STREET GANGS:

THE NEW URBAN INSURGENCY

Max G. Manwaring

March 2005

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iii

FOREWORD

 The intent of this monograph is to identify some of the most salient 

characteristics of contemporary criminal street gangs (that is, the 

gang phenomenon or third generation gangs), and to explain the 

linkage to insurgency. As a corollary, Dr. Max G. Manwaring 

argues that gang-related crime, in conjunction with the instability 

it wreaks upon governments, is now a serious national security and 

sovereignty problem in important parts of the global community. 

Although differences between gangs and insurgents exist, in terms 

of original motives and modes of operation, this linkage infers that 

the gang phenomenon is a mutated form of urban insurgency. That 

is, these nonstate actors must eventually seize political power to 

guarantee the freedom of action and the commercial environment 

they want. The common denominator that can link gangs and 

insurgents is that some gangs’ and insurgents’ ultimate objective is 

to depose or control the governments of targeted countries.

 Thus, a new kind of war is brewing in the global security 

arena. It involves youthful gangs that make up for their lack of raw 

conventional power in two ways. First, they rely on their “street 

smarts,” and generally use coercion, corruption, and co-optation to 

achieve their ends. Second, more mature gangs (i.e., third generation 

gangs) also rely on loose alliances with organized criminals and 

drug traffickers to gain additional resources, expand geographical 

parameters, and attain larger market shares. 

 This monograph contributes significantly to an understanding 

of the new enemies and the new kinds of threats characteristic of 

a world in which instability and irregular conflict are no longer on 

the margins of global politics. For those responsible for making 

and implementing national security policy in the United States and 

elsewhere in the world, the analysis of the new threats provided by 

the author is compelling. The Strategic Studies Institute is pleased 

to offer this cogent monograph as part of the ongoing debate on 

global and regional security.

DOUGLAS C. LOVELACE, JR.

Director

Strategic Studies Institute 
iv

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE AUTHOR

MAX G. MANWARING holds the General Douglas MacArthur 

Chair and is Professor of Military Strategy at the U.S. Army 

War College. He is a retired U.S. Army colonel and an Adjunct 

Professor of International Politics at Dickinson College. He 

has served in various civilian and military positions, including 

the U.S. Army War College, the U.S. Southern Command, 

and the Defense Intelligence Agency. Dr. Manwaring is the 

author and co-author of several articles, chapters, and reports 

dealing with political-military affairs, democratization and 

global ungovernability, and Latin American security affairs. 

He is also the editor or co-editor of El Salvador at War; Beyond 

Declaring Victory and Coming Home: The Challenges of Peace 

and Stability Operations; Deterrence in the 21st Century; and The 

Search for Security: A U.S. Grand Strategy for the Twenty-First 

Century. Dr. Manwaring holds a B.S. in Economics, a B.S. in 

Political Science, an M.A. in Political Science, and a Ph.D. in 

Political Science from the University of Illinois. He is also a 

graduate of the U.S. Army War College.
v

SUMMARY

 This monograph explains the linkage of contemporary 

criminal street gangs (that is, the gang phenomenon or third 

generation gangs) to insurgency in terms of the instability it 

wreaks upon governments and the concomitant challenge to 

state sovereignty. Although differences between gangs and 

insurgents regarding motives and modes of operations exist, 

this linkage infers that gang phenomena are mutated forms 

of urban insurgency. In these terms, these “new” nonstate 

actors must eventually seize political power to guarantee 

the freedom of action and the commercial environment 

they want. The common denominator that can link the gang 

phenomenon to insurgency is that some third generation 

gangs’ and insurgents’ ultimate objective is to depose or 

control the governments of targeted countries. 

 The author identifies those issues that must be taken 

together and understood as a whole before any effective 

countermeasures can be taken to deal with the half-criminal 

and half-political nature of the gang phenomenon. This 

is a universal compound-complex problem that must be 

understood on three distinct levels of analysis: first, the gangs 

phenomena are generating serious domestic and regional 

instability and insecurity that ranges from personal violence 

to insurgent to state failure: second, because if their criminal 

activities and security challenges, the gangs phenomena 

are exacerbating civil-military and police-military relations 

problems and reducing effective and civil-military ability to 

control the national territory; and, third, gangs are helping 

transitional criminal organizations, insurgents, warlords, and 

drug barons erode the legitimacy and effective sovereignty 

of nation-states . The analytical commonality linking these 

three issues is the inevitable contribution to either (a) failing 

and failed state status of targeted countries, or (b) deposing 

or controlling the governments of targeted countries. In these 
terms, we must remember that crime and instability are only 

symptoms of the threat. The ultimate threat is either state 

failure or the violent imposition of a radical socio-economicpolitical restructuring of the state and its governance.

 In describing the gang phenomenon as a simple mutation 

of a violent act we label as insurgency, we mischaracterize the 

activities of nonstate organizations that are attempting to take 

control of the state. We traditionally think of insurgency as 

primarily a military activity, and we think of gangs as a simple 

law-enforcement problem. Yet, insurgents and third generation 

gangs are engaged in a highly complex political act—political 

war. Under these conditions, police and military forces would 

provide personal and collective security and stability, while 

they and other governmental institutions combat the root 

causes of instability and political war—injustice, repression, 

inequity, and corruption. The intent would be to generate 

the political-economic-social development that will define 

the processes of national reform, regeneration, and wellbeing. The challenge, then, is to come to terms with the fact 

that contemporary security and stability, at whatever level, 

is at base a holistic political-diplomatic, socio-economic, 

psychological-moral, and military police effort.

 This monograph concludes with implications and strategiclevel recommendations derived from the instability, civilmilitary jurisdiction, and sovereignty issues noted above that 

will help leaders achieve strategic clarity and operate more 

effectively in the complex politically dominated, contemporary 

global security arena.

vi
1

STREET GANGS:

THE NEW URBAN INSURGENCY

 The traditional problem of external aggression against 

a state’s territory, markets, sources of raw materials and 

hydrocarbons, lines of communication, and peoples remains 

salient, but does not hold the urgency it once did. However, 

the Western mainstream legally-oriented security dialogue 

demonstrates that many political and military leaders and 

scholars of international relations have not yet adjusted to the 

reality that internal and transnational nonstate actors―such 

as criminal gangs―can be as important as traditional nationstates in determining political patterns and outcomes in 

global affairs. Similarly, many political leaders see nonstate 

actors as bit players on the international stage. At best, many 

leaders consider these nontraditional political actors to be 

low-level law enforcement problems, and, as a result, many 

argue that they do not require sustained national security 

policy attention.1

 Yet, more than half of the countries in the 

world are struggling to maintain their political, economic, and 

territorial integrity in the face of diverse direct and indirect 

nonstate―including criminal gang―challenges.2

 For sovereignty to be meaningful today, the state, together 

with its associated governmental institutions working under 

the rule of law, must be the only source of authority empowered 

to make and enforce laws and conduct the business of the 

people within the national territory. The violent, intimidating, 

and corrupting activities of illegal internal and transnational 

nonstate actors―such as urban gangs―can abridge sovereign 

state powers and negate national and regional security.3 The 

logic of the situation argues that the conscious choices that the 

international community and individual nation-states make 

about how to deal with the contemporary nontraditional 

threat situation will define the processes of national, regional, 

and global security and well-being far into the future.
2

AN OVERVIEW OF THE GANGS-INSURGENCY 

PROBLEM 

 The primary thrusts of this monograph are to identify 

some of the most salient characteristics of contemporary 

criminal street gangs (that is, the gang phenomenon or third 

generation gangs). It also explains the linkage to insurgency 

with assertions that gang-generated crime, in conjunction with 

the instability it wreaks upon governments, is now a serious 

national security problem in important parts of the global 

community. Although gangs and insurgents differ in terms of 

original motives and modes of operation, this linkage infers 

that street gangs are a mutated form of urban insurgency. 

That is, these nonstate actors must eventually seize political 

power to guarantee the freedom of action and the commercial 

environment they want. The common denominator that can 

link gangs to insurgency is that some gangs’ and insurgents’ 

ultimate objective is to depose or control the governments of 

targeted countries. As a consequence, the “Duck Analogy” 

applies. That is, third generation gangs look like ducks, walk 

like ducks, and act like ducks―a peculiar breed, but ducks 

nevertheless!

 This monograph will, then, identify those issues that must 

be taken together and understood as a whole before any 

effective countermeasures can be taken to deal with the halfcriminal and half-political nature of the gang phenomenon. 

This is a universal compound-complex problem that must be 

understood on three distinct levels of analysis: first, the gangs 

phenomena are generating serious domestic and regional 

instability and insecurity that ranges from personal violence 

to insurgent to state failure: second, because if their criminal 

activities and security challenges, the gangs phenomena 

are exacerbating civil-military and police-military relations 

problems and reducing effective and civil-military ability to 

control the national territory; and, third, gangs are helping 
3

transitional criminal organizations, insurgents, warlords, and 

drug barons erode the legitimacy and effective sovereignty 

of nation-states . The analytical commonality linking these 

three issues is the inevitable contribution to either (a) failing 

and failed state status of targeted countries, or (b) deposing 

or controlling the governments of targeted countries. In these 

terms, we must remember that crime and instability are only 

symptoms of the threat. The ultimate threat is either state 

failure or the violent imposition of a radical socio-economicpolitical restructuring of the state and its governance.

 In describing the gang phenomenon as a simple mutation 

of a violent act we label as insurgency, we mischaracterize the 

activities of nonstate organizations that are attempting to take 

control of the state. We traditionally think of insurgency as 

primarily a military activity, and we think of gangs as a simple 

law-enforcement problem. Yet, insurgents and third generation 

gangs are engaged in a highly complex political act—political 

war. Under these conditions, police and military forces would 

provide personal and collective security and stability, while 

they and other governmental institutions combat the root 

causes of instability and political war—injustice, repression, 

inequity, and corruption. The intent would be to generate 

the political-economic-social development that will define 

the processes of national reform, regeneration, and wellbeing. The challenge, then, is to come to terms with the fact 

that contemporary security and stability, at whatever level, 

is at base a holistic political-diplomatic, socio-economic, 

psychological-moral, and military police effort.

 This monograph concludes with implications and strategiclevel recommendations derived from the instability, civilmilitary jurisdiction, and sovereignty issues noted above that 

will help leaders achieve strategic clarity and operate more 

effectively in the complex politically dominated, contemporary 

global security arena. In short, these recommendations 

establish the beginning point from which civilian and military 
4

leaders might generate holistic civil-military success against 

the nonstate gang phenomenon and turn that success into 

strategic political victory.

LINKING GANGS AND INSURGENCY I: 

THE CONFLICT CONTEXT WITHIN WHICH GANGS 

OPERATE

 Before examining the characteristics of street gangs, 

it is useful to sketch the basic outlines of the larger 

picture of the current conflict situation and the place of 

insurgency and gangs in it. First, Dr. Steven Metz and 

Lieutenant Colonel Raymond Millen argue that four 

distinct but interrelated battle spaces exist. They are 

(1) traditional direct interstate war; (2) unconventional 

nonstate war; (3) unconventional intrastate war, which 

tends to involve direct vs. indirect conflict between state and 

nonstate actors; and (4) indirect interstate war, which entails 

aggression by a state against another through proxies.4

Nonstate Conflict and Gangs.

 Street gangs operate most effectively in the second category 

of nonstate battle space. Nonstate war involves criminal and 

terrorist actors who thrive among and within various host 

countries. This type of conflict is often called “guerrilla war,” 

“asymmetric war,” and also “complex emergencies.” This 

kind of war is defined as acting, organizing, and thinking 

differently from opponents to maximize one’s own advantages, 

exploit an opponent’s weaknesses, attain the initiative, 

and gain freedom of action and security. In these terms, 

nonstate war exploits―directly and indirectly―the disparity 

between contending parties to gain relative advantage and 

uses insurgent and terrorist methods. Moreover, it can have 

political-psychological and physical dimensions, as well as 
5

lethal and nonlethal dimensions; it can have both ideologicalpolitical objectives and commercial (search-for-wealth) 

motives; and it is constantly mutating.5 As a consequence, 

there are no formal declarations or terminations of conflict; no 

easily identified human foe to attack and defeat; no specific 

territory to take and hold; no single credible government 

or political actor with which to deal; and no guarantee that 

any agreement between or among contending groups will be 

honored. In short, the battle space is everywhere, and includes 

everything and everyone.6

 As a result, nonstate conflict is much too complex to allow a 

strictly military solution to a given national security problem. 

Likewise, it is too complicated to allow a strictly police solution to 

a law enforcement problem. Street gangs may be considered 

half political national security challenges and half criminal 

law enforcement issues in these unconventional terms.7

Nevertheless, these are not the only difficulties generated by 

the gang phenomenon and other nonstate actors in nonstate 

conflicts. Additional, nontraditional complexities further 

define the problem and dictate thoughtful responses. As 

an example, in a national security scenario, the “enemy” is 

not a recognizable military group or formation. The enemy 

is now the individual political actor or gang member who 

plans and implements coercive intimidation, corruption, 

and instabilities, and exploits the root causes of violence for 

his or her own commercial or political purposes. The enemy 

is also a composite of poverty, disease, and other causes of 

criminality and societal violence that must be dealt with on 

its own terms.8

 In this context, the harsh realities of the new world disorder 

are caused by myriad destabilizers. The causes include 

increasing poverty, human starvation, widespread disease, and 

lack of political and socio-economic justice. The consequences 

are seen in such forms as social violence, criminal anarchy, 

refugee flows, illegal drug trafficking and organized crime, 
6

extreme nationalism, irredentism, religious fundamentalism, 

insurgency, ethnic cleansing, and environmental devastation. 

These destabilizing conditions tend to be exploited by 

militant nationalists, militant reformers, militant religious 

fundamentalists, ideologues, civil and military bureaucrats, 

terrorists, insurgents, warlords, drug barons, and organized 

criminals working to achieve their own narrow purposes. Those 

who argue that instability and conflict―and the employment 

of terrorism and generalized violence as a tactic or strategy 

in conflict―are the results of poverty, injustice, corruption, 

and misery may well be right. We must remember, however, 

that individual men and women are prepared to kill and to 

destroy and, perhaps, die in the process to achieve their selfdetermined ideological or commercial objectives. In the end, 

Zbigniew Brzezinski reminds us that, “behind almost every 

[violent] act lurks a political problem.”9

 Consequently, “power” is no longer combat fire power 

or police power. It is the multilevel, combined political, 

psychological, moral, informational, economic, social, police, 

and military activity that can be brought to bear holistically 

on the causes and consequences, as well as the perpetrators, of 

violence. At the same time, success or “victory” is not a formal 

document signed by responsible authorities terminating a 

conflict. Also, it cannot be defined in terms of killing or jailing 

a given number of “enemies.” As a result, success is being 

defined more frequently as the establishment of a viable 

circular linkage between individual and collective security 

and sustainable societal peace. Ultimately, then, success in 

nonstate conflict comes as a result of a unified effort to apply 

the full human and physical resources of the nation-state and 

its international allies to achieve individual and collective 

well-being that leads to societal peace.10
7

The Challenge and the Threat.

 At base, nonstate guerrilla war, asymmetric war, or a 

complex emergency situation is ultimately a zero-sum game, 

in which there is only one winner or, in a worst-case scenario, 

there are no winners. It is, thus, total. This is the case with 

Osama bin Laden’s terrorists, Maoist insurgents, the Japanese 

Aum Shinrikyo cult, Mafia families, warlords, transnational 

criminal organizations, institutionalized criminality in West 

Africa, and street gangs, among others. It is also the case with 

the deliberate, direct financial attack or hacker attack that 

can allow anyone with access to the appropriate knowledge 

and technology―including gang members―to impair the 

security of a nation as effectively as with a nuclear bomb.11

Significantly, this is also the case with more subtle and 

indirect confrontation than the usual direct military-political 

challenges to the state. That is, rather than directly competing 

with a nation-state, sophisticated and internationalized 

street gangs and their criminal/narco allies can use a mix of 

complicity, indifference, corruption, and violent intimidation 

to co-opt and seize control of a state or a portion of a nationstate quietly and indirectly.12

 In these terms, the destabilizing commercial and political 

activities of third generation gangs may be characterized as a 

game of “Wizard’s Chess.” In that game, protagonists move 

pieces silently and subtly all over the game board. Under the 

players’ studied direction, each piece represents a different 

type of direct and indirect power and may simultaneously 

conduct its lethal and nonlethal attacks from differing 

directions. Each piece shows no mercy against its foe and is 

prepared to sacrifice itself in order to allow another piece the 

opportunity to destroy or control an adversary―or checkmate 

the king. Accordingly, all the above threats can be seen as 

methods of choice of globally connected commercial and 

ideological movements, dedicated to self-enrichment at the 
8

expense of others, to the destruction of the contemporary 

international system of cooperation and progress, or both. 

Over the long-term, however, this ongoing game is not a 

question of instability, illegal violence, or unconscionable 

commercial gain. Ultimately, it is a question of survival. 

Failure in “Wizard’s Chess” is not an option. 

 As a consequence, nonstate conflict will likely have 

different names, different motives, and exert different types 

and levels of violence. Nevertheless, whatever they are called, 

these unconventional nonstate wars can be identified by their 

ultimate objectives or by their results. That is, they are the 

organized application of coercive military or nonmilitary, 

lethal or nonlethal, direct or indirect, or a mix of all the above 

illicit methods, intended to resist, oppose, gain control of, or 

overthrow an existing government or symbol of power and 

bring about fundamental political change.13 Thus, according 

to El Salvadoran Vice-Minister of Justice Silvia Aguilar, 

“Domestic crime and its associated destabilization are now 

Latin America’s most serious security threat.”14

LINKING GANGS TO INSURGENCY II: 

THREE GENERATIONS OF URBAN GANGS

 This part of the monograph briefly reviews the evolution 

of street gangs from small, turf-oriented, petty-cash entities to 

larger, internationalized, commercial-political organizations. 

Also outlined here are the development of street gang violence 

from the level of “protection,” gangsterism, brigandage to 

drug trafficking, global criminal activity, and taking political 

control of ungoverned territory and/or areas governed by 

corrupt politicians and functionaries. Additionally, this threat 

to the state is exacerbated by the instability generated through 

the corruption and the destruction of democratic governance, 

by the disruption of equitable commercial transactions and the 

distortion of free market economic mechanisms, and through 
9

the normalization of intimidating violence by degrading 

personal and collective security. In sum, it would appear that 

gangs present much more than annoying law enforcement 

problems. Actually and potentially, they are national security 

problems that threaten the effective sovereignty of the nationstate. 

First Generation Gangs: Organization, Motives, 

and Level of Violence.

 An analysis of urban street gangs shows that some 

of these criminal entities have evolved through three 

generations of development. The first generation―or 

traditional street gangs―are primarily turf-oriented. They 

have loose and unsophisticated leadership and focus their 

attention on turf protection to gain petty cash and on gang 

loyalty within their immediate environs (designated city 

blocks or neighborhoods). When first generation street gangs 

engage in criminal enterprise, it is largely opportunistic and 

individual in scope and tends to be localized and operates 

at the lower end of extreme societal violence―gangsterism 

and brigandage. Most groups stay firmly within this first 

generation of development, but more than a few gangs have 

moved to the second generation.15

Second Generation Gangs.

 This generation of street gangs is organized for business 

and commercial gain. These gangs have a more centralized 

leadership, and members tend to focus on drug trafficking and 

market protection. At the same time, they operate in a broader 

spatial or geographic area that may include neighboring 

cities and other nation-states. Second generation gangs, like 

other more sophisticated criminal enterprises, use the level of 

violence necessary to protect their markets and control their 
10

competition. They also use violence as political interference 

to negate enforcement efforts directed against them by police 

and other security organizations. And as they seek to control 

or incapacitate state security organizations, they often begin 

to dominate vulnerable community life within large areas of 

the nation-state. In this environment, second generation gangs 

almost have to link with and provide services to transnational 

criminal organizations. In this context, these gangs have been 

known to develop broader, market-focused, and sometimes 

overtly political agendas to improve their market share and 

revenues.16

Third Generation Gangs.

 These gangs continue first and second generation actions 

as they expand their geographical parameters, as well as their 

commercial and political objectives. As they evolve, they 

develop into more seasoned organizations with broader drugrelated markets, as well as very sophisticated transnational 

criminal organizations with ambitious political and economic 

agendas. In this connection, they inevitably begin to control 

ungoverned territory within a nation-state and/or begin 

to acquire political power in poorly-governed space.17 This 

political action is intended to provide security and freedom 

of movement for gang activities. As a consequence, the third 

generation gang and its leadership challenge the legitimate 

state monopoly on the exercise of control and use of violence 

within a given political territory. The gang leader, then, acts 

much the same as a warlord or a drug baron.18

 That is, once a gang leader has achieved control of a 

specific geographical area within a given nation-state and 

takes measures to protect the gang’s turf from the state, that 

leader effectively becomes a warlord or drug baron. At the 

same time, that status takes the gang into another, somewhat 

different battle space―intrastate war. This unconventional 
11

type of conflict pits nonstate actors (for example, warlords, 

drug barons, or insurgents) directly against nation-states 

and requires a relatively effective warmaking capability. 

That, in turn, takes us back to the relationship between 

warlordism/drug baronism and insurgency. Clearly, many 

differences exist, especially in terms of mode of operation and 

motivation.19 The common denominators in both instances 

remain, however, to accomplish the following objectives: (1) 

depose or control an incumbent government, and (2) force a 

radical political-socio-economic restructuring of the nationstate and its governance. 

Implications.

 The generic evolution of urban street gangs illustrates that 

this is a compound-complex issue that has implications at 

three different levels of analysis. First, all three generations of 

gangs generate serious domestic instability and insecurity. Of 

course, as gangs evolve, they generate more and more violence 

and instability, over wider and wider sections of the political 

map, and create regional instability and insecurity. Second, 

because of their internal (intrastate) criminal activities and 

their international (transnational) commercial and political 

actions, they exacerbate the confusion regarding the traditional 

distinctions between police law enforcement functions and 

military national security or defense functions―to the extent 

that very little that is effective or lasting can be done to control 

or eliminate them. Third, thus, second and third generation 

gangs erode the effective sovereignty of the nation-states 

within which they operate. Additionally, when linked with or 

working for transnational criminal organizations, insurgents, 

drug barons, or warlords, the gangs’ activities further reduce 

police and military authorities’ abilities to maintain stability 

and, in so doing, challenge the sovereignty of the states within 

and between which they move. 
12

 At base, successful third generation gang activity can 

lead to (1) their control of parts of targeted counties or 

subregions within a country and the creation of enclaves that 

are essentially para-states, or (2) their taking either indirect or 

direct control of an entire state and establishing a criminal or 

a narco-state―or a narco-criminal state. Even if unsuccessful, 

third generation gang activity still can contribute significantly 

to the degenerative processes of state failure and regional 

instability. In any case, none of the results of gang success 

or failure benefit the peoples of targeted countries or the 

international community. It is important to remember that 

the primary characteristics of a gang and its leadership are 

individual and group survival and personal gain. Beyond 

this, there are no rules.20

LINKING GANGS TO INSURGENCY III: 

EXAMPLES OF CHALLENGES TO THE STATE

 To further illustrate the points outlined above, we will 

examine some vignettes that relate to the gang phenomenon. 

We intend to show briefly how differing types of gang activities 

contribute to the instabilities that lead to the erosion of state 

sovereignty and the processes of state failure―as well as to 

the creation of new criminal or narco-states out of legitimate 

members of the international community. Three examples 

from the Latin American context will suffice: (1) the current 

Central American situation, (2) the Bolivian “Coca-Coup” of 

the early 1980s, and (3) a composite case that demonstrates 

the results of contemporary third generation gang activity in 

at least two Mexican states and one Brazilian state. 

The Central American Situation.

 Youth gangs from California began moving into all five 

Central American republics in the early 1990s. The main impetus 

came as a result of convicted felons being sent from prisons in 
13

the United States back to the countries of their parents’ origins. 

These gangs include the famed Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13), 

Mara 18, and several others in El Salvador―Mao Mao, Crazy 

Harrisons Salvatrucho, and Crazy Normans Salvatrucho.21

At the present time, the Salvadoran gang phenomenon is 

estimated to number approximately 39,000 active members 

in El Salvador. Additionally, several thousand individuals 

with direct links back to El Salvador are located in the United 

States, other countries in Central and South America, Mexico, 

Canada, and Europe. In the early stages of their development 

and through the present, virtually all the Central American 

gangs have flourished under the protection and mercenary 

income provided by larger criminal networks. The basis of 

this alliance is the illegal drug trade that is credited with the 

transshipment of up to 75 percent of the cocaine that enters 

the United States.22

 Guatemalan gangs, as another example, appear to 

work closely with a clique of hard-line former military and 

police officers and intelligence and security officials that 

have transformed themselves into a highly profitable and 

powerful criminal cartel. As might be expected, that clique 

maintains strong links to contemporary politicians and 

customs, immigration, judicial, police, and army officers. In 

that connection, 217 Guatemalan police officials were fired 

on November 14, 2004, for failing to carry out their duties 

and alleged participation in criminal activities. This followed 

the firing of 320 officials of the Guatemalan equivalent of the 

U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) in the late 1990s after 

the government discovered that they were on the payrolls of 

various national and transnational criminal organizations. 

This, in turn, followed the discovery that a large group of active 

military personnel, including Guatemala’s Vice Minister of 

Defense, was operating a drug smuggling and robbery ring 

in conjunction with Colombia’s Cali cartel.23 More recently, 

Guatemala has been euphemistically dubbed the “Crown 

Prince” of Central American drug trafficking countries.24
14

 In addition to drug smuggling, second and third 

generation gangs in Central America are known to be involved 

in smuggling people, arms, and cars; associated murder, 

kidnapping, and robbery violence; home and community 

invasions; credit card fraud; and other more petty criminal first 

generation activities. As a result, crime rates have increased 

dramatically to the point where the Honduran annual murder 

rate―as only one example―at 154 per 100,000 population, is 

double that of Colombia’s. The comparison of Honduras with 

Colombia is interesting and important because Colombia, with 

its ongoing internal conflict, is widely considered to be the 

most violent society in Latin America. More specifically, 3,500 

people, including more than 455 women, were murdered in 

Guatemala in 2004. A majority of those murders took place in 

public, in broad daylight, and many of the mutilated bodies 

were left as grisly reminders of the gangs’ prowess. Clearly, 

the governments’ corruption and lack of control of national 

territory have allowed criminal gangs and other organized 

criminal organizations to operate with impunity within each 

country of Central American―and across borders.25

 Central American gangs’ seeming immunity from 

effective law enforcement efforts and the resultant lack of 

personal and collective security in that region have created a 

dangerous synergy between organized criminality and terror 

that is blurring the traditional line between criminal and 

political violence. In that context, the greatest fear haunting 

many Central American officials and citizens is that criminal 

violence is about to spiral completely out of control and 

acquire a political agenda. This fear is exacerbated because 

second and third generation gangs and their mercenary allies 

are controlling larger and larger portions of cities, the interior, 

and the traditionally inviolate national frontiers―and have 

achieved almost complete freedom of movement and action 

within and between national territories. As a consequence, 

the effective sovereignty of all the Central American countries 
15

is being impinged every day, and the gangs’ commercial 

motives are, in fact, becoming a political agenda for control 

of state governing and security institutions and for control of 

people and territory.26

The Bolivian Coca Coup of July 1980.

 The level of corruption of the political, economic, social, 

and security organs of a nation-state is closely related to the 

degree of weakness of the governmental apparatus, and is a 

major agent for destabilization and state failure.27 As such, 

governmental corruption is another point of entry from which 

the gangs phenomena―or a mutant clique―can exert control 

and/or depose a given government. Over the past several 

years, the transnational narcotics industry has exacerbated 

the corruption problem so much that it has achieved major 

destabilizing and legitimacy levels in Asia’s Golden Triangle 

(a 350,000-square kilometer area overlapping the mountains 

of Laos, Myanmar, and Thailand) and South America’s White 

Triangle (the “coca” producing areas of Bolivia, Colombia, 

and Peru). In this connection, the Bolivian situation in the 

early 1980s is instructive.

 Roberto Suarez Gomez was one of Bolivia’s leading drug 

barons in the late 1970s and early 1980s. With his expanding 

wealth, Suarez became a factor in national politics and 

engineered his country’s 189th coup d’ état. This “Coca Coup” 

placed the Suarez gang/clique in political office. General Luis 

Garcia Meza was given the national presidency through a 

reported $1.3 million bribe. Then, when Garcia Meza assumed 

office, he appointed Colonel Luis Arce Gomez, a relative of 

Suarez Gomez, as the Minister of the Interior, thereby giving 

him control of all counterdrug operations in Bolivia. Although 

the Garcia Meza regime lasted only until October 1982―ending 

in yet another coup―the fortune it generated for the Bolivian 

narco-elite clique, and the devastation it wreaked on the 
16

national economy, were significant. One observer suggested 

the following: “Think of a preposterous figure, double it and 

know damn well that you’ve made a gross underestimate.”28

Another observer noted that 10 years later, Bolivia had still not 

recovered economically or politically from that experience.29

 Bolivia’s experience with narco-corruption shows that the 

buying and use (renting) of public office make it difficult for 

a government to pursue the interests of a nation-state. More 

important, that experience demonstrates what can happen 

when the necessity of meeting a specific client’s needs and the 

intensity of the client’s expectations and demands mitigate 

against responsible democratic government―and against any 

allegiance to the public well-being or respect for the consent 

of the governed. Thus, high levels of corruption within a 

government and society can lead to the collapse of the rule of 

law and a general weakening of the state in direct proportion 

to its legitimacy. Under these conditions, virtually anyone―

not just a traditional street gang―can take advantage of the 

situation. The tendency is that the best motivated, best armed, 

and best financed organization on the scene will control 

that instability for its own purposes. In this particular case, 

Bolivia had the distinction of having become the Western 

Hemisphere’s first narco-state.30 Today, Bolivia is no longer 

a narco-state. It remains, however, a classic example of poor 

governance, lack of development, and rampant corruption that 

appears to be leading the country toward a radical populist 

solution to its political and socio-economic problems.31

A Composite Examination of Nonmilitary and Nonlethal 

Methods for Establishing Control of a State or Part of a 

State.

 A transnational nonstate actor, such as a third generation 

gang (a gang in an alliance with another criminal organization), 

has the capability to challenge the de jure sovereignty of nation-
17

states over entire regions (or states) within those countries’ own 

national territories. This has proven to be the case in at least 

two Mexican states and one Brazilian state.32 John P. Sullivan 

and Robert J. Bunker describe how unconventional attackers 

have wielded power in various parts of Latin America and 

other parts of the world: 

As an example, if the unconventional attacker―terrorists, 

drug cartels, criminal gangs, militant environmentalists, or a 

combination of such actors―blends crime, terrorism, and war, 

he can extend his already significant influence. After embracing 

advanced technology weaponry, including Weapons of Mass 

Destruction (including chemical and biological agents), radio 

frequency weapons, and advanced intelligence gathering 

technology, along with more common weapons systems, the 

attacker can transcend drug running, robbery, kidnapping, and 

murder and pose a significant challenge to the nation-state and 

its institutions. Using complicity, intimidation, corruption, and 

indifference, the irregular attacker can quietly and subtly co-opt 

individual politicians and bureaucrats and gain political control 

of a given geographical or political enclave. Such corruption 

and distortion can potentially lead to the emergence of a virtual 

criminal state or political entity. A series of networked enclaves 

could, then, become a dominant political actor within a state, 

or group of states. Thus, rather than violently and directly 

competing with a nation-state, an unconventional nonstate 

attacker can indirectly and criminally co-opt and seize control 

of the state.33

 Thus, taking the activities of the gangs’ phenomena to their 

logical (and actual) conclusion can be a mix of possibilities only 

limited by the imagination and willingness to use “unethical” 

ways and means to disrupt, control, or destroy a targeted 

nation-state. In this type of nonstate war, the traditional lines 

between civilian and military, lethal and nonlethal, and direct 

and indirect attack on the state are eliminated, and the “battle 

space” is extended well beyond traditional military-police 

dimensions to relatively uncharted political, psychological, 

socio-economic, and moral dimensions.34
18

Conclusions on Gangs’ Evolution.

 The United States, Europe, and those other parts of the 

global community most integrated into the interdependent 

world economy are embroiled in a security arena in which 

time-honored concepts regarding national security and the 

classical means to attain it, while still necessary, are no longer 

sufficient. War, or conflict, has changed. It is no longer limited 

to using military violence to bring about desired political 

change. Rather, all means that can be brought to bear on a 

given situation may be used to compel an enemy to do one’s 

will. Superior firepower is no panacea, and technology may 

not guarantee a knowledge or information advantage. Thus, 

unless thinking, actions, and organization are reoriented to 

deal with the asymmetric, knowledge-based information 

realities outlined above, the problems of global, regional, and 

subregional stability and security will resolve themselves―

and not in a manner designed to achieve the public good.

BASIC ISSUES THAT FURTHER DEFINE 

THE THREAT AND DICTATE RESPONSE

 It is increasingly clear that gangs are half-political and 

half-criminal nonstate actors that actually and potentially 

pose a dominant, “complex emergency” threat in a security 

environment in which failing states flourish.35 At the same time, 

logic would point out that targeted governments and their 

global allies cannot treat gangs as a simple law enforcement 

problem or as a generic insurgency issue. A much wider, 

multidimensional strategic approach to gangs is needed―one 

that includes the three distinct levels of analysis that have 

already been mentioned but require elaboration. The primary 

issues that must be taken together and understood as a whole 

before any effective countermeasures can be implemented to 

deal with the gang phenomenon include the following:
19

 • Gangs phenomena contribute significantly to national, 

regional, and global instability;

 • These organizations help transnational criminal 

organizations, warlords, drug barons, and insurgents 

erode the effective sovereignty of the nation-state; 

and, 

 • Gangs phenomena are challenging the traditional 

ways of dealing with law enforcement and national 

security issues. Effective response requires not so 

much a redefinition of military and/or police missions 

as the holistic use of all the instruments of state and 

international power.

 The common denominator(s) that links these three issues 

is the presence of one or both of the following:

 • Targeted countries’ failing or failed state status, and/

or

 • Criminal nonstate actors’ goals of deposing or 

controlling the governments of targeted countries or 

parts of targeted countries.

This analysis, hopefully, will stimulate strategic thinking and 

action regarding a set of complicated security problems that―

whether or not one likes them or is prepared to deal with 

them―are likely to be with the entire global community far 

beyond the year 2005.

Gangs and Instability.

 The current threat environment in Latin America and 

around the world is not a traditional security problem. While 

some international boundary disputes remain alive―such 

as the Bolivian desire to regain access to the Pacific Ocean, 

and the chronic problems between India and Pakistan, 

the Koreas, and Ethiopia/Eritrea―only a relatively few 

conventional formations of enemy soldiers are massing and 
20

preparing to invade the territory of a neighbor. What we 

see instead are numerous nonstate and transnational actors, 

including gangs, actively engaged in internal disruption and 

destabilization efforts. This kind of action is not necessarily a 

direct attack against a government. It is, however, an effective 

means for indirectly weakening a regime. Whether brought 

about inadvertently or by a conscious effort, instability 

and its associated insecurity generate a vicious downward 

spiral that manifests itself in diminished levels of individual 

and collective security, diminished levels of popular and 

institutional acceptance and support for the incumbent 

regime, and diminished levels of governmental ability to 

control its national territory. The intent might simply be to 

create and maintain a climate of violence, chaos, and regime 

inadequacy that allows the actor’s freedom of movement to 

pursue unconscionable personal and group enrichment.36

 The instability process tends to move from personal 

violence to increased collective violence and social disorder 

to kidnappings, bank robberies, violent property takeovers, 

murders/assassinations, personal and institutional corruption, 

criminal anarchy, and the beginnings of internal and external 

refugee flows. In turn, the momentum of this coercive process 

tends to evolve into more widespread social violence, serious 

degradation of the economy, and further governmental 

inability to provide personal and national security and to 

guarantee the rule of law. Over the past several years, many 

decisionmakers, policymakers, and opinion leaders seem to 

have been consistently surprised at the chaos, violence, and 

governmental degradation that stems from the destabilizing 

activities of gangs and their drug-trafficking allies. These 

decisionmakers also have been confused and unable to 

decide what to do or how to do it beyond the usual crisis 

management and spin control tactics. This kind of piecemeal, 

ad hoc approach to the contemporary gang phenomenon 

reminds one of the frustration detailed in the following report, 

published by the West Indian Commission:
21

Nothing poses greater threats to civil society in [Caribbean] 

countries than the drug problem, and nothing exemplifies 

the powerlessness of regional governments more. That is the 

magnitude of the damage that drug abuse and trafficking hold 

for our Community. It is a many-layered danger. At base is the 

human destruction implicit in drug addiction; but, implicit also, is 

the corruption of individuals and systems by the sheer enormity 

of the inducements of the illegal drug trade in relatively poor 

societies. On top of all this lie the implications for governance 

itself―at the hands of both external agencies engaged in 

international interdiction, and the drug barons themselves―the 

“dons” of the modern Caribbean―who threaten governance 

from within.37

 Thus, popular perceptions of corruption, disenfranchisement, poverty, lack of upward social mobility, and lack 

of personal security tend to limit the right―and the ability―of 

a regime to conduct the business of the state. As a government 

loses the rights and abilities to govern fairly and morally, it 

loses moral legitimacy. In turn, the loss of moral legitimacy 

leads to the degeneration of de facto state sovereignty. 

Conversely, stability begins with the provision of personal 

security to individual members of the citizenry. It extends 

to protection of citizens from violent internal nonstate actors 

(including gangs, organized criminals, and self-appointed 

vigilante groups) and external enemies. The security problem 

ends with the establishment of firm but fair control over the 

entire national territory and the people in it.38

The Civil-Military Challenge in Dealing 

with Law Enforcement and National Security Issues.

 Clearly, gangs and transnational criminal organizations are 

now powerful enough to destabilize, challenge, and destroy 

targeted societies and states. The continued growth and the 

increasing influence and power of these nonstate actors in 

individual countries are “spilling-over” into neighboring states 

and, in turn, generating associated transnational threats. The 
22

Organization of American States (OAS) affirmed in 2003 that 

these “new threats, concerns, and other challenges are crosscutting problems that may require appropriate hemispheric 

cooperation,” and that “the traditional concept and approach 

[to security threats] should be expanded to encompass 

new and nontraditional threats. . . .” The final result of this 

affirmation was the condemnation of “transnational organized 

crime, since it constitutes an assault on institutions in our 

states and negatively affects our societies.”39

 Nevertheless, there is a certain reluctance on the part of 

OAS member states to take a broadened definition of national 

security to its logical conclusion and correspondingly broaden 

the role of the military to a controversial internal protection 

mission. Many civilians are concerned about renewed military 

autonomy and immunities, as well as previous excesses. 

On the other hand, the violence and instability generated 

by the gang phenomenon in much of Latin America have 

fueled doubts about the problem-solving ability of those 

“democratically elected” leaders in power; public opinion 

polls indicate that resistance to authoritarian and/or populist 

solutions to the region’s ongoing problems has declined.40

In this environment, the security institutions of many states 

have demonstrated an inability and/or unwillingness to 

confront the gang phenomenon. Reasons given to explain 

these problems are usually: (1) “This is not our mission”; and 

(2) “We are not trained, organized, or equipped to deal with 

this kind of mission.” Within the context of that frustration, 

a new civil-military pragmatism appears to recognize that 

the modern world is much too interrelated, complicated, and 

dangerous to advocate a strictly law enforcement solution―

or even a strictly military solution―to provide any viable 

response to contemporary security and stability problems. 

Thus what is required is a combined civil-military effort to 

apply the full human and physical resources of the nationstate and the international community to generate effective 

sovereignty and national security.41
23

 Such a common effort for the general welfare must 

begin with a civil-military dialogue. That dialogue would 

be designed to help civilians understand the new realities of 

geopolitics and security and to help the military appreciate 

the nationalism and competence of civilians. The policy 

objectives would be for the military to join with civilian 

institutions to lend administrative and technical expertise, as 

well as human and physical resources to help the state grow 

out of its underdevelopment problems. That dialogue and 

understanding must be supported by long-term programs: 

(1) to professionalize and modernize the military, the police, 

and civil governance; (2) to canalize democratically the 

operational roles of professionalized and modernized civilmilitary institutions; and (3) to generate sufficient additional 

organization, funding, and staffing to create a critical mass 

from which to define and implement effective, legitimate 

security and stability actions.42

 In the long term, governments cannot depend on an 

outside power, such as the United States, or an organization, 

such as the OAS or the United Nations (UN), to do these 

things for them. At the same time, no government can simply 

legislate or decree these qualities for itself. Governments can, 

however, develop, sustain, and enhance these qualities by 

their actions over time. Legitimization and internal stability 

derive from popular and institutional perceptions that 

authority is genuine and effective and that it uses morally 

correct means for reasonable and fair purposes. Establishment 

of legitimate authority and internal stability, in turn, implies a 

serious anticorruption campaign coupled with a strong public 

diplomacy effort.43

Gangs Phenomena: A Silent Challenge to Sovereignty.

 The brief snapshot presented above of gang-induced 

instability and state civil-military inability to control the 

national territory requires further elaboration. To do this 
24

and better demonstrate why gangs and their national and 

transnational criminal allies are or can be a threat to the state, 

we will examine briefly their organization, operations, and 

profitability. The implications take us to the problems of 

sovereignty, state failure, and survival. 

 The organizations and activities of the gangs phenomena 

reflect expertise in communications, marketing, transportation, 

banking, and negotiations with other organizations. Senior 

U.S. and Latin-American officials have noted that gangs 

and their criminal allies function as a consortium in much 

the same way as virtually any multinational Fortune 500 

company. Thus, the phenomenon is a business organization 

striving to control the price of commodities, such as oil, arms, 

microchips, automobiles, human body parts, or cocaine. By 

performing its business tasks with super efficiency and for 

maximum profit, the general organization employs its chief 

executive officers and boards of directors, councils, system 

of internal justice, public affairs officers, negotiators, and 

project managers. And, of course, the company has a security 

division―somewhat more ruthless than those of other major 

corporations.44

 The equation that links narcotics trafficking to gangs turns 

on a combination of need, organizational infrastructure, 

development, ability, and the availability of sophisticated 

communications and weaponry. For example, traffickers 

possess cash and lines of transportation and communication. 

Gangs possess followers, discipline, and organization. 

Traffickers need these to help protect their assets and project 

their power within and among nation-states. Gangs are in 

constant need of logistical land communications support and 

money. Both groups possess relatively flat organizational 

structures that, when combined, can generate a more 

efficient and effective organization than any slow-moving 

bureaucratic, hierarchical governmental system. That 

combined organizational advantage of gangs and traffickers 

is a major source of power in itself. That is, a third generation 
25

gang can generate the economic and military power to equal 

or better than that of many nation-states. The organization 

also has additional advantages. No formal officials have 

to be “elected,” no national laws or boundaries must be 

respected, and no responsibility is owed to anyone outside 

the organization. Thus, the alliance acts as a state, demands 

to be treated as a state, yet escapes most of the restrictions 

imposed on the modern state.45 To be sure, these loose and 

dynamic mergers are subject to many vicissitudes, but such 

marriages of convenience have lasted and appear to be getting 

stronger.

 The annual net profit from gang-related activities is 

estimated to be in the billions of dollars. The precise numbers 

are not important. But the enormity of the amount of money 

involved is important, together with the additional benefits 

these financial resources can generate when linked to utter 

ruthlessness of purpose and no moral or legal constraints. 

In this connection, a third generation gang can afford the 

best talent―whether accountants, computer specialists, 

extortionists, or murderers―and the best equipment and 

technologies. With such extensive resources, a gang can bribe 

government officials, hire thugs to intimidate those who 

cannot be bought, and kill those who cannot be intimidated. 

Bottomless pockets mean that gangs can move, shift, diversify, 

and promote operations at will―and, most significantly, 

they can outspend virtually any legal political jurisdiction. 

Consequently, a gang can establish acceptance, credibility, 

and de facto legitimacy within and among the sovereign 

states where its general organization operates.46

 In short, the gang phenomenon represents a triple threat 

to the authority of a given government and to those of its 

neighbors. First, through murder, kidnapping, intimidation, 

corruption, and other means of coercion, these violent 

nonstate actors undermine the ability of a government to 

perform its legitimizing functions. Second, by violently 
26

imposing their will over the elected officials of the state, these 

actors compromise the legitimate exercise of state authority. 

Third, by taking control of portions of the national territory 

(including the borders), the various components of the gang 

phenomenon are directly performing the tasks of government 

and acting as states within a state.47

The Common Denominators.

 The sum of the political results of gang-related instability 

is an explosion of weak, incompetent, corrupt, and/or 

insensitive governments throughout large parts of Africa, 

Asia, Europe, and Latin America.48 This explosion of weak 

states and resultant chaos is also a cautionary story of failing 

and failed states. The situation is disheartening, and too 

serious to ignore. Thus, we explore three related issues that 

are crucial to understanding the problem: (1) what a failed 

state is, (2) why states fail, and (3) why state failure matters. 

What Is a Failed State? First, whatever the causes, 

instability within a nation-state leads to a crisis of governance 

and a downward spiral into violence, loss of de jure and de 

facto sovereignty, and failing and failed state status. In the 

novel, The Constant Gardener, author John le Carré vividly and 

succinctly captures that linkage. He answers the question, 

“When is a state not a state?” from the point of view of a 

commonsense practitioner:

I would suggest to you that these days, very roughly, the 

qualifications for being a civilized state amount to―electoral 

suffrage, ah―protection of life and property―um, justice, 

health, and education for all, at least to a certain level―then the 

maintenance of sound administrative infrastructure―and roads, 

transport, drains, et cetera―and―what else is there?―ah yes, the 

equitable collection of taxes. If a state fails to deliver on at least a 

quorum of the above―then one has to say the contract between 

the state and citizens begins to look pretty shaky―and if it fails 

on all of the above, then it’s a failed state, as we say these days.49
27

 State failure is, thus, a process by which the state loses 

the capacity and/or the will to perform its fundamental 

governance and security functions. Over time, the weaknesses 

inherent in its inability to perform the business of the state 

are likely to lead to the eventual erosion of its authority 

and legitimacy. And, in the end, the state cannot control its 

national territory or the people in it. 

The Road to Political Failure. The State Failure Project 

developed a series of circumstances under which states 

fail.50 As suggested by le Carré in the above quotation, those 

circumstances center on legitimate governance functions. 

That is, if the state does not fairly and adequately provide for 

security, basic human needs and socio-economic development, 

and general freedoms under the rule of law, and if it does 

not promote trust and cooperation among communal groups, 

both motive and opportunity for instability and violence―and 

gangs―exist. Failure to deal with progressively worsening 

internal social, economic, political, and security problems 

results in virtually complete turmoil, generally ineffective 

institutions, and illegitimate governance. The ultimate result 

is state failure.51

 Additionally, states fail for two other reasons. First, 

pressures to liberalize political and economic systems quickly 

and radically may result in the collapse of governmental 

authority and the rule of law. Simply holding “democratic” 

elections for national leaders without attending to other 

patterns of responsible democracy risks creating weak and 

vulnerable institutions. In this immature “democratic” 

situation, security and law and order are often progressively 

replaced by, at best, “irresponsible” democracy and corruption 

or, at worst, criminal anarchy and armed factional violence. In 

any case, the state collapses under the weight of irresponsible, 

misguided, insensitive, inept, and/or corrupt leadership.52

 Second, states collapse as a result of the conscious violent 

efforts of nonstate actors to bring them down or control 

them for their own nefarious purposes. As noted above, the 
28

thread that permits human destabilizers, such as gangs and 

other organized criminals, to develop, grow, and succeed 

is adequate freedom of movement and action over time. 

These groups attempt to attain and maintain their freedom 

of action through (1) establishing supporting underground 

infrastructure; (2) taking political control of ungoverned or 

corrupted rural and urban enclaves; (3) infiltrating government 

and social organizations for intelligence and political purposes 

and for recruiting popular support (whether willing, bribed, 

or intimidated); and (4) taking direct actions that distract 

and disburse security forces and correspondingly weaken 

the incumbent government. All these means of generating 

freedom of movement and action include deliberate acts of 

terror against key individuals and institutions associated with 

governance, economic development, and security. Gangs and 

drug cartels operating in Latin America and elsewhere call 

these activities “business incentives.” But, whatever they 

are called, these gang actions are aimed at lessening regime 

authority―and replacing it with their own.53

Why State Failure Matters. The argument in general is 

that failing or failed state status is the breeding ground for 

instability, criminality, insurgency, regional conflict, and 

terrorism. These conditions breed massive humanitarian 

disasters and major refugee flows. They can host pernicious 

networks of all kinds, involving criminal business enterprises, 

narco-trafficking, and/or various forms of ideological 

insurgency. They spawn conditions and activities most people 

find repugnant, such as human rights violations, torture, 

poverty, starvation, disease, the recruitment and use of child 

soldiers, trafficking in women and body parts, trafficking 

in and proliferation of conventional weapons systems and 

weapons of mass destruction, genocide, ethnic cleansing, 

warlordism, and criminal anarchy. At the same time, they 

usually are unconfined and spill over into regional syndromes 

of poverty, destabilization, and conflict.54
29

 Threats involving the gang phenomenon come in many 

forms and in a matrix of different kinds of challenges that 

vary in scope and scale. If these threats have a single feature 

in common, it is that they are systematic, well-calculated 

attempts to achieve political ends.55 In that connection, two 

of the many consequences that the gang-narco alliance has 

generated will be elaborated. First, we examine the erosion of 

the vital democratic institutional pillar of regime legitimacy 

and stability; then, we discuss the erosion of the central 

governance of the state.

The erosion of democracy and associated institutions. The 

policy-oriented definition of democracy that has been 

generally accepted and used in U.S. foreign policy over the 

past several years is probably best described as “procedural 

democracy.” This definition tends to focus on the election 

of civilian political leadership and, perhaps, on a relatively 

high level of participation on the part of the electorate. Thus, 

as long as a country is able to hold elections, it is considered 

a democracy―regardless of the level of accountability, 

transparency, corruption, ability to extract and distribute 

resources for national development, and protection of human 

rights and liberties.56

 In Central America and elsewhere in the Western 

Hemisphere, we observe important paradoxes. Elections 

are held on a regular basis; however, leaders, candidates, 

and elected politicians are also regularly assassinated or 

corrupted, for example, in Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, 

Honduras, the Caribbean states, and Mexico.57 Additionally, 

intimidation, direct threats, and the use of violence against 

a given person and his or her family play an important role 

prior to elections. As a corollary, it is important to note that, 

although the media and academia are generally free from 

state censorship, journalists and academicians who oppose 

the gang phenomenon are systematically assassinated.58

 As a consequence, it is problematic to credit most Central 

American and some Latin American elections as “democratic” 
30

or “free.” Neither competition nor participation in elections 

(leaving aside accountability and transparency) can be 

complete in an environment where armed and unscrupulous 

gangs and their narco-allies compete violently to control the 

government before and after elections. Moreover, it is difficult 

to credit some of these countries as “democracies” as long as 

leaders and the media are subject to corrupting controls or 

vetoes imposed by vicious nonstate actors. As an additional 

example, Ambassador David Jordan argues that Mexico may 

be considered an “anocratic democracy.” That is, Mexico is a 

state that has the procedural features of democracy but retains 

the features of an autocracy, in that members of the ruling elite 

face no real accountability.59 Sullivan and Bunker write about 

the narcostatization of two of the Mexican states, Quintana 

Roo and Sinaloa. These states have achieved narco-state status 

as a result of an advanced level of governmental corruption 

and very low levels of accountability.60 In either situation, the 

actions of the gang-narco alliance have debilitating effects on 

democracy and associated institutions and tend to erode the 

ability of the state to carry out its legitimizing functions. This, 

in turn, can lead to the eventual erosion of governmental 

authority and to a process of state failure. The example of 

Haiti immediately comes to mind.

The erosion of central governance and revisiting the process 

of state failure. The primary implications of the complex and 

ambiguous situations described above are straightforward. 

The contemporary, chaotic global security environment reflects 

a general lack of legitimate governance and civil-military 

cooperation in many parts of the world. Instability thrives under 

those conditions. Instability, violence, terrorism, and criminal 

anarchy are the general consequences of inept, misguided, 

insensitive, and/or corrupt governance. Nevertheless, we 

must remember that, as important as instability might be in 

a national or transnational threat environment, it is only a 

symptom―not the threat itself. Rather, the ultimate threat is 
31

“state failure.” In that connection, probably the most insidious 

security problem facing the nations of the world centers on 

the threat to a given nation-state’s ability and willingness 

to control its national territory and the nonstate actors who 

are seeking violent change within the borders of that nationstate.61

 The violent, intimidating, disrupting, and corrupting 

activities of illegal nonstate actors can abridge or negate these 

powers. The situation in Central America is instructive. In 

Central America’s “New War,” it appears that commercial 

profit is the primary motivation for the various destabilizing 

gangs and their narco-trafficking allies. Like their narcoterrorist cousins in Colombia, Central American gangs and 

narco-traffickers are not particularly interested in taking de 

facto control of any one of the region’s seven small republics, 

and they are not sending conventional military forces across 

national borders. What they are doing is ensuring they will 

have maximum freedom of movement and action within 

and between national territories.62 Significantly, we must 

remember that this is the purview of legitimate sovereign 

governance.

 In that regard, ample evidence clearly demonstrates that 

Central American and other states’ authority and presence 

has diminished over large geographical portions of the Latin 

American region. However, contrary to popular perceptions, 

these areas are not “lawless” or “ungoverned” territories. In 

fact, they are governed by the gangs operating in the areas 

where state institutions are absent or only partially present. 

In this sense, the nexus is not simply criminal and commercial 

in nature. It is more far reaching. For its self-preservation, the 

gang-narco alliance in Central America and elsewhere has 

had little choice but to control states or parts of states. Thus, 

whether a third generation gang is a criminal or an insurgent 

organization is irrelevant. Its putative objective is to control 

the state to ensure its own ends, and that is definitely a serious 

political agenda.63
32

 A state’s failure to extend a sovereign presence throughout 

its national territory―for whatever reason―leaves a vacuum 

in which gangs, drug cartels, leftist insurgents, the political 

and narco-Right, and the government may compete for power. 

A brief description of the town of Tocache, in the Upper 

Huallaga Valley of Peru, at its most prosperous moment in 

the mid-1980s, illustrates this kind of situation. Many towns 

in Central America, the Caribbean Basin, Bolivia, Mexico, and 

elsewhere in the world are not unlike Tocache.

Tocache had six banks (for laundering money), six fax machines, 

several stereo dealerships, a discotheque, and one of the largest 

Nissan outlets in the country. Tocache also had no (and still does 

not have) paved streets, clean drinking water, or a sewage system. 

Whatever education that takes place in or around the town is 

controlled by Sendero Luminoso officials. Commerce between 

coca producers and narco-traffickers in the area is controlled by 

Sendero Luminoso officials. Tax collection, conflict adjudication, 

and general security functions in and around town are performed 

by Sendero Luminoso officials. In all, the nonstate entity with 

the strongest motivation, the best organization, and the most 

physical power in the area exercises political control of Tocache 

and the area around it. To be sure, the Peruvian government 

sends security forces and representatives into to area from time 

to time to provide “law and order” and a certain presence. But, 

the government has never exerted effective political control over 

that portion of the national territory.64

Whether conducted by insurgents or a third generation gang, 

this kind of activity is a real and substantive threat to national 

security and sovereignty, and it must be addressed as such.

 Gang phenomena-induced instability, the associated 

challenge to civil-military missions, the “silent challenge” 

to sovereignty, and the attempt to either control or depose 

governments are the most salient lessons that should have 

been learned through involvement in the contemporary 

global security arena. The consistency of these lessons derived 

from relatively recent experience―from the White Triangle 
33

to Mexico and from Central America to Haiti and the rest of 

the Caribbean Basin―inspires confidence that the lessons are 

valid.65 At the same time, more than half of the countries in the 

world are struggling to maintain their political, economic, and 

territorial integrity in the face of diverse direct and indirect 

nonstate (including criminal) challenges.66

 State failure is an evolutionary process, not an outcome. It is 

a process by which the state loses the capacity and/or the will 

to perform its essential governance and security functions.67

However, just because a state fails does not mean that it will 

simply go away. In fact, failing and failed states tend to linger 

and go from bad to worse. The longer they persist, the more 

they and their spillover problems endanger regional and 

global peace and security.68 Ample evidence demonstrates 

that failing and failed states become dysfunctional states, 

rogue states, criminal states, narco-states, or new “people’s 

democracies.” 

IMPLICATIONS

 The primary implications of this monograph are clear. 

The abilities of “fragile,” “besieged,” “failing,” or “failed” 

governments to control, protect, and enhance their countries’ 

stability, sovereignty, and general well-being are severely 

threatened in the contemporary global security environment. 

A major challenge derives from street gangs that are allied 

with narco-trafficking or other criminal organizations (that is, 

again, third generation gangs or the gang phenomenon). The 

common denominator that clearly defines gangs as mutations 

of insurgents is the irrevocable need to depose or control an 

incumbent government to force a radical socio-economicpolitical restructuring of the nation-state and its governance. 

Thus, we reiterate that if third generation gangs look like 

ducks, walk like ducks, and act like ducks―they indeed are 

insurgent-type ducks. 
34

RECOMMENDATIONS FOR STRATEGIC LEADERS: 

A “PURPOSE-BUILT” BRIDGE TO THE FUTURE 

 The United States is embroiled in a world of dangerous 

uncertainty. Numerous political actors are exerting differing 

types and levels of power within a set of cross-cutting alliances; 

the playing field, rules, and players are more complex; and 

identifying the objectives of the game is more perplexing than 

in the past. Since the end of World War II―and especially since 

the ending of the Cold War―U.S. and other Western political 

and military leaders have been struggling with the “new” 

aspects of unconventional nonstate wars. Yet, the “Wizard’s 

Chess” nature of the contemporary conflict dilemma is still 

not well-understood. Strategic leaders often complain that a 

given asymmetrical conflict or complex emergency has been 

dealt with successfully from the military point of view but 

has been “lost” politically―as if these dimensions of conflict 

were not interdependent. 

 Those results are contrary to the popular wisdom of 

escalating the level of the conflict militarily to the point where 

victory is assured. That wisdom is based on the notion that the 

enemy military force is the primary center of gravity in a war 

of attrition. In order to win, one must have something like a 

10-to-1 ratio of military manpower superiority. The problems 

are that an asymmetrical war or a complex emergency―

or a confrontation with the gang phenomenon―is not a 

conventional war of attrition and that the center of gravity is 

not the “enemy” military force. Rather, as Carl von Clausewitz 

explained as early as 1832, two centers of gravity exist in this 

kind of situation―the personalities of the [enemy] leaders 

and public opinion.69 In that context, there are other more 

effective ways “to render the enemy powerless” than to attack 

him militarily. The situation can be described as one where 

the United States or other Western powers have been busy 

conducting a war of attrition and alienating public opinion, 

while the nontraditional actors in asymmetric nonstate wars 
35

are making political-psychological preparations to take 

control of the state.70

 Victory in any kind of contemporary war is not simply the 

sum of the battles won or lost or the number of criminals jailed 

over the course of a conflict. The outcome of conflicts such 

as those postulated in this monograph―and the nearly 100 

complex emergencies the UN Security Council has recognized 

since 1990 as destabilizing intrastate struggles―is determined 

by the qualitative leader judgments and the synergistic 

organizational processes established before, during, and after 

a nonstate war is politically recognized to have begun. These 

are the fundamental components of strategic clarity, which is 

essential to success in the new millennium.71

 At a minimum, then, two strategic-level imperatives 

pertain to complex emergencies and unconventional conflicts 

in nonstate wars―and to the gang mutations of contemporary, 

commercial urban insurgency. The first imperative involves 

the political, coalitional, and multi-organizational partnership 

requirements that mandate doctrinal and organizational 

change for strategic clarity and greater effectiveness in conflict 

situations. This, in turn, depends on the second imperative: 

the professional civil-military leadership development that 

will ensure not just unity of military command, but also the 

relevance of all civil-military effort. These two organizational 

and educational imperatives transcend the lessons noted above 

and act as a strategic bridge to future civil-military success in 

contemporary complex conflict situations. In Clausewitzian 

terms, these are the bases of “all power and movement, 

on which everything depends.”72 The recommended basic 

direction for such an effort to achieve strategic clarity is 

outlined as follows.

Unity of Effort.

 The United States is not the only political actor in the 

global security arena, and it is not the only player in more 

specific, smaller-scale contingency or complex emergency 
36

operations. At the same time, the U.S. military is not the only 

actor in any kind of U.S. involvement in the international 

security environment. A bewildering array of U.S. civilian 

agencies, international organizations, and nongovernmental 

organizations, as well as coalition and host country civilian 

and military organizations, respond to complex emergencies 

and state collapse. For any degree of success in “going beyond 

declaring victory and going home” and actually providing the 

foundations of a sustainable and just peace, involvement must 

be understood to be a holistic process that relies on various 

U.S. and other civilian and military agencies and contingents, 

working together in an integrated fashion. The creation of 

unity of effort to gain ultimate success must be addressed at 

different levels. 

 • At the highest level, the primary parties to a given 

conflict situation must be in general agreement with 

regard to the threats, end-state, and associated set of 

operations designed to achieve a common political 

vision. Although such an agreement regarding a strategic 

or operational end-state is a necessary condition for 

unity of effort, it is not sufficient by itself. Sufficiency 

and clarity are achieved by adding appropriate policy 

implementation and military management structure―

and “mind-state adjustments”―at the following three 

additional levels.

 • An executive-level management structure that can 

and will ensure continuous cooperative planning and 

execution of policy among and between the relevant 

U.S. civilian and military agencies (that is, vertical 

coordination). That structure must also ensure that 

all civil-military action at the operational and tactical 

levels directly contributes to the achievement of the 

mutually agreed strategic political end-state. This 

requirement reflects a need to improve coordination 

and cooperation within the operational theater and 

between the theater commander and Washington.
37

 • Steps must be taken to ensure clarity, unity, and 

effectiveness by integrating coalition military, 

international organizational, and nongovernmental 

organization processes with U.S. civil-military planning 

and implementing processes (that is, horizontal 

coordination). It has become quite clear that the political 

end-state is elusive, and operations suffer when there is 

no strategic planning structure empowered to integrate 

the key multinational and multi-organizational civilmilitary elements of a given operation. It is also clear 

that duplication of effort, an immediate consequence 

of the absence of such a strategic planning body, is 

costly in political, personnel, and financial terms. These 

lessons have been demonstrated over and over again 

in such diverse operations as the Hurricane Mitch 

natural disaster relief operation in Central America 

and the various man-made disaster relief operations in 

the former Yugoslavia.73

 • At a base-level, however, unity of effort requires 

education as well as organizational solutions. Even 

with an adequate planning and organizational 

structure, ambiguity, confusion, tensions, and 

unwanted third and fourth order complications are 

likely to emerge. Only when the various civilian 

and military leaders involved in an operation can 

develop the judgment and empathy necessary to work 

cooperatively and collegially will they be able to plan 

and conduct operations that meet the needs of the host 

nation and use the appropriate capabilities of the U.S. 

interagency community, international organizations, 

nongovernmental organizations, and coalition military 

forces. Unity of effort ultimately entails the type of 

professional civilian and military education and leader 

development that engenders effective diplomacy and 

professional competence.
38

Leader Development.

 The study of the fundamental nature of conflict has 

always been the philosophical cornerstone for understanding 

conventional war. It is no less relevant to nontraditional war 

involving nonstate actors. In the past, some wars tended to 

be unrealistically viewed as providing traditional military 

solutions to conventional military problems. This view is 

too simplistic. At this time the complex realities of particular 

past conflicts must be understood as a holistic cooperative 

process that relies on various unconventional civilian and 

military solutions to nontraditional political-psychologicalmilitary problems. At a minimum, eight educational and 

cultural imperatives can be used to modify Cold War and 

ethnocentric mindsets and to develop the leader judgment 

needed to deal effectively with complex, politically dominated, 

multidimensional, multiorganizational, multinational, and 

multicultural contingencies.74 They are:

 • Concepts such as “enemy,” “war,” and “victory” 

should be reconsidered and redefined for intrastate 

conflicts. At the same time, leaders at all levels must 

understand how to apply all the instruments of national 

and international power―including the full integration 

of legitimate civil and military coalition partners―to 

achieve agreed political ends.

 • Civilian and military leaders at all levels must learn 

the fundamental nature of subversion and insurgency, 

with particular reference to the way in which force can 

be employed to achieve political ends and the way in 

which political considerations affect the use of force. 

Additionally, leaders need to understand the strategic 

and political-psychological implications of operational 

and tactical actions.

 • Civilian and military leaders at all levels must learn that 

power is not simply combat firepower directed at an 
39

enemy military formation or industrial capacity. Power 

is multilevel and combines “hard” and “soft” political, 

psychological, moral, informational, economic, societal, 

military, police, and civil bureaucratic activity that can 

be brought to bear directly and indirectly within a 

given security environment. 

 • U.S. civilian and military personnel are expected to be 

able to operate effectively and collegially in coalitions or 

multinational contingents. They must also acquire the 

ability to deal collegially with civilian populations and 

local and global media. As a consequence, efforts that 

enhance interagency as well as international cultural 

awareness, such as civilian and military exchange 

programs, language training programs, and combined 

(multinational) exercises, should be revitalized and 

expanded. 

 • In that connection, planners and negotiators who 

will operate at the strategic and high operational 

levels should be nurtured to function in coalitional 

decisionmaking and planning situations that can blend 

U.S. deliberate planning processes with concurrent 

multinational and multiorganizational practices.

 • Leaders must learn that an intelligence capability 

several steps beyond the usual is required for nonstate 

conflicts. This capability involves active utilization of 

intelligence operations as a dominant element of both 

strategy and tactics. Thus, commanders at all levels 

must be responsible for collecting and exploiting timely 

intelligence.

 • Civilian and military leaders must understand 

the totality of small, intrastate wars. Negotiations, 

agreements, and accords notwithstanding, complex 

emergency situations are zero-sum games in which 

there can be only one winner or no winners.
40

 • Finally, education and training for contemporary 

man-made or natural emergencies must prepare 

military “peacekeepers/enforcers” or “humanitarian 

relief providers” to be effective war fighters. The 

contemporary “savage wars of peace” will continue to 

put military forces into harm’s way. 

CONCLUSIONS

 These are the essential components of strategic clarity. 

Even though every conflict situation differs in one way or 

another, none is ever truly unique. Throughout the universe of 

contemporary conflict in general―and complex emergencies 

involving nonstate actors in particular―there are analytical 

commonalities. The final outcomes of the “New Wars,” such 

as those ongoing in Central America, the Caribbean, Mexico, 

and the Andean Ridge of South America brought about by 

narco-traffickers and gangs, are not determined primarily by 

the skillful manipulation of violence on the battlefield. Control 

of these situations and their resolutions will be determined 

by the qualitative judgments and unity of effort established 

before, during, and after conflicts are politically recognized to 

have begun and ended. 

 Two common denominators underlie the discussion of the 

issues considered. The first is the need to understand and to 

behave as though the Cold War is over, combined with learning 

how to optimize capabilities in an ambiguous, nontraditional, 

global security environment. In colloquial terms, this first 

common denominator relates specifically to “mind-set,” and, 

in more formal terms, it refers to leader judgment. The second 

common denominator involves the political partnership 

requirements that will permit doctrinal and structural change 

related to coalitions and operations involving mixes of military 

and civilian organizations. This requirement is fundamental 

to maintaining unity of effort in unconventional nonstate 
41

conflict. These common denominators are essential for success 

in complex emergencies. Thus, we must develop leaders and 

organizational structures that can generate strategic clarity 

and make it work―the sooner, the better.75

 To dismiss the above recommendations as “too difficult,” 

“unrealistic,” or “simply impossible” is to accept the 

inevitability of unattractive alternatives. At best, international 

leadership can leave forces in place to maintain a de facto 

military occupation, as in Cyprus. Or, at worst, leadership 

can “declare victory and go home” with the sure knowledge 

that that particular set of problems will erupt again and again, 

and the time, treasure, and blood expended will have been for 

nothing. 

*****

AFTERWORD

 The political-psychological issues of the urban gang 

phenomenon in the global security environment translate into 

constant subtle and not-so-subtle struggles for governmental 

power that dominate life throughout most of the world. This, 

in turn, leads to the slow but sure destruction of the state, its 

associated government, and the society. And, again, the basic 

threat devolves to that of state failure.

 This contemporary political war situation is extremely 

volatile and dangerous and requires careful attention. In 

these terms, the United States, the other countries of the 

Western Hemisphere, and the entire global community must 

understand and cope with the threat imposed by diverse 

third generation gangs that are engaged in destabilizing and 

devastating violence, which is more and more often being 

called “terrorism,” “criminal anarchy,” “narco-terrorism,” 

or “complex emergency situations.” If the United States 

concentrates its efforts and resources elsewhere and ignores 

what is happening in Latin America and the Caribbean, 
42

the expansion of gangs, of “lawless areas,” and of general 

instability, as well as the compromise of effective national 

sovereignty and security could easily destroy the democracy, 

free market economies, and prosperity that have been 

achieved in recent years. In turn, that would profoundly affect 

the health of the U.S. economy―and U.S. concomitant power 

to act in the global security arena.

ENDNOTES

 1. To be fair, it must be noted that some scholars and journalists are 

beginning to understand this problem and are writing in these terms. 

See, as three examples, Anthony T. Bryan, Transnational Organized Crime: 

The Caribbean Context, Coral Gables, FL: University of Miami, The Dante 

B. Fascell North-South Center Press, 2002; Ivelaw Lloyd Griffith, Drugs 

and Security in the Caribbean: Sovereignty Under Siege, University Park, 

PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997; and “El delito como 

una amenaza geopolítica,” in Clarin.com, 3 de Julio de 2003. Related 

international relations theory may be found in Barry Buzan, People, States 

and Fear, 2nd ed., Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1991; Keith 

Krause and Michael C. Williams, eds., Critical Security Studies, Minneapolis: 

University of Minnesota Press, 1997; and Mohammed Ayoob, “Defining 

Security: A Subaltern Realist Perspective,” in Krause and Williams, 1997, 

pp. 121-146.

 2. One published map of the world emphasizes this particular point. 

See “World Conflict and Human Rights Map 2001/2002,” prepared 

by PIOOM for IIMCR with the support of the Goals for Americans 

Foundation, St. Louis, MO, June 2003. It should also be noted that this 

idea was articulated earlier by Robert D. Kaplan, “The Coming Anarchy,” 

The Atlantic Monthly, February 1994, pp. 72-76; and Robert D. Kaplan, The 

Coming Anarchy, New York: Random House, 2000, pp. 3-57.

 3. This idea is not new. In the author’s opinion, it was best stated by 

Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison, in The Federalist Papers 

[1787–1788], New York: Mentor, 1961.

 4. Steven Metz and Raymond Millan, Future Wars/Future Battle Space: 

The Strategic Role of American Landpower, Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies 

Institute, 2003, pp. ix, 15-17. 

 5. Steven Metz and Douglas V. Johnson II, Asymmetry and U.S. Military 

Strategy: Definitions, Background, and Strategic Concepts, Carlisle, PA: 

Strategic Studies Institute, 2001, pp. 5-6. Also see Steven Metz, The Future 
43

of Insurgency, Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, 1993, pp. 13-15; and 

Steven Metz and Raymond Millan, Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in the 

21st Century: Reconceptualizing Threat and Response, Carlisle, PA: Strategic 

Studies Institute, 2004, p. 15.

 6. A very interesting and sobering analysis of this type of conflict may 

be found in Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui, Unrestricted Warfare, Beijing: 

PLA Literature and Arts Publishing House, 1999, p. 109.

 7. John P. Sullivan and Robert J. Bunker, “Drug Cartels, Street Gangs, 

and Warlords,” in Robert J. Bunker, ed., Nonstate Threats and Future Wars, 

London: Frank Cass, 2003, p. 42. 

 8. Max G. Manwaring, “The New Global Security Landscape: The 

Road Ahead,” Low Intensity Conflict & Law Enforcement, Winter 2002, pp. 

202-204.

 9. Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Choice: Global Domination or Global 

Leadership, New York: Basic Books, 2004, p. 28. Also see Max G. 

Manwaring, The Inescapable Global Security Arena, Carlisle, PA: Strategic 

Studies Institute, 2002, p. 7; and Manwaring, “The New Global Security 

Landscape: The Road Ahead,” 2002, pp. 202-204.

 10. Ibid.

 11. One of the first public officials in the United States to suggest this 

set of issues was a former Secretary of the Navy, Richard Danzig. See 

“Countering Traumatic Attacks,” in Max G. Manwaring, ed., Deterrence in 

the 21st Century, London: Frank Cass, 2001, pp. 89-105.

 12. Sullivan and Bunker, 2003, pp. 40-53. 

 13. FM 90-8, Counterguerrilla Operations, Washington, DC: 

Headquarters, Department of the Army, 1986.

 14. Silvia Aguilar, Vice Minister of Justice, El Salvador, at a U.S. Army 

War College-Florida International University (USAWC/FIU) conference 

held at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) entitled 

“New Security Threats in the Western Hemisphere,” Washington, DC, 

June 29, 2004.

 15. Sullivan and Bunker, 2003, pp. 48-49.

 16. Ibid.

 17. Ibid.

 18. John Mackinlay, “Warlords,” Defence and International Security, 

April 1998, pp. 24-32. Also see “Beyond the Logjam: A Doctrine for 

Complex Emergencies,” in Max G. Manwaring and John T. Fishel, eds., 

Toward Responsibility in the New World Disorder, London: Frank Cass, 1998, 

pp. 114-131.
44

 19. Ibid.

 20. Ibid. Also see Oscar Bonilla, “Current Situation of Gangs in El 

Salvador,” unpublished paper for the Consejo Nacional de Seguridad 

Pública, El Salvador, November 2004; John P. Sullivan, “Third Generation 

Street Gangs: Turf, Cartels and Net Warriors,” Transnational Organized 

Crime, Autumn 1997, p. 106; John P. Sullivan, “Urban Gangs Evolving as 

Criminal Netwar Actors,” Small Wars and Insurgencies, Spring 2000, pp. 

82-106; and Luis Bitencourt, “Brazil’s Growing Urban Insecurity: Is It a 

Threat to Brazilian Democracy?” unpublished paper, nd. 

 21. Note: Mara is slang for “gang” and comes from a type of ant in 

Central America known for its ferocity. Trucha is literally a “trout” but 

is slang for a “shrewd Salvadoran.” Thus, Mara Salvatrucha is a gang of 

shrewd Salvadorans.

 22. See Bonilla, 2004; Ana Arana, “The New Battle for Central 

America,” Foreign Affairs, November-December 2001, pp. 88-101; and Ana 

Arana, unpublished paper written for the author, October 2004.

 23. Ibid.

24. Panama News, January 11, 2005.

 25. Ibid.

 26. Ibid. Also see Silvia Aguilar, 2004; John P. Sullivan, “Urban Gangs 

Evolving as Criminal Netwar Actors,” Small Wars & Insurgencies, Spring 

2000, pp. 82-96; and Max G. Manwaring, Security in the Americas: Neither 

Evolution nor Devolution―Impasse, Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, 

2004.

 27. Daniel C. Esty, Jack Goldstone, Ted Robert Gurr, Barbara Harff, 

and Pamela T. Surko, “The State Failure Project: Early Warning Research 

for U.S. Foreign Policy Planning,” in John L. Davies and Ted Robert Gurr, 

eds., Preventive Measures: Building Risk Assessment and Crisis Early Warning 

Systems, New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998.

 28. For greater detail, see Brian Freemantle, The Fix: Inside the World 

Drug Trade, New York: Tom Doherty Associates, Inc., 1986, p. 242. 

 29. Interview with former U.S. Ambassador to Bolivia Edwin G. Corr 

in Washington, DC, August 22, 1992.

 30. David C. Jordan, Drug Politics: Dirty Money and Democracies, 

Norman, OkL: University of Oklahoma Press, 1999, pp. 132-137. 

 31. Author Interviews.

 32. Sullivan and Bunker, 2003, pp. 45-53.

 33. Ibid.
45

 34. Liang and Xiangsui, p. 109.

 35. Sullivan and Bunker, 2003, p. 42.

 36. Esty, et al., 1998; Jordan, 1999.

 37. This statement is taken from Ivelaw Lloyd Griffith, Drugs and 

Security in the Caribbean: Sovereignty Under Siege, University Park, PA: 

Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997, p. 1.

 38. Anthony T. Bryan, Transnational Organized Crime: The Caribbean 

Context, Coral Gables, FL: University of Miami, The Dante B. Fascell NorthSouth Center Press, 2002; Ivelaw L. Griffith, “Understanding Caribbean 

Security: Back to Basics and Building Blocks,” in Social & Economic Studies, 

March 2004, pp. 1-33; and “El delito como una amenaza geopolítica,”

Clarin.com, 3 de Julio de 2003. Also see Max G. Manwaring, Security in the 

Americas: Neither Evolution nor Devolution―Impasse, Carlisle, PA: Strategic 

Studies Institute, 2004. 

 39. “Draft Declaration on Security in the Americas,” approved by the 

Permanent Council of the Organization of American States at its regular 

session, held on October 22, 2003, in Mexico City, Mexico, pp. 1, 3, 8.

 40. David Pion-Berlin, “A New Civil-Military Pragmatism in Latin 

America,” unpublished manuscript, nd. 

 41. Ibid.; Francisco Rojas Aravena, “Nuevo contexto de seguridad 

internacional: nuevos desafíos, nuevas oportunidades?” in Francisco 

Rojas Aravena, ed., La seguridad en America Latina pos 11 de Septiembre, 

FLACSO–Chile, 2003, pp. 23-43; and author interviews.

 42. These keys to security and civil-military relations were advocated 

in the strongest terms at a Conference on Hemispheric Security held at the 

University of Miami North-South Center, Coral Gables, FL, February 22–

24, 1994; a Conference on Cooperative Security among Central American 

States, held at the National Defense University, Washington, DC, August 

2–3, 1994; and subsequent conferences held at Carlisle, PA, December 10–

11, 1998; and in Coral Gables, FL, 2000–04. In each conference, the author 

was a rapporteur or an organizer.

 43. Ibid.; and author interviews.

 44. These and subsequent assertions are consensus statements, based 

on a series of author interviews with more than 160 senior U.S. and Latin 

American officials and journalists. These interviews were conducted 

from October 1989 through July 1994, September 1996, December 1998, 

November 2000, February 2001, March 2002, February 2003, and March 

and August 2004. To allow anonymity for those who have an objection to 

their names being made public, these are cited as author interviews.
46

 45. Ibid.; and Peter A. Lupsha, “The Role of Drugs and Drug Trafficking 

in the Invisible Wars,” in Richard Ward and Harold Smith, eds., International 

Terrorism: Operational Issues, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987, 

p. 181; Peter A. Lupsha, “Towards an Etiology of Drug Trafficking and 

Insurgent Relations: The Phenomenon of Narco-Terrorism,” International 

Journal of Comparative and Applied Criminal Justice, Fall 1989, pp. 70-74; 

and Stephen E. Flynn, The Transnational Drug Challenge and the New World 

Order, Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies, 

1993.

 46. Ibid.; and William J. Olson, “International Organized Crime: The 

Silent Threat to Sovereignty,” The Fletcher Forum, Summer/Fall 1997, pp. 

75-78; and Roy Godson and William J. Olson, “International Organized 

Crime,” Society, January/February 1995, pp. 18-29. 

 47. Ibid.; Jordan, 1999; and Max G. Manwaring, “Security of the 

Western Hemisphere: International Terrorism and Organized Crime,” 

Strategic Forum, April 1998, pp. 2-5.

 48. Olson, 1997, pp. 69-70.

 49. John le Carré, The Constant Gardener, New York: Scribner, 2001, p. 

137.

 50. Esty, et al., 1998.

 51. Ibid.

 52. Ana Maria Bejarano and Eduardo Pizarro, “Colombia: A Failing 

State?” ReVista: Harvard Review of Latin America, Spring 2003, pp. 1-6.

 53. Ibid.; Esty, et al., 1998; Jordan, 1999; Olson, 1997; and author 

interviews.

 54. Robert H. Dorff, “Strategy, Grand Strategy, and the Search for 

Strategy,” in Max G. Manwaring, Edwin G. Corr, and Robert H. Dorff, 

The Search for Security: A U.S. Grand Strategy for the Twenty-first Century, 

Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003, pp. 127-140.

 55. This observation was made by former Secretary of State George P. 

Shultz in an address before the Low-intensity Warfare Conference at the 

National Defense University on January 15, 1986, in Washington, DC.

 56. Jordan, 1999, p. 19.

 57. Arana, “The New Battle for Central America,” Foreign Affairs, 

November-December 2001, pp. 88-101; Ana Arana, unpublished paper 

written for the author, October 2004; and author interviews.

 58. Ibid.

 59. Jordan, 1999, p. 21.

 60. Sullivan and Bunker, 2003, pp. 47-48.
47

 61. Esty, et al., 1998.

 62. Arana, 2001; Arana, 2004; and author interviews.

 63. Ibid.

 64. Author interviews and observations.

 65. Author interview with General Charles E. Wilhelm, USMC, Ret., 

former Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Southern Command, June 22, 2001, in 

Washington, DC.

 66. While it does not show many of the problems that Kaplan points 

up, one published map does emphasize this particular point. See “World 

Conflict and Human Rights Map 2001/2002,” prepared by Berto Jongman 

with the support of the Goals for Americans Foundation, St. Louis, June 

2003; The State of the World Atlas, 1997; and website for Genocide Watch.com, 

Dr. Greg Stanton, among other sources. Also see Robert D. Kaplan, “The 

Coming Anarchy,” The Atlantic Monthly, February 1994, pp. 72-76; and 

Robert D. Kaplan, The Coming Anarchy, New York: Random House, 2000, 

pp. 3-57.

 67. Esty. et al., 1998; Jordan, 1999; and author interviews.

 68. Ibid.; and Chester A. Crocker, “Engaging Failed States,” Foreign 

Affairs, September-October 2003, pp. 32-44.

 69. Carl von Clausewitz, On War, Michael Howard and Peter Paret, 

trans., Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, [1832, 1873] 1976, p. 596.

 70. Max G. Manwaring and John T. Fishel, “Insurgency and CounterInsurgency: Toward a New Analytical Approach,” Small Wars & 

Insurgencies, Winter 1992, pp. 282-282. 

 71. Ibid.

 72. Clausewitz, 1976, pp. 595-596.

 73. See, as examples, Max G. Manwaring, “An Interview with General 

John R. Galvin, U.S. Army, Ret.,” former NATO Commander and Dean 

of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, August 6, 1997, in Max G. 

Manwaring and John T. Fishel, eds., Toward Responsibility in the New World 

Disorder, London: Frank Cass, 1998, pp. 1-11; Max G. Manwaring, “Peace 

and Stability Lessons from Bosnia,” Parameters, Winter 1998-99, pp. 28-38; 

Max G. Manwaring, “The U.S. Army Experience in Bosnia-Herzegovina: 

Challenges for Now and the Future,” in Anthony James Joes, ed., Saving 

Democracies: U.S. Intervention in Threatened Democratic States, Westport, 

CT: Praeger, 1999, pp. 81-92; and author interviews. 

 74. Ibid.

 75. Ibid.