartel are often in desperate situations. Child operatives in cartels are victims, exploited for their innocence. Some of the most powerful cartels in Mexico have used names that allude to themes of traditional domestic structures including La Familia and Jalisco Nueva Generación. Cartels use propaganda effectively to recruit members and keep their operations running.
For many children growing up underneath the shadow of cartels, the AR-15 would seem to be a poignant symbol of a childhood stripped of love, happiness, growth, security, and education. Cartels target vulnerable children because their malleable minds make them easier targets and better soldiers. Cartels exploit children that grow up in regions with limited access to education and employment opportunities forcing them to become operatives for sometimes low pay for their duties. Cartels turn a lucrative profit by using children that have seemingly no other viable skill or contribution to society. For many of the children recruited by cartels, their family was replaced by the cartel. Children are told that they are not allowed to communicate with family members while they are working for the cartels. Additionally, children are forced to do the bidding of the cartels under penalty of being shot.Cartels use propaganda and manipulation tactics to recruit operatives effectively replacing the family structures in a child’s life. For the children, there is no higher authority than the cartels. The vicious cycle of trafficking, murdering, and recruiting done by the cartels is driven and made possible by a simple object, an AR-15, an object that every cartel operative is familiar with. AR-15s exist in our own consciousness and have become the very thing that essentializes Mexican cartels and allows them to express control over the childhood of thousands.
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