According to revelation, Spy airplane flights of the United States Armed Forces on the border They have gone from an average monthly to 18 in just 10 days, between the end of January and early February.
Until now, the greatest attention of Pentagon has been focused on the collection of information on other priority issues for USA as the Russian activity in Ukraine and the search for Russian or Chinese submarines.
The remarkable increase in spy flights occurs while Trump He has ordered the military to ensure the border with Mexico to avoid the entry of undocumented immigrants and deter the drug smuggling operations of the cartels, highlights CNN.
Yes ok These flights have not crossed the border airplanes have the ability to collect information from intelligence in the face of Mexico said former officials consulted by CNN.
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Of the 18 flights, at least 11 have been made by P-8 aircraft of the Navy which has a sophisticated radar system that specializes in identifying submarines, but is also able to collect images and signs of intelligence.
In addition, the United States is using the U-2 spy plane one of the most venerated of the army that was designed during the Cold War to collect images of the Soviet Union at great altitude.
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Current and previous military officers who were consulted by CNN for their extensive experience in anti -narcotics work on the border with Mexico They said they did not remember that before a U-2 had been used for that purpose.
CNN said that flight routes cover missions in California, Arizona y Texas. The news chain also identified at least a longer mission that turned the peninsula of Baja California and passed near Sinaloa February 4. That time was used plane RC-135 Rivet of the Air Force, which specializes in capturing communications from land.
To Andrés Gómez de la Torre Specialist in Defense and Intelligence issues, the United States Armed Forces overdue over the border with Mexico have a double reading.
“First of all, the context is a unilateral policy of Washington to declare drug cartels as terrorist organizations. The second, The fight against drugs from the point of view of the Trump government acquires a military connotation. The proof of this is that the new ambassador appointed by the United States in Mexico is the former Green Special Forces Boine Ronald Johnsonwhich has been linked to unconventional operations and American intelligence services “, Gómez de la Torre says Commerce.
“While the flights are developed in the international border limit, it is not accidental that they have concentrated on the Baja California peninsula and on the coast of Sinaloa, which are bastions of the Sinaloa cartel,” Indicates Gómez de la Torre.
“I have no doubt that they are intelligence flights due to the type of used aircraft. The P-8 Poseidon is a surveillance, tracking and monitoring plane of maritime spaces. While for land surveillance they use the famous U-2 aircraft, which are working on intelligence, electronic and communications intelligence issues, called Elint and Comint ”add.
Gómez de la Torre recalled that the Rivet RC-135 plane, of electronic surveillance and with monitoring capabilities, was used by the United States in the 1983 urgent fury operation to overthrow the Granada dictator Hudson Austin; and in the operation in Panama of 1989 to overthrow and detain the dictator Manuel Antonio Noriega.
“They are extremely intrusive aircraft, intrusive intelligence. Then, we must see this phenomenon from the point of view of the prominence of the pentagon in the fight against drugs and a unilateral neo-interventionist policy of foreign policy and the United States defense policy ”, The specialist holds.
The United States recognizes espionage
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The head of the North Command of the United States, the General Gregory GuillotHe confirmed to the Senate that the Pentagon uses air surveillance for more information about drug trafficking cartels in Mexico and thus determine how to counteract their actions.
The general indicated that there was cooperation with the Mexican army.
“Yes we have an intelligence exchange with Mexico To show them what we see, ”he said. “And we have increased cooperation with Mexico to address cartels violence in terms of sending more troops,” he added.
Guillot He also reported that the Army has doubled its forces at the border with Mexico in a week in support of the Department of National Security (DHS).
A senator raised the possibility of carrying a “attack group of aircraft carriers to the Gulf of America (Gulf of Mexico)”, but the general ruled out for the moment.
Sheinbaum: “To share the information”
For its part, the president of Mexico, Claudia SheinbaumHe said Thursday that he does not “alarm” the flights on the border, but said he will ask for an explanation about it.
He added that the important thing is that US authorities share information with their government.
He also said that flights must respect the sovereignty of the country, that “it is not negotiable.”
“We are always going to coordinate without subordinating. And if there is information that has the United States regarding our country, then it is shared, it is coordinated to work in Mexico. Then, all within the framework of the Constitution, ”Sheinbaum emphasized.
Cartels to the list of terrorist organizations
The New York Times reported that the United States Department of State plans to include in its list of terrorist groups the Mexican Cartel de Sinaloa, Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generación, Cartel del Nortete, the Michoacan family and United Cartels.
The measure will be adopted after Trump signed an order on January 20 where he asked to take energetic actions against drug cartels, which “constitute a threat of national security greater than that of traditional organized crime.”
Trump gave the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, two weeks to appoint these groups as terrorists.
The New York Times also indicated that the Mexican cartels that will be on the list work closely with the Colombian Gulf Clan to transfer migrants clandestinely to the United States.
The Gulf clan will also be designated terrorist organization.