The CIA is reviewing authorizations to use lethal force against drug cartels in Mexico and beyond, while the Trump government seeks to make cartels fight an important priority for the intelligence agency, according to a US employee and three people informed on the subject.
The review does not indicate that President Donald Trump ordered the CIA to take direct action against the cartels.
But it was designed to assist the agency to understand what types of activities could legally perform and what would be the potential risks in all options, the sources said – emphasizing how seriously the Trump government is considering the possibility.
This also highlights the concerns of some American employees that using traditional cartel counter -terrorism tools – as the Trump government said it intends to do – carries a much higher risk of collateral damage to American citizens than similar operations conducted in the Middle East, away from American ground.
Among the issues that agency lawyers are examining is the responsibility of the CIA and its officers if an American is accidentally killed in any operation, according to one of the informed persons.
Agency employees are “cautious” about using “resources traditionally directed to what were seen as military targets and is now employed against cartel targets,” one of them reported.
War against cartels
The Trump government designated several cartels earlier this year as foreign terrorist organizations-a maneuver that some current and former US employees believe it is designed to build a precedent for lethal action-and the CIA is already flying surveillance drones that can be armed over Mexico.
THE CNN He could not determine whether the effort was ordered by the White House or the director of CIA John Ratcliffe, or if it was performed as a prudent planning measure by the agency team in response to clear signs of the Trump administration that it wants national security agencies to increase pressure on cartels.
“If any administration is pushing us to do something that has significant adverse branches for the agency, [a CIA] You will want to check two and three times: ‘Is it cool?’ ”And“ Do we have an extraordinarily clear political direction to do what we are going to do? ”A former CIA employee with experience in building this kind of review.
“Just because something is cool under [a lei do conflito armado] It doesn’t mean it’s something you should do, ”he continued, referring to the protocols that regulate state conduct during war.“ There is an ethical component. There is a practical component. There is a pragmatic component. ”
The CIA has the legal authority to conduct lethal attacks on its own or provide target information, or other support for another nation to perform a lethal attack, provided that it is duly authorized by the president and follows the interconnected constellation of US laws and regulations that govern armed conflicts.
But do this against cartel actors in an area where there are, comparatively, many more US -born citizens and people with Green Card – people who may have legitimacy to process the US government if they are harmed – is new to the agency.
“It is not a matter of whether or not they can use lethal strength. They can,” said one of the informed people about the review. “It’s more about the implications of Americans to be potentially injured or killed based on their wider presence in space.”
Possible consequences of actions with drones
Side damage could also have repercussions on any partner nation that allows the CIA to conduct direct action within its borders or accept the agency’s intelligence support to conduct its own lethal operations, the US official noted.
If CIA support creates a political problem for the partner nation – Mexico, for example – his government could refuse to allow the agency to operate there in the future.
Former employees also warned of the risks of retaliation by cartels, some of which are present within the United States.
“Mexican cartels are not merely criminal organizations; they operate as paramilitary entities with profound financial resources, global supply chains and sophisticated logistics networks extending to the United States,” Doug Livermore, an irregular war expert and former defense department employee, wrote in a recent study for the Atlantic Council, a Think Tank of international affairs.
“They are highly prone to retaliation” and “have a substantial capacity for terrorism that, when combined with their established presence within the United States, could climb the conflict.”
One of the people informed about the review said that it reflected a profound institutional memory of the “enrogated interrogation” program of the George W. Bush government, which legislators and the Obama government later considered as torture.
In this case, according to former employees, the agency took its operations to the limit of what they believed the law could bear. Critics, of course, claim that the agency and administration have gone beyond what it was legal, and in the following years, CIA and its officers have undergone a series of public investigations and a high profile on the adequacy of their actions.
This type of review, according to people informed on the subject, reflects an understanding that the agency can be called account for any action that takes against cartels – especially if retaliation.
And especially if the agency conducts operations that are considered disproportionate to the threat of cartels – fundamental criteria that lethal action must meet under the law of armed conflicts.
The annual assessment of threats from the US intelligence community, published last month, began with the threat of drug cartels, apparently for the first time in the nearly 20 years of the report’s history.
However, many current and old employees of national security have repeatedly argued that while cartels are a serious problem, they do not represent an existential threat to the country.
This content was originally published in Cia Review authorization to use lethal force against Mexican cartels on the CNN Brazil website.
Source: CNN Brasil
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