They are assuming that the US would let it get to the point of cartel operating in the States with impunity kidnapping and murdering their way into effectively owning the government. This seems to be predicated by the understanding that the US has met abject failure in its campaign to hold, reform, and dominate perceptively weaker countries. It's true we couldn't dominate Mexico any more than we could dominate Iraq. It would be a deadly waste of blood and treasure that would work out horribly for all. We don't actually have to however.
We could trivially and in short order destroy Mexicos ability to function as a modern nation by destroying power generation, water, farming, roads, bridges, shipping, trains, airplanes. We could deny all large scale transport in or out and keep this up for years for less than the cost of Iraq. There wouldn't be a drug business there any more than there would be any other kind of business once all the engines that enable commerce are silent.
The logical end game for infinite acceleration is maximum violence on both sides. The fantasy described assumes that the cartel is able to accelerate infinitely while the US is stuck in first gear. I think in fact that the US citizenry are far too bloodthirsty for that to be reasonable. More likely far less acceleration on the cartel's side sees join missions between US soldiers and Mexican authorities leading to a shit ton of dead cartel followed by comparative peace leading to disengagement. Ultimately the drug trade returns to normal and nothing is resolved.
> They are assuming that the US would let it get to the point of cartel operating in the States with impunity kidnapping and murdering their way into effectively owning the government.
No, they aren't.
They are explicitly describing that the US might be forced to take extreme action domestically to avoid the “with impunity” part, because the cartels have the resources and US penetration already to act, if they were no longer constrained by the threat of what the US might do if they did, which they cease to be when the US goes to war anyway.
> We could trivially and in short order destroy Mexicos ability to function as a modern nation by destroying power generation, water, farming, roads, bridges, shipping, trains, airplanes.
What happens to conditions in neighboring countries when the US has done that elsewhwere?
Now, where is Mexico?
> There wouldn't be a drug business there any more than there would be any other kind of business once all the engines that enable commerce are silent.
We destroyed Afghanistan that way.
It didn't destroy the drug business there, quite the opposite. Well, until the Taliban takeover, but I’m not sure that's the win you want to look for in Mexico.
> There wouldn't be a drug business there any more than there would be any other kind of business once all the engines that enable commerce are silent.
This would conflict with US goal of reshoring manufacturing from Asia to NAFTA/USMCA.
It would acheive both: destroying the goals long sought by US trade policy, and increasing terrorist violence (in the short term by cartels, but once you destroy Mexico, it won't just be the cartel members with motives, opportunity, and a perception of nothing to lose) directed at US policymakers.
We could trivially and in short order destroy Mexicos ability to function as a modern nation by destroying power generation, water, farming, roads, bridges, shipping, trains, airplanes. We could deny all large scale transport in or out and keep this up for years for less than the cost of Iraq. There wouldn't be a drug business there any more than there would be any other kind of business once all the engines that enable commerce are silent.
The logical end game for infinite acceleration is maximum violence on both sides. The fantasy described assumes that the cartel is able to accelerate infinitely while the US is stuck in first gear. I think in fact that the US citizenry are far too bloodthirsty for that to be reasonable. More likely far less acceleration on the cartel's side sees join missions between US soldiers and Mexican authorities leading to a shit ton of dead cartel followed by comparative peace leading to disengagement. Ultimately the drug trade returns to normal and nothing is resolved.