page_title: Mexican Drug War
section_title: CJNG
hierarchical_section_title: Mexican Drug War / Mexican cartels / Major cartels in the war / CJNG
caption_attribution_description: English: Area of influence map of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel in the United States.
context_page_description: The Mexican Drug War is the Mexican theater of the global war on drugs, as led by the U.S. federal government, that has resulted in an ongoing asymmetric low-intensity conflict between the Mexican government and various drug trafficking syndicates. When the Mexican military began to intervene in 2006, the government's principal goal was to reduce drug-related violence. The Mexican government has asserted that their primary focus is on dismantling the powerful drug cartels, and on preventing drug trafficking demand along with the U.S. functionaries.
  Violence escalated soon after the arrest of Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo in 1989; he was the leader and the founder of the first Mexican drug cartel, the Guadalajara Cartel, an alliance of the current existing cartels headed by Félix Gallardo. Due to his arrest, the alliance broke and certain high-ranking members formed their own cartels and each of them fought for control of territory and trafficking routes.
  Although Mexican drug trafficking organizations have existed for several decades, their influence increased after the demise of the Colombian Cali and Medellín cartels in the 1990s.
context_section_description: The Jalisco New Generation Cartel (Spanish: Cártel de Jalisco Nueva Generación, CJNG, Los Mata Zetas and Los Torcidos) is a Mexican criminal group based in Jalisco and headed by Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes ("El Mencho"), one of Mexico's most-wanted drug lords. Jalisco New Generation Cartel started as one of splits of Milenio Cartel the other being La Resistencia. La Resistencia accused CJNG of giving up Oscar Valencia (El Lobo) to the authorities and called them Los Torcidos (The Twisted Ones). Jalisco Cartel defeated La Resistencia and took control of Millenio Cartel's smuggling networks. Jalisco New Generation Cartel expanded its operation network from coast to coast in only six months, making it one of the criminal groups with the greatest operating capacity in Mexico as of 2012. Through online videos, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel has tried to seek society's approval and tacit consent from the Mexican government to confront Los Zetas by posing as a "righteous" and "nationalistic" group. Such claims have stoked fears that Mexico, just like Colombia a generation before, may be witnessing the rise of paramilitary drug gangs. By 2018 the CJNG was hyped as the most powerful cartel in Mexico, though Insight Crime has said the Sinaloa Cartel is still the most powerful cartel and called the CJNG its closest rival. In 2019, the group was greatly weakened by infighting, arrests of senior operatives, and a war with the Sinaloa Cartel and its allies,
caption: Area of influence map of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel in the United States.
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