Los Zetas Inc

Los Zetas Inc.

The rapid growth of organized crime in Mexico and the government’s response to it have driven an unprecedented rise in violence and impelled major structural economic changes, including the recent passage of energy reform. Los Zetas Inc. asserts that these phenomena are a direct and intended result of the emergence of the brutal Zetas criminal organization in the Mexican border state of Tamaulipas. Going beyond previous studies of the group as a drug trafficking organization, Guadalupe Correa-Cabrera builds a convincing case that the Zetas and similar organizations effectively constitute transnational corporations with business practices that include the trafficking of crude oil, natural gas, and gasoline; migrant and weapons smuggling; kidnapping for ransom; and video and music piracy. Combining vivid interview commentary with in-depth analysis of organized crime as a transnational and corporate phenomenon, Los Zetas Inc. proposes a new theoretical framework for understanding the emerging face, new structure, and economic implications of organized crime in Mexico. Correa-Cabrera delineates the Zetas establishment, structure, and forms of operation, along with the reactions to this new model of criminality by the state and other lawbreaking, foreign, and corporate actors. Since the Zetas share some characteristics with legal transnational businesses that operate in the energy and private security industries, she also compares this criminal corporation with ExxonMobil, Halliburton, and Blackwater (renamed “Academi” and now a Constellis company). Asserting that the elevated level of violence between the Zetas and the Mexican state resembles a civil war, Correa-Cabrera identifies the beneficiaries of this war, including arms-producing companies, the international banking system, the US border economy, the US border security/military-industrial complex, and corporate capital, especially international oil and gas companies.

Los Zetas, Inc

Edge of Battle

New York Times –bestselling Author: Multiple agendas collide and set off an explosion on the Southern border in this thriller from "a superb storyteller" ( The Washington Post). Violence and tensions along the U.S.-Mexican border have never been higher, sparked by battles between rival drug lords and an increased flow of illegal migrants. To combat the threat, the United States has executed Operation Rampart: a controversial test base in Southern California run by Major Richter and TALON, his high-tech special operations unit. Their success is threatened by a drug kingpin and migrant smuggler named Ernesto Fuerza. In the guise of a Mexican nationalist going by the name Commander Veracruz, he causes a storm of controversy on both sides of the border, calling for a revolution to take back the northernmost "Mexican states"—also known as the southwestern United States. His real intention, though, is to make it easier to import illegal drugs across the border. While panic is stirred to a fever pitch by a popular talk-show host, Richter and his force are reassigned to the FBI to investigate the murders of several Border Patrol agents—a mission that will bring him face-to-face with Fuerza and set off a wave of bloodshed that threatens to become an all-out guerrilla war. And lurking behind Fuerza may be an even more powerful puppet master . . . "The novels of Dale Brown brim with action, sophisticated weaponry and political intrigue." — San Francisco Chronicle